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The 'House of Cards' Creator Is Sending Sean Penn to Space

The Hulu show will follow humanity's journey to settle Mars, from the astronauts and their families, to the ground control team on Earth.
Photo of Sean Penn via Getty/Scott Olson and photo of Mars via NASA/JPL

It looks as if two-time Academy Award–winner and onetime drug-lord interviewer Sean Penn is going to make the leap from film to television in a new Hulu show from House of Cards creator Beau Willimon.

According the Hollywood Reporter, the actor is set to star in The First, an eight-episode drama chronicling humanity's journey to settle Mars—from the astronauts floating in a tin can to the Red Planet, to the family and ground control team supporting them from Earth. Willimon wrote the script for the Hulu drama and is joining up with Jordan Tappis to produce.

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"I have such deep admiration for Sean's immense talent and extraordinary body of work," Willimon said, according to THR. "I feel very lucky to be collaborating with an artist of his caliber."

The network is keeping details on Penn's role close to the chest, so it's unclear whether the 57-year-old actor will make it to the fourth rock from the sun. The star of Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Mystic River, and Milk has made some guest star appearances on TV shows like Friends and Family Guy, but The First will be his first starring in a recurring role. He's also set to star in HBO's miniseries about Andrew Jackson, American Lion, later this year.

The First is billed as a near-future sci-fi epic that will focus on the human struggles of interplanetary travel, which is all-too-real considering NASA says it can get us to Mars by 2030. Interestingly, 2030 is also the timeframe scientific journal Nature Communications projects Earth's oceans will be suffering from increased acidity, chaotic temperature changes, and other catastrophic effects of climate change, if environmental policy isn't drastically altered.

In 2016, Penn called the Paris Climate Accords the "last great hope" for humanity, so his involvement seems fitting for a show that could explore our chance at survival following years of disastrous environmental policy.

Hulu is set to drop The First sometime in 2018.