How many things would have to go right for those people to survive the landing?
They got the idea from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) ,LOL
Here’s the original reentry heat shield story from the 1st object recovered from orbit: Discoverer XIII (aka CORONA) in 1960:
http://www.berksmontnews.com/article/BM/20120509/NEWS01/305099999
http://www.nro.gov/history/csnr/corona/Intel_Revolution_Web.pdf
Nothing new, really. Such technologies were in use 30 years ago.
“Resembling a giant mushroom”
The Martians love pizza. They’ll get really excited about this.