The world may hold startling developments and shocking unknowns.
Directing offers you the hope that your vision will reach the screen, unmolested and intact. Therefore, it's tantalizing to all writers.
Space and spacecraft and zero gravity and so forth are very difficult to render.
An X-wing fighter flies like an airplane. If you look at the physics, it's actually quite impossible.
You want magic to feel real.
I mean that much more than wiser beings from beyond the stars bringing us enlightenment or death or salvation, we are likely to find ourselves the wisest beings on the scene.