Your thoughts on The Orville?

When I first started this show I found it to be a really awkward mix of comedy and seriousness. It had some jokes thrown it at the most inopportune times as some kind of comic relief from a really serious situation. Perhaps the first half of the first season was actually a bit rough or maybe the show just grew on me, but by season 2 I found myself loving this show.

To me it seems as every bit as comfy, intellectually interesting and even funny as some classic Star Treks while still clearly being its own thing. I wish more comfy space shows like this would get made.

What are your thoughts on The Orville? Also I miss Alara.

ANALHACKER_3000,

It’s better Trek than most Trek, IMO. Had some cool adventures and raised some interesting on sometimes difficult questions about morality and how it’s shaped by our societies.

RealPuyo,

Who’s Orvile?

nnjethro,

One of the Write brothers

CaptPretentious,

For me after DS9, The Orville is (to me) the next canonical Start Trek series. Everything after is, from what I’ve seen is trash that exploits the name for an established fan base. Now I haven’t seen everything, but like, how many times do you need to be kicked in the nuts to know that you don’t like getting kicked in the nuts and you just stop!

I loved, FUCKING LOVED, TNG. Honestly, that show shaped a lot of who I am, especially since I didn’t have a good father figure growing up.

The Orville isn’t perfect. Seth for better or for worse tries some jokes and some of them really don’t land. But to his credit he tries. And it felt like as the show went on it got more refined in what it wanted to be.

The people who are in charge of modern Star Trek can shove it up their ass. You can’t tell me a single one of them ever sat down and ever actually watched Star Trek. TOS, TNG, VOY, and DS9 I’m here for it all. Everything after, Jesus Christ, just awful. I’d rather watch Dr Crusher get it on with a ghost repeatedly than sit and watch modern Star Trek.

But the Oroville like a breath of fresh air.

Akip,

did you try stange new worlds?

CaptPretentious,

No. Isn’t that a spin off of Discovery? I survived the ride that was Enterprise, but Discovery said as the first time I noped the fuck out.

I did a quick look via Google, the uniforms look very TOS to me, is it good? Or is it just that much more of terrible writing and 0 acknowledgement of any established stories and lore or just generally Gene’s vision for what Start Trek as a concept was.

Akip,

I think season2 of Strange new worlds might be my favorite star trek season. Its focusing more on inter crew relationships again instead of useless power creep like discovery did. The crew feels like a family again like it did in TNG and Voyager, while also leaving you with a new concept each episode something for your brain to digest, something you hadn’t seen yet. I think they succeeded in the balancing act something new while infused with the original essence of star trek.

Rootiest,
@Rootiest@lemmy.world avatar

It filled a hole when there was no good classic star trek being made.

Now we have Strange New Worlds and Lower Decks so there a bit more variety/competition in the arena

NuPNuA,

When Orville started and all we had was Discovery I’d agree, but Trek has pulled itself together of late with Pic S3, Strange New Worlds and Prodigy. The last few episodes of SNW have been amazing.

CaptPretentious,

I might check out Strange New World, seems to get mentioned a few times.

But you ain’t getting me to watch Picard, lol. A show that very clearly should have been a direct continuation of TNG… Unless season 3 is Picard waking up in his quarters and everything that happened before (in Star Trek: Picard) was just a terribly written nightmare… From perhaps drinking to much… Uh… Well it was green.

Nacktmull,

The people who are in charge of modern Star Trek can shove it up their ass

I support that initiative!

TWeaK,

Modern Trek does have a few gems. Lower Decks is fun, Prodigy was nice (and will hopefully still get its next season soon) and Strange New Worlds has been pretty close to proper old Trek.

M4775,
@M4775@lemmy.world avatar

The Orville is my favorite Star Trek franchise. It’s canon - you can’t deny it. The Orville revived the Star Trek Franchise and gave it a pulse. It’s like blockchain. You can say it doesn’t belong, but it will always be there and nothing can change that. It has great attention to detail and decent story writing with that original “there’s a moral in this episode” that endeared ST in our hearts, something the newer ST franchises lack.

grahamja,

And Galaxy Quest is the best Star Trek movie since the Undiscovered Country.

M4775,
@M4775@lemmy.world avatar

I’m not sure how to answer without getting roasted, but including GQ in canon does complete the Star Trek good-then-bad movie pattern.

evatronic,

I really liked it.

The early seasons were less serious than later ones. But overall, it did well with serious social issues and addresses some very relevant topics.

The storyline with Topah was absolutely amazing. At every step, each character was portrayed well, and respectfully. It’s rare that there is a story like that that still has conflict without having a clear villain.

The time travel episode with Gordon was also especially brutal with some great performances from everyone on screen.

There were a few misses. I found the Isaac / Doctor relationship… forced, even if it did bring us the best line in decades (“As I am incapable of stuttering, I must conclude that you heard me.”). I also don’t think I’m alone with disliking the Charlie character in season 3.

CanadianCorhen,

I loved how Klyden grew through that story line, realizing what his prejudice was costing him and growing!

ashok36,

The Klyden storyline has so many nuances to it. It’s not just that Klyden is a bigot. “He” was also re-gendered so he knows what Topa is going through and feeling far better than anyone else. A big part of his intransigence comes from a place of, “If I had to deal with this trauma, so should everyone else.” It helps explain his extreme position without letting him off the hook and I really liked that.

CanadianCorhen,

For sure. I’m calling him “he”, because thats what he appears to identify with.

Hes undeniably a bigiot at the beginning, but i think a lot of that comes from… a gamblers fallacy, worrying what hes already invested in his identity, and knowing he might have been wrong, and it reaches a crescendo, before Klyden is forced to realize hes made the wrong decision, and rejoins his husband and daughter.

so good.

evatronic,

I think it’s deeper than that. Klyden exists to represent Moclan society as a whole. He is the stand-in for their traditions, world, history, and culture.

We, the audience, are presented at the onset with a society that is male-only. The ship’s crew, along with us, are sort of hand-waved away when asking questions about how things work in the bedroom, but on the whole, no one seems to have a problem with their culture. In fact, we even see this male-only species reproduce successfully before we learn that there are the potential for female infants.

In Moclan society, being born female is an aberration. It’s not a biological necessity, and, for whatever reason, the Moclan culture views “being female” as a birth defect, one that can be easily corrected. It’s sort of how, today, we view children born with a clef palette. There’s no good reason to keep it around, and lots of reasons to repair it as soon as possible. Klyden represents this mindset and viewpoint perfectly.

Imagine someone fighting tooth-and-nail to not repair a cleft palette, or some other easily-fixable birth defect. Imagine them standing up in court and declaring that this obvious flaw is something that no one has the right to fix. Klyden is, from his own experience, outraged, and furious. Put yourself in his shoes, and his actions have nothing to do with bigotry, or hate. He’s not angry at his child for being female, or at his husband for supporting her decision to become female. He’s mad at the world because his entire world-view is challenged by his family.

In fact, he sees his culture, history, society, and even legal system saying that he is right, that the child should be male, and then he sees his husband and child, serving on a Union starship, talking nonsense about a “choice.” That line where he says he wishes she’d never been born wasn’t anger at her. It was anger that he is being forced to choose, and no matter which thing he chooses, he will loose a huge part of himself – either his family, or his history.

And if he chooses his family, he has to confront the fact that what was done to him was just as wrong as what he did to his daughter.

Few people, even space aliens, have the emotional maturity to handle that kind of revelation in the moment without doing something regrettable.

But fuck, this kind of novel is why I love this show so much. When was the last time you had a long talk about that time Riker killed all his clones?

CanadianCorhen,

Well put!

ashok36,

Imagine someone fighting tooth-and-nail to not repair a cleft palette, or some other easily-fixable birth defect. Imagine them standing up in court and declaring that this obvious flaw is something that no one has the right to fix.

I think this comparison doesn’t really work. In this analogy, Topa would be going to the doctor and saying, “For some reason, my lip feels wrong to me. I can’t put my finger on it but I feel like I have the wrong lip. Can you help me?”

It’s a bit of a different dynamic when the person who was ‘fixed’ is telling you over and over again that they don’t feel fixed; Rather they feel broken and don’t know why.

evatronic,

The season 3 episode, perhaps, but remember, there was an entire episode when Topa was born in season 1. It was like, episode 3 or 4 or something early in the show, where the doctor refused to perform the surgery, and they went all the way back to Moclan. It’s where we first meet that Dolly Parton female Moclan lady whose name I can’t remember at the moment. This is the incident I was referencing here.

TheOnlyAphex,

I agree on the doctor/Isaac arc (some spoilers), I thought it was all absolutely ridiculous. Isaac is only there to gather data about humanity and characterised as unfeeling and non-emotional. Then the doc pulls a fit about how he doesn’t have feelings for her and everyone on the ship is behind her, ostrasising Isaac. It felt like there was no logic at all to the situation and everyone had gone bananas. The Isaac breakup scene was hands down my favourite in the show.

yeather,

Best part of season three is Charlie’s death. Felt almost forced in a way, but not in a good way. Like Charlie is an ensign but is on the bridge because she’s really smart at 4d maneuvering or something, and they bring her everywhere. Definitely great when she finally went.

Tippon,
@Tippon@lemmy.world avatar

I think they screwed up the ending of the Gordon episode. If they’d cut from the captain and the team walking out of the door to Gordon being back on the ship packing away the phone and other things, it would have left it more to the viewers to decide if the decision was right or wrong.

evatronic,

Maybe.

On the flip side, the way it ended worked as a sort of “what if?” story about what Gordon is capable of.

Maybe plans for some later season involve Gordon turning on Mercer for similar reasons, again?

Tippon,
@Tippon@lemmy.world avatar

I don’t know. Given what was taken from him, and how grateful he was that it was done, I think they took that option away.

TheOneAndOnly,

The Gordon/Time travel episode was brutal. It’s the episode I keep referring to when attempting to get my girlfriend to suspend her dislike of Seth McFarlane enough to give the show a shot. I will be very disappointed if there isn’t a 4th episode.

XanXic,

All I could think with how forced Charly was as a character was like is this a producers wife or girlfriend or something? I never looked into it, but I’ve never seen a show introduce a new character and focus on them so hard, even to the detriment of OG cast members, before. Like they pivoted to the Charly show. Some of the plots were good like her prejudice towards Isaac’s race but like why did she get introduced and become the main character in one season? Lol

acow,

I wanted to like it, but didn’t get through S1. I found the humor so uneven that it made the whole thing almost uncomfortable. Is it an irreverent parody, sci-fi, slightly crude comedy, or is it Star Trek? It’s all of those things, and I’m happy folks enjoyed it. I’ll try to revisit at some point, but for now I’m so happy that Strange New Worlds is as surprisingly excellent as it is. For me, it nails the mixture of lightheartedness, sci-fi adventure, and earnestness that I like in Star Trek.

KiofKi,
@KiofKi@feddit.de avatar

It’s a love letter to star trek. I strongly recommend you give it another try to get through the first season, because by season 2 they found their stride and it got way better.

TwigletSparkle,

probably quicker amd easier to just pick an early episode of S2 and see if you enjoy it more. Orville does a pretty good job of being fairly episodic, which is a highlight.

AA5B,

Huh, I also struggled to like SNW but really enjoyed Discovery. Maybe I’ll try that again too

Jimmycakes,

It’s good

leftabitcharlie,

I like it, enjoy it for the most part and am glad it exists. But the politics comes off a bit weak and tips sometimes too far towards the self-congratulatory ethno-centrism of bad early 20th century anthropology.

hglman,

Season 3 was not good; it was heavy-handed writing and wasn’t all that good drama.

Zoboomafoo,
@Zoboomafoo@lemmy.world avatar

It felt to me like there was someone, maybe the studio, reigning in MacFarlane since they weren’t confident about his writing, then for S3 they let him have full control and it got bloated

hglman,

It’s almost incredible; Seth needs to not be on screen and he needs to just seed some control.

Semi-Hemi-Demigod,
@Semi-Hemi-Demigod@kbin.social avatar

Just fyi it’s “cede” control

And you’re totally right about Seth.

Zoboomafoo,
@Zoboomafoo@lemmy.world avatar

I think he’s fine as a writer and an actor, he just needed someone to tell him to cut the scripts down to a reasonable size

Nacktmull,

I generally dislike the typial Mc Farlane type of comedy and I don´t think it fit´s particularly well in a Star Trek like show. Beside that, The Orville is a really good show, way better than Nu Trek (with the exception of SNW). When watching The Orville I feel like I can tell that the people who made it actually like and even respect classic Star Trek - which is the opposite of how I felt when trying to watch DIS and PIC.

turtlepower,

I seriously feel SNW was Star Trek seeing how much people loved what the Orville did and doing it themselves.

Nacktmull,

I seriously feel SNW was Star Trek seeing how much people loved what the Orville classic Star Trek did and doing it themselves.

FTFY

1984,
@1984@lemmy.today avatar

It was surprisingly good. I enjoyed it a lot. Didn’t think I would but it’s much better than Picard, such a boring show.

Mezzy,

Picard season 3 is a beautiful love letter to TNG

evatronic,

Picard existed for one reason: To provide a vehicle for ending a bunch of TNG-era storylines so they wouldn’t end up fucking the next Trek series as fans ask, “What happened to the Borg? Where is Q? Why doesn’t Guinan show up? What about the Romulan homeworld?” and so on. (Okay, two reasons: The second is “money!”)

In that, it did an acceptable job, presuming you look at it as a series of endings. And season 3 was an absolute blast full of nostalgia, while still giving the post-TNG era a relatively clean slate to start from.

In keeping an audience engaged with an exciting storyline, or a coherent plot… not so much.

NuPNuA,

The problem with that is the first two series just made things more complicated than they were. Series 3 smashed it though and wrapped things up nicely. If we don’t see more of the Enterprise G crew in future we’ve been robbed.

Nacktmull,

The way I read this, what you are saying is that they made PIC so they can make even worse abominations in the future without being limited by classic Trek canon. That is horrible!

MaxMouseOCX,

They kinda went clean slate on tng stuff… It’s aweful if you’re out age… But to new trek fans, it’s the start of “their” era of trek.

Nacktmull,

But to new trek fans, it’s the start of “their” era of trek

I honestly pitty them

greavous,

Star trek with jokes!

CatfishSushi,

Try Avenue 5 (It was on HBO)

IMO, it was much funnier than Orville. Space cruise ship goes off-course.

greavous,

Yeah armando ianucci is a British comedy institution! Ave5 is more gag oriented than the orville and didn’t have the more serious elements the orville incorporates. Both good for different reasons.

ArtificialLink,

It was/is the best modern “star trek” thats coming out. Loved that you could see all the writers and seth were just huge trekies. The moral dilemma’s are almost always good. And the mostly episodic episodes are a huge bonus.

FlexibleToast,

I would agree with you, until Star Trek Strange New Worlds. That show is fantastic.

ArtificialLink,

Ive yet to watch it but ive heard good things.

FlexibleToast,

I was in the same boat as you until recently. I was burned so bad from Discovery and Picard I just couldn’t go through it again. I heard all the good things, but still I just couldn’t get around to it. I’m so glad I finally did. I know there is some recency bias but I think I would go so far as to say Captain Pike is my favorite Captain now…

ArtificialLink,

Damn it’s like you know me LMAO. I swear I will check it out soon.

FlexibleToast,

I bet it was common in the Trek community. I guess the positive side is you have two seasons to be able to binge when you finally get around to it.

RojoSanIchiban,

I find it to be very much the opposite, but infinite diversity in infinite combinations.

thal3s,
@thal3s@sh.itjust.works avatar

Renewed for Season 3!

FlexibleToast,

It’s so good I didn’t even consider that not being a possibility. Glad to hear it though.

kennocha,

Along with Lower Decks as well. The crossover to Strange New Worlds was great.

FlexibleToast,

Lower Decks is fantastic, but it’s almost its own thing while still being a love letter to earlier Treks. It is obviously aimed at a different demographic while still being one of the best modern Treks. That crossover episode was almost all fan service, but there is nothing wrong with that every once and a while. It was a very fun episode. The end where the SNW cast was animated had me laughing, it was very well done.

randon31415,

I liked that they weren’t the most important ship… and then they became the most important ship. Near the end the fate of every species in the galaxy hinged on the love life of three couples on a minor starship.

It also felt like they had 2 or 3 seasons of stories and hulu said “you get one”, so they rushed it.

CatfishSushi,

Wanted to like it more than I did. Just didn’t think it was all that funny.

Now I thought Avenue 5 (HBO) was absolutely hilarious. It’s the funny I expected from Orville. Too bad it ended after 2 seasons.

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