I liked me some Cosmos: A Space/Time Odyssey. And I'm looking forward to The Martian. And in a brilliant bit of sympathetic promotion, as part of the viral marketing campaign for the forthcoming Ridley Scott film, Neil deGrasse Tyson explains the intricacies of the Ares Mars missions in the film. One of the many fantastic elements of Andy Weir's novel was how logical the Ares missions were structured. Mars is a hell of a lot further away from Earth than anywhere humans have ever went, and it takes a long time to get there. So, the missions were staggered, but also seeded in the time between. NASA sent construction materials and equipment to the landing site long before the astronauts left Earth. This limits weight on the mission craft, and cuts down on fuel costs.
The novel has a very organic way of introducing this exposition to the reader. The movie has to overcome this by not being an information dump. So what better way to educate the audience than by letting the current Face of Space explain it in his entirely likable way? Plus, it's always good to keep Tyson on retainer. He's like Alan Grant being asked to vet Jurassic Park: shit like this is right up his alley.
Via /Film.