Are Elon Musk’s Mars plans finally coming back down to Earth?

Elon Musk has shifted SpaceX's focus from Mars colonization to building a lunar city, abandoning his previous stance that the Moon was "a distraction" from reaching Mars. Space experts view this change with skepticism due to Musk's history of unrealistic timelines and note that SpaceX never actually hired for Mars-related roles, suggesting the company was never seriously pursuing Mars missions. The Moon offers a more practical testing ground for deep space exploration technologies, being only days from Earth rather than months, aligning with NASA's approach and potentially driven by competition with Blue Origin and SpaceX's upcoming IPO.