Were my expectations too high?

Rating: 6/10 (8 October 2015)

I wish I liked this movie more like a lot of moviegoers who are giving it good to even great reviews, but I left the theater with a bitter taste in my mouth I had to write this review to reconcile my feelings.
Imagine a movie that takes from the glory of Gravity, Cast Away and Apollo 13 which also tries to be as hilarious and groovy as Guardians of The Galaxy at times but fails? You've got The Martian. The first 1/3 of the movie was quite engaging: An astronaut on Mars expedition team gets left behind after a huge storm because he was assumed dead. But he was alive and we watch him try and utilize every cell of his brains and science savvy to survive until help comes. But once he gets out of initial danger things get all too predictable and over-wrought. Couple of annoyances: 141 mins. About 30 mins too long for the storyline. There were too many mentions of Disco music the commander of the mission left behind to ill effect, unconvincing supporting characters on the Earth who seem to be just reciting a script, and some characters the movie shouldn't have had whatsoever (such as Kristen Wiig).
Did Matt Damon do a good job ? I thought so until they showed a body double that didn't even resemble him and from there nothing he did was believable unfortunately. Had Damon actually lost weight without using a body double, I might have gotten more into the movie. But then again, he is no Christian Bale. So I wasn't expecting it but a little weight loss would have made him more convincing.
A few good acting jobs came from Michael Pena and Benedict Wong whose characters added to the storytelling instead of subtracting it in the midst of too many unnecessary characters reciting an already weak script.