TRAVEL THE GALAXY
National Geographic’s six-part ‘Mars’ series presents a feature film quality scripted drama with special effects. It highlights our quest to colonise Mars.
THE big global television event of the weekend is National Geographic’s six-part series Mars which premieres here on Sunday at 8.05pm.
Produced by Hollywood heavyweights Ron Howard and Brian Grazer, it is a combination of feature film-quality scripted drama and visual effects set in the future with present day documentary sequences to drive forward a cohesive, edge-of-your-seat story of mankind’s quest to colonise Mars.
The scripted portion focuses on Earth’s first crewed mission to Mars aboard the spacecraft Daedalus. On its maiden voyage in 2033 a carefully selected international team includes American mission commander Ben Sawyer (Ben Cotton); Korean-American mission pilot Hana Seung (Jihae); Spanish hydrologist and geochemist Javier Delgado (Alberto Ammann); French mission physician and biochemist Amelie Durand (Clementine Poidatz); Nigerian mechanical engineer and roboticist Robert Foucault (Sammi Rotibi) and Russian exobiologist and geologist Marta Kamen (Anamaria Marinca). Back on Earth, the Mars Mission Corporation (MMC) control team based in London includes Hana Seung’s twin sister, capsule communicator Joon Seung (also played by Jihae), and French CEO of the MMC, Ed Grann (Olivier Martinez).
Once Daedalus successfully lands on Mars and sets up a preliminary base of operations, British nuclear physicist Leslie Richardson (Cosima Shaw) will lead a Phase 2 settlement team along with her husband, world-renowned experimental botanist Dr Paul Richardson (John Light).
On the documentary side, there are interviews with a number of real-world space experts – including astronauts and scientists, among them South African-born Elon Musk.
In the first episode, the crew of Daedalus face a life-threatening emergency when the ship’s landing system goes offline.
The crew’s commander risks his life to fix the problem as mission control monitors back on Earth.
In the present-day documentary, SpaceX attempts to land the world’s first reusable rocket in order to pioneer the critical technology that will help humans reach Mars.
How popular is internet TV in South Africa?
While there is a still a place for old fashioned linear television viewing, a Showmax survey suggests subscription video on demand (SVOD) usage is set to rapidly accelerate in South Africa. Only 35% of those surveyed currently subscribe to an internet TV service, but when asked whether they plan to be using an internet TV service within the next six months, that number rose to 65% of the respondents.
As we all whip ourselves into a frenzy of excitement about fast uncapped fibre, it never hurts to have a few tips on how to manage those gigs. Richard Boorman, head of communications for ShowMax, shares this advice.
1. This is cheating, but skip mobile entirely. If you’re in a free wifi hotspot or your techie mate has an uncapped connection, just get connected with your smart phone or tablet, fire up the ShowMax app and start downloading shows to watch later.
You can download up to 25 shows at any one time, which is enough to satisfy even the biggest binge session.
2. Sticking with downloads, how about using up that night time data? You’ll need to set your alarm, but if you’re quick picking what to download you’ll be back to sweet dreams in no time.
3. Change the size of those downloads – ShowMax has four file sizes to choose from. Depending which you pick, a 20-minute episode of something like The Big Bang Theory could use anything from around 75 MB to more than 300 MB.
4. Use bandwidth capping. Almost all ShowMax apps have the option to set a cap on how much data is used.
The higher the setting, the higher the video quality. Do the kids really need to watch those cartoons in super crisp hi-def ?
The low setting limits data usage to 300 MB per hour, the medium setting to 700 MB per hour. Leaving ShowMax uncapped can use up to 1.4 GB per hour depending what device you’re on and how fast your internet connection is.
5. Buy the right size data bundle. A bigger bundle means lower priced data, but nobody wants to go so big that they lose unused data at the end of the month.
How do you know how much data you’ll need? Simple – use the ShowMax bandwidth calculator.
For a risk-free seven-day trial, visit www.showmax.com
TOMORROW MOM M-Net, 6.30pm
Anna Faris and Allison Janney star as dysfunctional mother/ daughter duo Christy and Bonnie Plunkett. In the season four premiere Adam (William Fitchner) comes home early to surprise Bonnie.
He stays with her while waiting for the tenant to move out of his apartment, and they start to see each other’s flaws. Jill (Jaime Pressly) agrees to be Christy’s wing woman at a meeting where there are lots of single guys but then gets annoyed when one of them fancies Christy instead of her.
SUNDAY PLANET’S GOT TALENT M-Net, 5.30pm
Season two of the spinoff series is a compilation of clips from around the world. Presented by Warwick Davis, you’ll see some of the best and worst acts that the world has to offer, from Indonesia to Iceland, Bulgaria to Brazil and China to Chile.
These include a dog from the US who does back flips, Russian acrobats who bring a whole new meaning to the word flexible, a Korean woman with a vendetta against apples and a man in India who can stuff 200 straws into his mouth at a time. For most of these, the only question is “why?”.
Robbie Coltrane’s Critical Evidence (C+I, 8pm): British actor and comedian Robbie Coltrane (Harry Potter, Cracker) reveals eight of the hardest, most complex and baffling murder cases investigated by British police. The focus of each episode is the trail of evidence - how it was discovered, what it meant and how it became critical to crack the case. With interviews from the lead investigators and forensic specialists, many speaking for the first time, Coltrane reveals the twists and turns of often stranger-than-fiction cases.
IN THE WEEK PITCH FOX Life, Monday, 9pm
There are those rare shows which captivate from the very first episode. This is one of them. What makes it even more remarkable – for me – is its sports setting. Usually I avoid anything with children, dogs, or sport of any kind.
The premiere episode was simply perfect and could have stood on its own just there, but it has continued to entertain as the weeks go by. Kylie Bunbury stars as Ginny Baker, the first woman to play Major League baseball with the San Diego Padres, and all the pressures and controversies that come with the role – in the media, from the public, and in her own team locker room. The critics are loving this series; the editors of TV Guide placed it fourth among the top 10 picks for the most anticipated new shows of the 2016–2017 season.
Liz Rafferty’s review reads: “Not since Friday Night Lights have we seen a ‘sports’ show that managed to deliver week after week, making viewers feel as invested in the characters’ personal dramas as we were in the final scores of the games.”
She praised Bunbury, whom she cited as a “breakout star, not to mention her (fictional) character Ginny Baker, the first woman to pitch in the MLB, to be a role model for young female athletes everywhere.
VIKINGS M-Net Edge, Thursday, 8pm
The second part of season four begins Express From The US on December 1 – which is a lot closer than you’d think. The previous two episodes of season four will be screened over two weeks as a recap, on November 17 and 24. In case you haven’t watched it, we’ll refrain from spoilers. Good news for fans is that Vikings has been renewed for a fifth season.
All programming information is supplied by the channels and subject to change.