Ron Howard Will Produce ‘Mars,’ A National Geographic Six-Part Miniseries Based On Elon Musk’s Plan To Colonize The Red Planet

Ron Howard and Brian Grazer are producing an exciting new miniseries for National Geographic. Simply titled Mars, this film is an eclectic mix of documentary, scripted drama, and exciting interviews with Andy Weir, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and Peter Diamandis, according to Mashable. The production will combine science fiction and science fact and tell a true story about something that hasn’t happened yet.

Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX and mastermind behind the Tesla car, will also be interviewed for the production. Ron Howard’s story line for the National Geographic miniseries is in many ways Musk’s story, as Mr. Musk plans to send a group of pioneers to Mars by 2025. This genius of a billionaire has a plan to colonize the red planet well before the middle of the 21st century.

Ron Howard’s National Geographic production of Mars will be set both in the present day and in 2033, a conservative date compared to Elon’s plans. The drama portion of Howard’s docudrama will be directed by Everardo Gout and feature twin Asian American girls, Hana and Joon Seung, who have always dreamed of becoming astronauts. Both parts will be played by Jihae, according to Yahoo TV.

As Ron Howard explained to USA Today, the Mars miniseries is designed to encourage enthusiasm for space exploration.

“[T]his nexus of science, true-life adventure and the drama of our human experience in a scripted format, and intercutting that drama with interviews and documentary footage to offer a really powerful experience for audiences that I hope transports them, stimulates the imagination and fires the belief that space exploration is an important, inevitable aspect of the human experience.”

Ron Howard’s Mars, which is based on Elon Musk’s plan to send humans to colonize the red planet by 2025, is an exciting concept to be put forth by National Geographic. Veteran executive producers like Howard and Brian can certainly dramatize the future event in order to win over documentary, space, and science fiction fans. The work will most likely become science fact in about 10 years. It will be interesting to see what the film got right once the event actually occurs.

Elon Musk’s SpaceX project is already stirring interest in space travel again. His plan is based largely on a spacecraft Musk named the Falcon 9. Falcon 9, unlike all previous space vehicles, is recoverable and reusable with a bit of refurbishment after a flight into deep space. This is a first in space travel. It will also be far more fuel efficient than previous manned space flights.

Every recovered Falcon 9 brings mankind closer to an affordable Mars voyage for those adventurous people willing to relocate to another planet, according to the Observer. Elon Musk believes that once he perfects the development of the recoverable and reusable spacecraft, he can offer tickets to Mars for $500,000 each, according to Popular Mechanics.

Ron Howard is very excited to produce the National Geographic miniseries. Howard is also very enthusiastic about depicting Mr. Musk’s plan to colonize the red planet within the decade. The show should be something quite unique. Depicting a history that hasn’t happened yet but probably will is something that is not often done. Mars is a series depicting events that are planned, and while the characters in the dramatization are fictional, they represent real people who will be the first passengers to travel to Mars as Howard told USA Today.

“It is a tremendous opportunity for us and one that we’re pouring all of our energy behind, and hoping to help be the innovators of something really original and dynamic for television.”

Elon Musk is making travel to Mars both possible and affordable, at least for some people who would really like to live there. The price of $500,000 each isn’t cheap, but it is a lot less than the cost of space travel in the past. In the future, Mr. Musk says the price will plummet as SpaceX continues to work on affordability.

Ron Howard’s Mars, which will depict Elon Musk’s first SpaceX Voyage to Mars, airs in November on the National Geographic Channel.

[Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images]