It’s hard to find fault with such noble ambitions, and while the presence of a new Cosmos is certainly welcome the initial episode tries so hard to appeal to modern audiences that at times it feels like it’s missing its own point: that the greatest wonders aren’t CG spectacle, but our own marvelous universe. It should come as no surprise then that Tyson serves as host of the new show Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, which debuts tonight as part of a major global event that will see the show simulcast across 10 domestic networks - with an introduction by President Obama, no less - before reaching more than 180 countries.Ī reboot of Carl Sagan’s landmark 1980 program, the new Cosmos aims to be a primer on the incredible grandeur of the world around us, lionizing the scientists that have made our greatest discoveries, and hopefully stoking the fires for education and learning in the process. Neil deGrasse Tyson has a remarkably consistent message: our future depends on a passionate embrace of science, and for that to happen, science needs to be cool. Nature doesn't really come into the picture until the second episode, though, which contracts in as far as it initially expanded: DNA and molecules make the focus small, but vast in their own way.Whether he’s discussing NASA’s impact on our cultural psyche or emailing James Cameron about the night sky, Dr.
#COSMOS A SPACETIME ODYSSEY SERIES#
Visions of rogue planets seen only by infrared, and massive planet-sized hurricanes are all explored with amazing clarity, on par with other nature series of recent years. Mixing live action, animation and CGI, Cosmos' first episode generally outlines the known universe by using illustrative tools like a "cosmic calendar," to explain the passage of such large swaths of time. Tyson also brings things down to a personal level, speaking at length at the close of the first episode about a personal encounter with Sagan in his youth that helped cement his desire to become a scientist, which also pays homage to Sagan and the original series. Like Sagan before him, Tyson is a good ambassador of the universal, because he is able to explain even the most mentally tortuous concepts in ways that are able to be understood on a basic level (the series is also co-written, directed and executive produced by Carl Sagan's wife, Ann Druyan). His involvement with Cosmos suddenly made the project's viability a toss up - which MacFarlane were we going to get? He can be brutally funny, then willfully obtuse (take, as exhibit A and B, Family Guy versus Dads).
MacFarlane is a man of extremes, much of which was on display when he hosted the Oscars. One of the most focused-upon aspects of Cosmos is not its enthusiastic, friendly and well-respected (not to mention uber smart) host Neil DeGrasse Tyson, but MacFarlane. Hit the jump for whether it deserves its high-profile slot. A revival of Carl Sagan's seminal work Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, which was a massive hit on PBS in the 1980s, Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey goes on a visually masterful trek through space at the hands of popular astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, and his "ship of imagination." The 13-episode series, which will be running on a myriad of Fox networks, is the first time a documentary has aired in primetime in a very long time, thanks to a big push from executive producer Seth MacFarlane.