Last week Mars One announced a list of 100 people who will train on Earth for a one-way mission to the red planet in 2025.

But the venture's accompanying reality TV show - which was to be made by the makers of Big Brother to document their training and new lives on the red planet - has been shelved after the companies were 'unable to reach an agreement on details', MailOnline has learned.

Instead, Mars One is working with a new production company to record the colonists' progress.

The proposed mission has been widely criticised ever since it was first announced in 2011, leading some experts to speculate that it was never more than a pipe dream.

Endemol - the TV production company behind Big Brother - will no longer make a TV show abut the training and outcome of the Mars One mission, MailOnline has learned. The final four colonists will live in small pods on Mars (illustrated), and grow their own food to survive in the harsh environment, according to Mars One's plans

It is unclear whether the breakdown in communications may blow a hole in Mars One's already tight $6 billion (£4 billion) budget because TV rights were expected to help finance the majority of the mission.

So far less than $760,000 (£496,000) has been donated to cover the estimated total cost, and time is of the essence.

However, Bas Lansdorp, co-founder and CEO of Mars One, told MailOnline that the idea of a television programme providing a hefty chunk of funding was a 'big misconception'.

'Media exposure is one of our business cases. Funding for the mission will come mostly from equity investors,' he said.

'The return on their investment will come when the first crew leaves or even when it lands: that's when the revenues from the media exposure are much larger than the cost of the mission.'

He said the documentary will 'involve more people in our adventure,' but declined to name the production company that will make the programme.

Initially, there were plans for Endemol to make a reality TV programme documenting the selection process and training of the colonists.

It was to be made by Endemol-owned Darlow Smithson Productions (DSP) and was dubbed 'Big Brother on Mars'.

MARS ONE SELECTS 100 HOPEFULS FOR MISSION TO THE RED PLANET Earlier this week 100 people - including five Britons - were shortlisted for the questionable Mars One mission, which claims it will send people to live on the red planet. The five British candidates are all under the age of 35 and hope to be chosen to be among the final crew of four who are set to begin their new lives in just 10 years time - and ultimately die on Mars. The team is scheduled to arrive in 2025 following a gruelling seven-month journey from Earth. 'The large cut in candidates [from 200,000 to 100] is an important step towards finding out who has the right stuff to go to Mars,' said Bas Lansdorp, co-founder of the Dutch Mars One mission. 'These aspiring Martians provide the world with a glimpse into who the modern day explorers will be.' The Mars 100 Round Three candidates were selected from a pool of 660 candidates after participating in personal online interviews. They include 50 men and 50 women who successfully passed the second round. Advertisement

But DSP told MailOnline: ‘DSP and Mars One were unable reach agreement on the details of the contract and DSP is no longer involved in the project.

'We wish Bas and the team all the very best.’

It is unclear when the decision was made, although Endemol originally said that the first installments of the TV show would air in early 2015.

Lansdorp also told MailOnline: 'We have ended our cooperation with Endemol because we could not reach agreement on the details of the contract.

'We have contracted a new production company that will produce the documentary series for us.

'They have already produced the trailer on our Youtube channel and progress is good.'

Endemol first announced the partnership in June last year, saying that viewers of the documentary would 'see people from all walks of life undergo one of the most extraordinary and challenging assessment processes ever seen.

'...[they] will be tested to the extreme as part of an elite training program run by a panel composed of pre-eminent scientists, adventurers and astronauts.'

Lansdrop said: 'We're still aiming for a documentary series following the selection and training process.'

He spoke to MailOnline about Mars One's original television opportunities just three days ago.

He said that while there would be footage of the colonists' life on Mars, we wouldn't watch them live, including their deaths.

‘It’s not going to be Big Brother on Mars - it’s going to be the most exciting story of all time,' he said.

‘Just like the Olympics, we watch highlights, we don’t watch things that athletes do when they’re not performing their abilities.’

He also brushed off theories that the whole thing was a scam that would end up being like the Truman Show - with the crew being tricked into thinking they had gone to Mars, when actually they were on a TV set on Earth.

‘We’re sending the best smart people to Mars, they’re not going to believe they’re on Mars if they’re in Earth gravity,’ he said.

‘You can’t make smart people believe they’re on Mars, and beyond that, I would not be so interested about organising a fake manned mission.’

Earlier this week, Mars One picked 100 candidates who will train for their mission to Mars. One of those was Ryan Macdonald, 21, pictured. Mars One thinks a huge global audience will tune in to watch people train to become astronauts. Another production company will take up the challenge, Bas Lansdorp said

Mars One says that ‘When Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon, the whole world was watching.’ An image showing Pope Paul VI watches the lunar landing in this image. Mars One hopes to finance part of its ambitious $6 billion (£4 billion) mission from TV rights

According to the venture's official timeline, Mars One will launch a stationary lander and satellite to Mars in 2018.

In 2020 they will send a rover to Mars, before cargo missions begin in 2022.

Humans will then arrive in 2025, with a second crew making the journey the following year.

It may sound exciting, but the company has done nothing to suggest any of this is remotely possible within the given time frame.

‘You have to applaud the ambition, but sadly the whole project feels very much like wing-and-a-prayer stuff when you start to look into the details,’ said Giles Sparrow, author of Mars: A New View of the Red Planet.

‘They say they can put a first crew on Mars for $6 billion [£3.9 billion], which is a shoestring budget compared to the Apollo program which cost $25 billion [£16.2 billion] - and that was in 1960's money!

‘The reason they say they can do it so cheaply is by using existing technology, but a lot of that technology isn't really there yet, and they're relying on it advancing enough on its own in the next decade so that they can just order it off the shelf when they need it.

In an exclusive interview, Bas Lansdorp (pictured) co-founder and CEO Mars One spoke to MailOnline about TV opportunities just three days ago. He said: ‘It’s not going to be Big Brother on Mars - it’s going to be the most exciting story of all time'. He said a 'new production company that will produce the documentary series for us'

Lansdorp brushed off theories that the whole Mars One project was a scam that would end up being like the Truman Show - with the crew being tricked into thinking they had gone to Mars, when actually they were on a TV set on Earth. An image of Jim Carrey in The Truman Show is pictured above

‘And even if they can do it for $6 billion, where does that money come from? So far as I can tell the bulk of the funding is supposed to come from advertising and reality TV deals, which sounds unlikely to me.’

Mars One supposedly has an answer to this - it is expecting a huge audience, in the order of hundreds of millions, to tune in to watch the crew train for their ultimate mission to Mars, meaning that it could make a lot of money from TV rights and potentially advertising.

‘When Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon, the whole world was watching,’ the company claims on their website.

‘In the next decade, about four billion people will have access to video images.

'Mars One expects that virtually every one of them will watch when the first humans land on Mars.’

But science broadcaster Dr Christopher Riley isn’t so sure about their financial plan.

'On one hand I think that such a step needs a bold idea like this to ultimately make it happen,' he explained.

'On the other hand my concern with the proposal is that there seems to be a funding shortfall about as wide as the distance between Earth and Mars itself, and it's hard to see how it could be filled.

‘The people who they're selecting to send to Mars aren't going to pay for their flights, and so who is.

‘The only funding source they are proposing at the moment is through TV rights - which will fall short by several orders of magnitude.

MEET THE HOPEFUL BRITISH CANDIDATES FOR THE MARS ONE MISSION Name: Hannah Earnshaw Age: 23 Born: Durham Occupation: Student in astronomy at the University of Durham Reason for going to Mars: 'Human space exploration has always interested me so the opportunity to be one of the people involved was really appealing. The future of humanity is in space.' Hannah Earnshaw Name: Alison Rigby Age: 35 Born: Beckenham, Kent Occupation: Lab technician Reason for Going to Mars: 'I think it's time for humans to start living somewhere else and I have the skills to make that happen.' Dr Alison Rigby Name: Maggie Lieu Age: 24 Born: Coventry Occupation: Astrophysics student at the University of Birmingham Thoughts about Mars: 'Mars is a challenge. It is highly risky, and an enormous responsibility as well as an adventure.' Maggie Lieu Name: Ryan MacDonald Age: 21 Born: Derby Occupation: Master's student in physics at the University of Oxford Reason for going to Mars: 'The most important thing to do in life is to leave a legacy. A lot of people do that by having a child...for me this would be my legacy' Ryan MacDonald Name: Clare Weedon Age: 27 Born: Addlestone, Surrey Occupation: Systems information manager for Virgin Media, who lives in Addlestone in Surrey Reason for going to Mars: ‘I believe there is more to life than marriage and babies and I soon hope to escape the office environment and travel the world solo for some amazing life experiences.’ Clare Weedon Advertisement

About two thirds of all mission destined for Mars (shown) have failed before fulfilling their goals, highlighting the difficulties of performing a mission to the red planet. With no prior spaceflight experience, even in Earth orbit, the goals of Mars One seem ambitious at best

MARS ONE'S AMBITIOUS TIMELINE 2015 Mars One selects candidates for full-time training. 2018 A demonstration mission is sent to Mars to test technologies, while a satellite is placed into Martian orbit. No development appears to have started on either, though. 2020 A rover is launched to Mars to find a settlement location. Again, little seems to have been shown about this rover - aside from a few concept images. 2022 Mars One sends a second rover, two living units, two life support systems and a supply unit to Mars, to form the habitat. Companies like Lockheed Martin and SpaceX will apparently help build these – but neither have confirmed this. 2023 The ‘outpost’ becomes operational. 2024 The crew departs for Mars and lands near the outpost in 2025. There’s no information on how the crew will pass through the atmosphere and land on the surface, though. Or even what will taken them, how it will work, who will build it and so on. 2026 A second crew departs from Earth and arrives in 2027. ‘They are welcomed by the first crew,’ claim Mars One in their official timeline. Advertisement

‘As someone who's worked in TV for a lot of his career I'm only too aware how low most TV budgets are - even for a big game show format.

‘If you are very lucky, you might well get a few million out of world TV rights for Mars One, but to stage such a show for real would run into the tens and probably hundreds of billions, even without having to engineer a system to bring anyone home.

‘And that's where I think the idea very sadly falls down.'

But perhaps the biggest obstacle to the whole mission is that, as yet, it is nothing but fancy pictures and concept drawings exist.

And the danger is that the company could dampen public interest in missions to Mars that are actually almost certain to take place.

These include Nasa's 2016 Insight mission, Esa's 2018 ExoMars rover and Nasa's successor to the Curiosity rover, which will launch in 2020.

In addition, significant progress is being made to land humans on Mars in the 2030s by several national space agencies around the world - Nasa, Esa, Roscosmos (Russia) and perhaps even Jaxa (Japan).

Mars One, on the other hand, have shown no signs of development, no testing, absolutely nothing to suggest they are anywhere close to even building a demonstration vehicle on Earth - let alone a fully-fledged manned capsule.

The ambitious mission for Mars One, according to their official timeline, involves launching a probe to the surface by 2018 - just three years away.

That’s a relatively short time scale, considering it took Nasa more than three years to build any of the spacecraft that have landed on Mars.

For example, the Phoenix lander - which appears to be similar to what Mars One wants to launch to Mars first - was in development from 2003 to 2007.

It also cost £250 million ($386 million) - an amount of money that is simply a pipe dream for Mars One.

It is estimated that, from investments, the company has at most a few million dollars in funding so far. Last year, they failed even in an Indiegogo funding campaign to raise £260,000 ($400,000).

Suggesting they could send humans to Mars in nine years - as they claim - seems naive.

In 2018 Mars One claim they will send a stationary lander to the surface of Mars, shown in this illustration, to test some of the technologies for the human mission. Considering the launch window is only three years away, though, it's surprising no work appears to have yet started on any aspect of it

Esa has been busy testing a prototype of its ExoMars rover, pictured here, which will be sent to Mars in 2018 - the same year Mars One plans to send their first lander there. But the Dutch company has yet to reveal any signs of development like this, leading some to question how serious their timeline is

At any rate, it’s questionable how long TV viewers would be willing to watch people live in a cramped habitat on Mars.

But let’s for a moment suspend disbelief and suggest that they are able to find the necessary funding - to the tune of £3.9 billion ($6 billion) - in the next few months. Can they then land humans on Mars in 2025?

It’s highly unlikely, especially considering they have absolutely no spaceflight experience, and have done nothing to address some of the challenges of a mission to Mars.

‘There are a large number of technological considerations for safely sending a human mission to Mars,’ said Dr Lewis Dartnell from the Space Research Centre at the University of Leicester.

‘These include the long-term reliability of life-support systems and how to grow sufficient food and for a balanced diet, and these necessary technologies are not yet mature enough or well-tested in less risky situations -such as on a moon base.

‘But even the first step of securing enough large rockets to launch the mission to Mars has not been demonstrated by Mars One.’

FIVE REASONS MARS ONE WILL NEVER HAPPEN The most obvious issue facing the Mars One mission is funding, or a lack thereof. By the company’s own estimates they need £3.9 billion ($6 billion) to get humans to Mars, although this figure is thought to be much, much higher. It’s estimated that the company has raised only a few million dollars in funding, and last year an Indiegogo campaign to raise just £260,000 ($400,000) failed. The company also has no spacecraft in development. This includes, but is not limited to, a vehicle to take humans into orbit, a habitat to take them to Mars and something to get them through the atmosphere. Considering the human mission is supposed to launch in just nine years, there seems to be quite a lot of work still to do. Mars One also has no rocket that can launch anything into space, and not even a place on a rocket built by another company. Nasa estimates that multiple launches of the Space Launch System will be needed for their return missions to the red planet. Mars One don’t have anything, as of yet. Considering most launch contracts are decided several years in advance, it seems unlikely they’ll launch anything by 2018, as they plan. They have also not shown any research into the effects of microgravity on humans, and how they plan to keep humans safe during their mission to Mars. Nasa is considering using a rotating habitat to provide artificial gravity, and layers of water to protect from radiation. Mars One has not revealed research into these problems. And perhaps most telling of all, Mars One has not studied how their crew will actually survive on Mars. They will have to contend with lower gravity, Martian dust storms, limited supplies and much more - with no obvious solutions. Nasa, Esa and other agencies have spent billions of dollars sending rovers, landers and satellites to Mars to ascertain how habitable it was, or still is. To think that Mars One can just appear out of nowhere and send humans to Mars without conducting any such research is rather foolish. It certainly doesn’t bode well for the first crew, if they did land there in 2025. Advertisement

Shown is an illustration of Nasa's Space Launch System rocket, a huge launcher that will become the cornerstone of Nasa's efforts to get to the red planet. Mars One have yet to reveal any rocket contracts that suggest they have the means to even get to Earth orbit, let alone Mars itself

Shown is another fanciful concept image from Mars One, with habitats and a rover in the background. Who will build these habitats is not quite clear, although they appear to bear some similarity to SpaceX's proposed Red Dragon capsule - again, only a concept. And SpaceX have not confirmed their involvement in the mission

And the feelings of many experts were summed up by Ben Biggs, Editor of All About Space magazine.

FIVE UPCOMING MISSIONS TO MARS THAT WILL ACTUALLY HAPPEN 2016 Insight: Nasa mission to drill into Mars and determine its interior structure. Trace Gas Orbiter: Esa and Roscosmos mission to map sources of methane on Mars - precursor to 2018’s ExoMars rover. 2018 Mangalyaan 2: India’s successor to their 2014 Mars Orbiter Mission. ExoMars: Esa rover that will explore the surface of Mars. 2020 A successor to Nasa’s Curiosity rover, known provisionally as the ‘Mars 2020 rover’. Advertisement

‘The biggest space companies in the world are investing billions and billions of dollars, and thousands of hours into a manned Mars mission, with dozens of human and technology missions acting as preparation,’ he said.

‘Nasa, SpaceX, Esa, Roscosmos - they're currently looking at a human landing, sample and return similar to the Apollo missions on Mars by the mid 2030's at the earliest.

‘A human habitat on Mars is barely on the drawing board even for the big boys, so to think that the Mars One team, with a fraction of the expertise and resources, can tackle a project of this magnitude, is a fool's dream.’

Of course, these are just some of the many problems facing the Mars One mission.

They have also yet to secure any space on a rocket to launch anything into orbit. Considering that rocket schedules are decided years in advance, it’s unlikely they’ll be launching anything in 2018.

On their website they also claim that they ‘will secure the landing capsule from one of the experienced suppliers in the world, for example Lockheed Martin or SpaceX.’

When contacted by MailOnline, though, Lockheed Martin said that Mars One had not followed up their initial interest in the lander - suggesting the robotic mission may even be on hold.

'Mars One contracted with Lockheed Martin to develop a mission concept study for their un-crewed 2018 Mars lander spacecraft,' a spokesperson told MailOnline.

'The lander concept is based on a flight-proven, affordable spacecraft design we created for the successful Nasa Phoenix Mars Lander mission.

'We have not been asked to study any more of the Mars One architecture beyond the 2018 lander.

'We have concluded the initial contract with Mars One in which we performed mission formulation studies and developed payload interface specifications to support the selection of a payload suite for the 2018 Mars robotic lander.

'We await notification from Mars One on the next phase of the 2018 lander project.'

Mars One was yet to reply to any requests to comment on this, or some of the other questions regarding the mission.

To keep the astronauts alive on Mars, the Dutch company says they would grow their own food in a greenhouse, in order to be somewhat self-sustainable. As the mission would be a one-way trip, they would have no chance to return to Earth in the immediate future after their landing

In the 2030s, or perhaps as late as the 2040s, it’s highly likely that humans will land on Mars thanks to a multi-billion dollar project led by Nasa, and including other agencies such as Esa and SpaceX.

Significant progress is already being made towards this goal.

Nasa has built the spacecraft that will take humans to space and return them to Earth - the Orion spacecraft - and is also developing the powerful rocket that will lift them there - the Space Launch System (SLS).

Other agencies, such as SpaceX, are set to announce their own plans for a Mars mission this year, while Esa has already signalled its willingness to partner with Nasa by agreeing to construct part of the Orion spacecraft.

The first humans to land on Mars, however, will not have been taken there by the company known as Mars One - unless serious alterations to their timeline are made, or significant progress is suddenly revealed in the next few months.