re: The Unmanned versus Manned fallacy
I understand what you mean , but remember a spacelab flight that took place when SL9 impacted Jupiter. that science event attracted the public's attention far more than the Spacelab flight. Another spacelab flight also went unnoticed when Mars Pathfinder landed on Mars.
There are interesting manned flights and others less interesting.
Like unmanned flights: some are far more interesting than others too.