The Orville Season 2

Fox picked up “Last Man Standing” this year. A show that was canceled by it’s previous network.

I can’t imagine they will be dropping all scripted shows. Much less The Orvile.

The economics of the business today mean that it’s really hard for a network to make money with an outside show (partly because the production company is the one that gets the lion’s share of the syndication revenues). So that’s why the networks rely mostly on in-house programs. And it’s a reason why the Fox network might reduce the number of scripted shows it airs.

I just have to say, tonight’s show was one HELL of an episode.

And without spoiling anything, was that one musical riff an exact take from The Wrath of Khan?

I was underwhelmed.

If it’s cancelled maybe a letter writing campaign would change their minds. Seems to me there was a science fiction show once that was cancelled after its second season and when the network was deluged with letters they brought it back.

I thought they handled the storyline quite well tonight. Made for a worthy finale to the season.

I’d agree.

See… I’m a huge Marvel fan, since Spider-Man #1. Have not been able to wait for Avengers:Endust tonight, was planning to buy one of the few single seats way out on the edge of the theater that are left.

But I stayed home to watch the Orville – and see how they wrapped up the storyline they’d set up.

To me, it brought back memories of sitting through season 3 of Enterprise. There were moments here and there, but, on the whole, it was pretty trite and unimaginative. I mean, the Marianas Trench? Really?

I would actually not name the trench as one of the problems with the episode. I was more rolling my eyes at the heavy “Empire Strikes Back” vibe, as well as going to such an extreme with the trope of the bad guys not being able to shoot straight.

It wasn’t terrible, but it does diminish the previous episode a bit by association, which is too bad because on its own that was one of my very favorites. And I would have been fine with their just leaving that ending as it stood, without revisiting it. But I guess people who expect time travel to involve a single timeline would have been confused or unsatisfied with that.

A replicator that looks like a microwave. Silly at first, but I’m sure a household appliance would look like that.

Does anyone have names and addresses for a write in campaign?

It just seemed overdone to me. Like they still had a whole buncha money in their special effects budget, so by damn we’re gonna spend it all. And so we got gun fights on the planet and space ship battles and what seemed like hours dodging through an asteroid belt or whatever that was.

And I don’t even know what to say of them just entering the horizon of a black hole “a little bit” to hide from the Kaylons, and then emerge without even having blown a battery on an old space freighter?

And then every bit of life dead on Earth, even on the bottom of the deepest sea, except for one person who of course just happens to be Bortus.

And on and on.

Last week’s episode, though not perfect, was clever and thoughtful with a point to make. This one was, well, really bad. Tons of cliches wrapped in a bunch of special effects to make you go OOOOH! instead of thinking.

And it didn’t even fit the tone of the rest of the series. This felt like a homage to Star Wars instead of Star Trek.

I didn’t realize the show hadn’t been renewed for a third season. Maybe they can come to an agreement – renew for a third season, but fewer Moclan-centric episodes.

Good finale, although yeah I had problems with a robot army that couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn. And I think my wife got tired of me figuring out plot points before she did. (“The dead Kaylon!” “Bortus!”)

So I was on the right track - without his failed marriage to Kelly, Ed never got a ship, he just got stuck in an admin job in charge of a starbase. Not the failed career Picard had, but not Ed’s dream either.

The black hole part had me scratching my head as well. When they got into the whole time compression thing, I thought they were going to use that to go back in time, instead of the original plan of finding the crashed but still somehow perfectly usable Orville.

Some websites track which shows are renewed, which are cancelled or ending and which are still up in the air. The ones I checked listed this show as still up in the air.

As for the episode, fun enough, but it’s a little weird that the exact same crew got together in a parallel universe. Wouldn’t there have been some different people?

It was fine.

As someone who expected that the result of Kelly’s coming back with foreknowledge would be Kaylon supremacy, I’m a bit surprised they played it as Kelly not even having tried to warn the Union about the Kaylon’s plans, Cassandra-like.

And a bit odd for that time line’s Ed and Kelly to have such strong feelings for each other after just one fun date from Ed’s POV and a sort of two from Kelly’s personal time line.

The ep seem less a Trek or a Star Wars homage than one to “It’s a Wonderful Life” …

I did like that new time line Ed would also go to “open up this jar of pickles” though.

I think Dr Finn was NOT in that time line’s crew (thus was not there to influence Issac). But yeah, Gordon was only on board because Ed wanted him and shouldn’t have been there, and Talla seems like a crew choice that might not have happened in an Ed-less Orville.

It was a little weird that Victor Laszlo was fighting for the Czech resistance, escaped from a Nazi concentration camp, made his way to Paris, reunited with his wife, eluded the Nazis again while they made their escape to Casablanca, and somehow ended up in a gin joint with his wife’s ex-boyfriend, who happened to have just the thing the couple needed to get to a free country where they could continue* La Resistance*.

Problem?

I thought they did a generally good job of it. They did deal with the ramifications of Kelly saying no to Ed in the previous episode. Some thoughts and nitpicks:

  1. If you go beyond the event horizon in a black hole, nothing gets out.
  2. “It’s at the bottom of the Pacific.” Me: in the Marianas Trench, no doubt. – Vindicated!
  3. They’re going to have a massive case of the bends.
  4. Loved seeing Alara.

Definitely hope it gets renewed.

The crew was separated until Kelly brought them together. Yaphit, Bortus,Alara and Lamarr had been on the Orville before Ed got there, so they were there without Ed. Finn and Gordon (and Kelly) came because of Ed, so in the alternate universe they weren’t in the Orville.

I’m comfortable with the idea the the impact of Ed and Kelly not getting married was pretty minor until the Captaincy of the Orville became an issue.

Right way, wrong way, Janeway.