First of all, the “missing link” bit is a bit of PR hyperbole. If I may quote PZ Myers, as quoted in The Opinionator blog’s “Let’s Not Go Ape Over Ida” at NYTimes.com:

”The whole “missing link” category is a bit of journalistic trumpery: almost every fossil could be called a link, and it feeds the simplistic notion that there could be a single definitive bridge between ancient and modern species. There isn’t: there is the slow shift of whole populations which can branch and diverge.”

Second of all, no amount of filling in of the historical record will please or convince the most ardent of creationists, so why overhype something if it’s not necessary? It just ultimately cheapens the true value of scientific knowledge when people see it promoted like any other for-profit PR event.