Watch The Cosmos: A Space-Time Odyssey Trailer Inspire Wonder In This Super Bowl Commercial

Even science geeks get to have a moment during this year’s game. The Super Bowl isn’t just about how Peyton Manning is paying in karma points for what his brother, Eli, has allegedly done with game equipment. It’s about the trailers and commercials, and as usual the host network uses the opportunity to hype their upcoming programs. Fox has released the latest tease for the upcoming revamp of Cosmos, this time showcasing some clear footage of host Neil deGrasse Tyson and what we can expect from the series.

Produced by A Million Ways To Die In The West's Seth MacFarlane and Ann Druyan, the series updates the world on what science has discovered since the original ended. Cosmos, the original, is considered by everyone as the most important public outreach by the scientific community. It presented accurate scientific concepts that are complex and beyond the ken of average people without specialized degrees in an entertaining and easily digestible way. The late Carl Sagan was the uncle who had all the answers and lived for the joy of sharing.

Now all these years later his widow, Ann Druyan, has succeeded in Carl’s vision being reformed for a new generation. Who better than the charming Neil deGrasse Tyson to continue the efforts of Sagan and the scientific community? Of course Cosmos: A Space-Time Odyssey will be amazing, and informative, but the short Super Bowl teaser has me hopeful that it could also be damn near as revolutionary as Cosmos: A Personal Voyage. Watching Sagan walk through our universe on television in the late 70s had to be mind blowing, and with the inundation of CGI in today’s entertainment I wonder how the new series will match that wonder.

I think the answer lies in the host. Neil deGrasse Tyson is an astrophysicist and current Frederick P. Rose director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History. Beyond that, he’s a science advocate who is called upon whenever the public needs to be informed of those confusing wibbledy wobbledy things. But it’s his enthusiasm for science, and the wonders of the cosmos, that makes his job as host so exciting. His podcast, Startalk Radio, features Tyson, his colleagues, and comedians tackling scientific subjects. He’s an informed man with an ease and accessibility that is rare in even the most common of people, but could be considered extraordinary in such a brilliant scientist.

For a clear example of Tyson’s ability to communicate look no further than the interview Stephen Colbert did with him back in 2010 at Montclair Kimberley Academy. The entire program is a lesson in wonderment, but watch at the 18:20 mark as Tyson describes the beauty he finds in what science has taught us.

Cosmos: A Space-Time Odyssey premieres Sunday, March 9, at 9:00 PM EST on Fox, and Monday, March 10 at 10:00 PM EST on The National Geographic Channel.

Steve West

Staff Writer at CinemaBlend.