In a thrilling season finale, The Orville shows how much worse it can get when you try to avoid mistakes
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This is a purely anecdotal feeling on my part, completely uninformed by any actual data or research; but I feel television is perfecting the art of making a season finale that can double as an emotionally satisfying series finale if need be. Maybe it’s just that I tend to follow shows that are perpetually on the verge of being cancelled that have writers and show runners who are intimately aware of their precariousness, but it’s always impressive to see a finale provide some drama, some spectacle, an emotionally resonant ending that encapsulates the key themes of the show while at the same time (ensuring the favor of the renewal gods) keep things sufficiently open-ended to leave room for further adventures and hijinks. All of which is to say, the finale has aired, The Orville has yet to be renewed for a third season, and if it doesn’t, “The Road Not Taken” was as worthy a story to end the show with as any the series has done.
I certainly hope the show is renewed. This second season has been an exponential improvement over the first in pretty much every way. Generally it’s been smarter, more tightly scripted, pushed outward on the bounds of its universe, and provided plenty of moments of grand spacefaring spectacle. Sure, a few of the episodes were duds —but overall, The Orville has more than proved worthy of the chance to keep refining its strengths. And one of those strengths is to take last week’s middling episode and build on it to make this week’s very fun episode. Granted, “The Road Not Taken” was still ostensibly about Ed and Kelly’s romance, but I’m not bothered by it simply because I love alternate universe stories. I just love them. I love how in the absence of order, the world immediately becomes filth and leather and bent —but not broken!— steely eyed determination. I love the reconfiguration of characters and places and, as wonderfully demonstrated tonight by the brief return of Alara Kitan, I love how alternate timelines provide an enjoyable, if brief opportunity to reconnect with departed characters.
We learn the full weight of Kelly’s decision last episode to turn down Ed for a second date. In one world, you’re a little lovesick, but still able to enjoy the full benefits of civilization. In the other, you’re running across a snowfield trying to escape murderous flying robot heads just so you can secure yourself the means of synthesizing a Twinkie. In the absence of Ed and Kelly’s marriage, the Kaylon invasion of earth was successful and they have continued their pogrom against biological life that has successfully eradicated half of the galaxies population. Ed and Gordon are a couple of space rats trying to survive with nothing but a beat up old Union shuttle they use to scavenge through the wreckage of Union space. They assume they’re going to be eaten when a tractor beam pulls them aboard a pirate freighter, but it turns out to be Kelly. She retains the knowledge of the original timeline future and has been trying, since the Kaylon war, to get the old crew back together. The deficiency of a certain type of protein in her brain caused the mind wipe to fail, and now she’s hell bent on securing the protein and returning to the Orville to send Dr. Claire through time to ensure Ed and Kelly have that second date. After all, it was only Kelly’s guilt over her infidelity that compelled her to push extra hard to get Ed his post on the Orville.
It would be easy for a story like this to pin the original timeline’s success on Ed being the captain. As the one in charge he should be the one unique and clever enough to outsmart the Kaylons in a manner other captains could not. But as Ed himself put it, “I had to swim with my shirt on until I was 20.” So it was a welcome continuation of the show’s core concept of average people in space that it wasn’t Ed’s genius, but instead the almost incidental relationship Isaac formed with Dr. Claire’s children that proved to be the key to holding off the Kaylon invasion. Isaac and the kids growing friendship were handled naturalistically enough that it never seemed like a giant neon arrow pointing to Isaac’s newfound humanity. And while that certainly was happening, the relaxed humor that defined their time together kept the relationship from feeling too portentous. It’s a nice confirmation on how important seemingly small things can be, and a good example of the show’s capacity for showing, not telling.
The crew locates a source for the protein at one of the few remaining resistance bases opposing the Kaylon. There, a sufficiently Mad Max shoulder pad-adorned Alara Katan trades a few grizzled barbs with her former crew mates before forking over the protein and ultimately giving her life buying them time to escape from the arrival of Kaylon troops. The freighter escapes, and evades the pursuing Kaylon ships by hiding out in a black hole. I’m no space genius, but I just don’t feel like a black hole event horizon is a thing you can amble around as though it were a shrub you can duck behind. I just can’t picture a ratty old freighter being capable of escaping what light can’t. I’ve said before that I rarely get hung up on the hard science of sci-fi, but that was a little goofy. But goofy or no, the Kaylons finally gave up their search and the freighter departs to find the Orville.
For all the urgency in the front half of the episode, things slow down a surprising degree in the second half. On the way back towards earth, Ed manages to wrangle together a bunch of candles and the means of creating a spaghetti dinner for two. Kelly explains her reason for turning down a second date, citing the pain she saw both of them living with. But that pain feels increasingly abstract, especially in comparison to how comforting it is to have a connection with another human being at the end of the universe.
The ship makes it to earth, now a gray, dried-up husk orbited by a broken moon. The Orville had the good luck of surviving the Kaylon attack in one piece, but the bad luck of doing so at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. While the shuttle nearly collapses in the process, the crew is able to manage to get on board. Ed gets clocked across the jaw by a hermit Bortus. It’s pretty swell. The Orville returns to space where John informs the crew the only way he can get the time travel cone to work is by interfacing with the Kaylon neural net in order to dredge up Isaac’s identity and the data he holds. Doing so will provide a solid lock on the Orville’s location. Obviously, they do so anyway, and John is able to get the time travel apparatus working again. However, the Kaylon aren’t even able to get there in time to kill everyone, because the strain of the device on the ship’s engines cause it blow up spectacularly. Fortunately, not before Dr. Claire is able to return to the past and set things right.
So who knows what happens now? Hopefully the show gets renewed. If not, it remains a positive, optimistic contribution to a television landscape that frequently feels lacking in both; and a welcome example of how quickly and well a show can grow beyond its lackluster origins. Either way, thanks to all of you for watching with me.
Stray Observations
- Yaphit’s snout poking out of the resistance base was as overt a Star Wars reference I’ve seen from the show yet. The score even had a playful flute trill almost identical to Return of the Jedi.
- Again, some lovely spectacle this week. Gordon and Ed’s flight through the ice canyons as they evaded the Kaylon ships in particular was gorgeous.
- Isaac’s matter-of-fact “We have found you.” was chilling and a good example of how frightening an otherwise deliberately unfrightening-looking species can be. Also the disembodied gun heads.
172 Comments
I was not expecting to see Alara again so this was a nice surprise. If this does end up being the series finale then there are worse ways it could have ended.This was probably the shows most effects heavy episode since the Kaylon Battle episode and it was all very nice. They did have some nice practical ones too like Bortus looking a lot skinny then usual.
Should the show return, my wish is they refine the Moclan makeup so the actors can turn their heads. I understand they’re kind of an armadillo species, but Bortus and Klyden have been called on to do too much relationship dialog to have to Robocop their emotions.
Counterpoint, the Moclan ritual mating dance of the previous episode. TONIGHT THE NIGHT IS OURS!
Counterpoint: Get rid of Klyden.
Yes! Death to Klyden! I loved all of the stuff that happened in the first season but after the shit that went down with Klyden and the female Moclans I’m just ready for him to go and for Bortus to be with someone who shares his values.
I’m utterly baffled that Klyden keeps pulling reprehensible shit and then they just reset them to “wacky gay alien couple” by the next episode.
And their two year-old going on sixteen year-old son.
Gotta say, I was kind of happy when Klyden died upon return to his home planet in the alt timeline.
It should not return.
But then they won’t be REAL Moclans! That’s what they said when they changed the Klingon makeup in Star Trek Discovery. You just can’t please everyone …
Yes! That was the first thing I noticed when Bortus showed up – that his makeup had him looking super thin. Cool little detail.
Nice that it was a John heavy episode. He had an alternate-universe thing with Alara! … not bowling-alley girl. The Black Hole scene was cool enough that after a bit of techno-babble I didn’t question it. Pretty amusing that Alter-Orville World was Star Wars (then Interstellar! then The Abyss!). I wanted Alara to say, “You can escape out the back, the furry diminutive tree-dwelling natives of the forest will cover your escape.” … … “Ah la-loo!!”It was a lot of fun. I hope they get renewed too. It’s Disney’s call now, I suppose.
Disney doesn’t own the channel, they have no say in the matter.
Disney purchased Fox’s IP, which includes Family Guy, American Dad and The Orville. If they choose not to finance any future seasons, it won’t happen.
Jointly owned with Seth McFarlene’s company. And again it doesn’t matter what Disney wants to do because the show is contracted to Fox Broadcasting (Which Disney doesn’t own) so it’s entirely up to Fox.
I haven’t seen the contracts in question, but normally the show requires two sides. A production company (in this case, Disney combined with McFarlane) pays for and produces the show, which is then licensed out (in this case to FX). The current run, season 2, has concluded and FX has not announced whether or not they have agreed to terms to renew the show on their end. If Disney chooses to cease production on the show, there may or may not be terms allowing McFarlane to continue on his own or with another partner. McFarlane could also find himself in a situation where the show is moved, either to another Disney property (including their streaming service) or to another network altogether. The most likely version of this is that Disney assumes at least part (if not most/all) of the production costs to film a new season. I can’t imagine FX having the leverage to force Disney to finance and produce a season that they do not wish to finance, and if there were language contracting the show for a multiple season run on FX in a way that would tie Disney’s hands, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.So, yeah. FX has a choice whether or not to renew the show for Season 3 should the season be filmed. Barring some very out-of-character-for-Disney contract weirdness, it’s up to Disney whether they choose to finance and produce that season.
The deal between Disney and Fox is complete. Disney owns all Fox properties except for Fox News and Fox Sports.
Dsney doesn’t own Fox Broadcasting either. Disney owns the show but not the channel, as Disney already owned ABC, another Big Four Network and owning both would be creating a monopoly or something. Disney, however, can put the show on Hulu if it makes sense for 20th TV and Hulu, both properties of Disney.
Deathmaster780 is correct. Disney does not own the Fox TV network. They own the version of Fox that produces the show, but the network that will make the renewal decision is still Murdoch’s.
https://www.vox.com/culture/2019/3/20/18273477/disney-fox-merger-deal-details-marvel-x-men2) Fox Corp still exists, independent from Disney. It’s primarily a news and sports company now, though it does still own the Fox TV network….What’s left for Murdoch are his many, many publications (the Wall Street Journal among them) as part of the company News Corp, and then the various holdings of Fox Corp, including Fox Sports, Fox News, and the Fox TV network. (That last one is still at Fox Corp because no one corporation can own more than one broadcast network, and Disney already owned ABC.)
Either way, why are networks so stupid? Are they just going by ratings or buzz? The show is getting more buzz as it goes along hence a solid chance that ratings will get better. Why do tv network decisions almost always screw viewers over?
So, barring an unannounced already filmed third season, it would require FX renewing AND Disney greenlighting and financing a third season.
No, they don’t own the Fox Network. The FCC doesn’t allow mergers between any two of the four broadcast networks.
They didn’t get the network. FCC rules against owning two networks and Disney already owned ABC.
Hah, this was pretty much exactly my friend and I’s commentary as we watched. Though I called out SeaQuest rather than The Abyss.
AND also original Alien Goldsmith plaintive notes before they knew the survivor was Bortus.
Considering the trash talking of Disney on Family Guy and American Dad over the years, I’ll be shocked if Orville gets renewed. I kind of half-expect Disney to purge certain episodes from reruns of both series as well, especially the Familyland episode of American Dad from 2014.
Counterpoint: Disney won’t give a shit as long as the IP makes them money.
No, Disney has an image to maintain, Liebkartoffel – which is pretty much diametrically opposed to anything Seth McFarlane’s done other than COSMOS.
Seth MacFarlane stated on Late Night w/ J. Corden that he still had a job, despite going over budget in Season 2 (so worth it!). So, I’m hoping this means the show is renewed.
Dr Finn is WhoSeriously The Orville has been a great show for me. I love this finale. That spaghetti dinner, at the end of the scene was so heart wrenching too. When they realized how they really felt about each other, how their lives entwined and what it meant if they succeeded. They would never know what they now new.
I guess the spaghetti dinner was as close to spaghettification we were going to get, despite the black hole’s involvement in the episode.
Could be it was a metaphor for several things you’re right. I didn’t think of that aspect too. Nothing is wasted on this show.
This seems to be the year of big time travel stories. Both Discovery and Orville have major time travel plots. There’s also Mortal Kombat 11 and Infinity War. I wouldn’t be surprised if GoT ends up having time travel too.
What’s the time travel aspect in Infinity War?
Please, don’t tell.
I blame Barry Allen.
Goddamnit, Barry.
I love ‘what if’ episodes even if they often feel like filler. That said I do find it an odd choice for a season finale due to that ‘filler-esque’ feel. You’re right that, as a series finale, it does work but if the show does get renewed I expect this episode to feel a little flat to those catching up.
I think, even though we were taken out of the ‘normal’ Orville universe, it still works as a season finale. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say it works especially well because it’s so outside the norm. The core of the series has always been Ed and Kelly’s relationship. It may rely on it a little too much at times, but this episode reinforces that theme and, probably more so than any, demonstrates that despite the pain and regrets and mistakes, things are ultimately the way they were meant to be. In that sense, it’s the perfect season finale because it perfectly illustrates this.
Holy frackin’ moly that has GOT to be the best Orville episode yet!It was Star Trek meets Star Wars with a big chunk of Firefly thrown in and a smattering of BSG if you count the Kaylons as the Cylons. (You could even throw in later StarGate sprinkled on top if you think the Scavenger ship that Kelly was commanding looks a bit like the Prometheus….)Am I the only one who thinks this alt timeline is pretty damm cool (and frankly I’d love to see more of it.)..?
I won’t lie. I was actively rooting against the mind wipe working the second time so that season 3 would be back in this dystopian hell of a universe. No disrespect to the ‘prime’ universe, but this was a lot of fun.
I’ve put too much thought into event horizons, black holes, and warp drives.Any FTL drive should, by virtue of being able to travel faster than light and thus sidestep general and special relativity entirely, be capable of entering and leaving the event horizon of a black hole. Only small black holes ‘spahettify’ matter that falls into them, so a large black hole’s event horizon could be entered without automatic destruction. Indeed, it should be noneventful.
Given that a sufficient normal-space speed could be attained to keep a starship in orbit just inside the event horizon, nothing further should happen to a ship, so the basic premise of ‘hiding in a black hole’ is not as ridiculous as it sounds.Getting out again, however, demands faster-than-light travel – but granted that one gimmick – leaving an event horizon would be no more difficult than simply traveling faster than light in the first place.There is, however, one problem that cannot be glossed over – even with an FTL drive, any starship that close to a black hole is going to suffer relativistic time distortion – they are going to see events outside their frame of reference move forward at a terribly accelerated rate. Even a few seconds that close to a singularity would result in perhaps centuries passing outside the ship. Minutes could be millennia – the ship might FTL its way safely away from the black hole, but it would find itself horrifically far into its own future. So that’s an oops, I think.
I have to assume you didn’t actually see this episode. The Orville crew did in fact see their Kaylon pursuers moving at a drastically accellerated rate. The time dilation was explicitly called out. What was maybe a minute or two for them was said to have been two full days in normal space.
I believe 2 days was probably too short though. I know in Interstellar being near a black hole for a short time caused time to slow down enough for 25 years or so to advance on Earth. I’m glad they did at least acknowledge this phenomenon though.
Well, they supposedly slipped “just” inside the event horizon. Without hard numbers there’s really no way to tell what factor of time dilation “should” have been in play.
“I have to assume you didn’t actually see this episode.”BURN!
Plus hiding inside the event horizon wouldn’t make the ship disappear, it would simply look stationary at the point where they crossed the line to outside observers. The Kaylon should have been able to see them, but would have had to risk going in after them or waiting for them to come out.
What is your reasoning? The photons bounced off the ship while it was outside of the event horizon already did, then some of them are trapped in a circular orbit around the black hole and can be seen only if you enter their trajectory and when the ship enters the event horizon no photon gets out anymore. So, what is your reasoning when you are saying the ship would be visible? What would be the reason of the photons’ bounce?
The time dilation as the ship descends into the gravity well means that to the outside observer it takes the ship an infinite amount of time to reach the event horizon. So, not exactly stationary and also the view of the ship is increasingly red shifted.
Which, being both AI (and thus not having requirements for food and such), and having the advantage of being able to call in greater numbers (so able to rotate ships in and out as-needed), I can’t fathom why they wouldn’t do exactly that and out-wait our intrepid heroes. Great, time moves differently in there? Fine by us- you can’t stay forever. Even if it’s just a couple of ships on station at a time, we certainly can.
An event horizon is the “point” where even light can’t escape from. So the light reflected from the ship wouldn’t escape the black hole and hence wouldn’t be visible.
This is simple physics: the time dilation started well before they reached the event horizon (time slows as the gravity proximity increases), so for an outside observer, they would see the ship getting slower and slower as they get closer the the black hole and despite time moving at a normal pace in the ship, their image crossing the horizon would remain for hours, maybe years, if someone happened to look in the direction of their point of entry. In summary: while they can’t be seen IN the black hole their after image can’t be easy to hide because it takes so long to vanish, as the two points of reference are dramatically different for the passage of time. As it was explained to me: you never actually see someone vanish in the black hole as the time dilation becomes so huge, they just appear stuck just before the point of disappearing.
I was responding to “Plus hiding inside the event horizon wouldn’t make the ship disappear”.
I wasn’t talking about what happens outside the event horizon. The ship may well appear stuck forever from far enough away, but as it wasn’t clear how close the Kaylon were observing I figured the writers wanted us to assume they were close enough that they could see the ship vanishing into the black hole over a short period of time.
the light bouncing off the craft would have to leave the event horizon for them to see it on the outside…..they would more likely see the instant just before the crossing of the event as if the ship was frozen at that point unmoving
Any event horizon is the “point of no return”, no matter the size. The gravitational pull is so great that escape is impossible. That they left without using the quantum drive (which was down) should have been impossible too.
Wouldn’t the gravity have been horribly straining to the ship’s hull?
– In the alternate dystopian reality timeline, there will be cleavage.- I liked that Alara and Lamar had a thing in this timeline.
All alternate dystopian timelines have cleavage. I think its a basic law of dystopia. p.s. why doesn’t Kinja have dystopia in it’s dictionary…and ironically Kinja.
I mean if The 100 has taught me anything, it is the more dystopian things get, the more cleavagey they get.
Saves on precious fabric.
Speaking of cleavage, was it kind of… weird? Is there too much space between? They really made an effort to really showcase it, but it just looked off somehow.
I was getting a distinctly sounding James Horner Star Trek soundtrack vibe when they were rising out of the ocean, I think from ST2: Khan…very similar but just enough different that it’s not a direct ripoff. That’s the first time I heard Ed mention opening a jar of pickles since Alara left.“I don’t want my last meal to be a twinkie.”I was getting a strong Empire Strikes Back vibe (asteroid field) when they were running from the Kaylon, when in the scrapper ship.
Oh yeah – so many times in this I thought – this is Seth MacFarlane LARPing.
Eh, he’s earned it.
I got a Star Wars vibe from the entire episode, score included. Costumes, ship design, and yeah the whole asteroid field scene.I was a little annoyed to hear his “jar of pickles” comment because that was his in-joke with Alara, but then I remembered that this Ed never had that with Alara so why not use it with Keyali.
When the shuttle was diving through the ice tunnels of that moon, there was a brief quote of the “Asteroid Field” music from Empire Strikes Back.
The ice moon was pure Star Tours
Yep, I was going to mention the many musical homages in this ep. The James Horner stuff during that sequence particularly reminded me of the stealing the Enterprise sequence from ST3.Not only was the asteroid field sequence and music a definite nod to Empire, but the sequence when the Kaylon attack the resistance base had ROTJ Endor vibes.And, back with Horner… when they first board the sunken Orville, all that music (and direction) was very much from Alien/Aliens.Lots of fun bits in the episode, I was grinning every time I noticed one, hehe.
and a quick Jaws theme reference as the Orville came out of the ocean
Genesis Countdown, or Stealing the Enterprise from the Search for Spock soundtrack were definitely used in the temp track.
As well as a bit of Alien, when they walked through the abandoned Orville corridors, but the real surprise was hearing the theme from John Williams’ Seven Years in Tibet score when they approached the resistance hideout.
And when they popped up from under the surface of the ice moon, I totally expected a giant space worm to pop up after them. It was a very, very similar shot.
If the show got cut, could McFarlane bounce Orville to Netflix? ….Actually seems up their alley…..
With so many shows leaving Netflix (the Marvel series, the NBC staples like The Office, etc.), and Amazon muscling in on them so heavily, it couldn’t hurt for them to look at adding something like this. Then again, I’d think it also comes down to money- how many people watch a silly sci-fi show vs. how much it costs to make an average episode.I certainly hope you’re right though.
I think it’s right up Netflix’s alley; plus they could set up more content deals from Seth McFarlane (hey they kept Adam Sandler’s career going). The Orville seems to be a passion project for him after all. Netflix has demonstrated that it is willing to burn money for content. Will they keep being the “Sugar Daddy” for Discovery tho’?
As someone else said, Netflix would probably go for it so they could secure McFarlane and all the connections he has.That guy is beloved by most of Hollywood and you know Netflix would love to bring him into the fold.
Not bold, not a big swing, but competently done.True to this episode not doing much to subvert expectations for anybody familiar with the general sci-fi/fantasy pastiche of the last few decades, I feel like I said most of what I wanted to say about *this* episode *last* week.How’s that for time travel?The reviewer made a nice point about the convergence of season and series finales, though, and the minor surprise of getting Alara back is a good illustrative example of where this episode falls on the scale: it was a very solid sendoff for the series, if that’s what it ends up being, with some care taken to do right by the universe and the whole series’s cast. Granted, that’s much easier to do when you’ve only got two seasons under your belt.
I’d say the one thing that was missing was a clearer Krill presence, but they just didn’t have the time. I’m assuming the system the shuttle jumped to near the start of the show was a Krill system, and I don’t recall them shouting “KRILL SYSTEM,” specifically, in the dialogue. That’s good. It shows a little respect for the audience.The second season seems to indicate that Seth was much more interested in making Star Trek than in critiquing it in any serious way. For people who want TNG back, the second season of The Orville is a big step up. For people who wanted a gentle Trek takedown where the tool of parody was gross and petty shit from Family Guy, well, the second season is a bit of letdown, and warning of things to come (if anything, besides cancellation.)
If you’re a weirdo like me who was hoping that the gross and petty shit was a hint of a more serious attempt to critique Trek’s imagined future, or even some meta tropes, well… oh well. Weirdos get disappointed all the time. Nature of the beast.
I’m guessing we didn’t see the Krill because in this timeline, without Captain Ed, there’s been no meaningful interaction with them.
“I’m assuming the system the shuttle jumped to near the start of the show was a Krill system,”The chyron identifies the system as a Union monitoring outpost. (Sorry, I forgot the name.)
– No mention of Kelly’s Boobs? They could’ve named the episode Kelly’s Boobs.
– Yeah those weren’t exactly the only two Star Wars references… the whole episode was a low budget tribute to Star Wars. Asteroids, Hoth, Endor… twas all there…
Interestingly enough, this episode reminded me much more of Star Wars, especially Empire, and Firefly than Star Trek and it was great.
Also, I think it’s important to note that Union training apparently includes “Temporal Law” as if time travel is something bureaucraticly boring. 😉
Thoroughly enjoyed. The score added a lot to this as they went full space epic for the finale.
Few things:
The black hole I didn’t mind. They have FTL drive, they can escape a black hole. It’s not like Interstellar which posed as hard science but – yes you can get data out of a black hole ‘if you’re just quick enough’. You have fantasy technology, you can get fantasy situations.
PROs: They mentioned time dilatation and the ultra violet pulses zipping past them further in to the centre seemed like a nice stab at a ‘what if’ you could look past the event horizon.
CONs: They didn’t seem to be travelling at quantum drive when they left the black hole, and while that ship couldn’t cope with the pressure of the Mariana trench the gravity pull of a Black Hole was not a problem.
Didn’t John get to his position of being kick ass in engineering through Kelly’s recommendation? Alternative John should have still been a goof off. Though the end of civilization might have sharpened his perspective.
Anyone else get a Futurama flash back?
Also:
Kelly got Ed and the whole gang back together pretty quick. I was hoping for a bit more alter-world building and a slower reveal to the characters but ok.Given the accidental/finicky nature of time travel in the previous episode I wasn’t ever sure what the plan was to re-administer the brain wipe. Turns out it was put Claire under the beam and she’ll got right where/when she’s needed.
But these are minor. This was a fun episode.
I love Orville and I haven’t watched any of Discovery, but I wonder if Orville didn’t exist and the makers of Discovery didn’t make Discovery but rather made a Star Trek show like Orville… what would the fan reaction be? I suspect possibly a lot would be upset that the new Star Trek show is so similar to TNG.I think this is hilarious.
I have watched some Discovery, and I have nothing nice to say about it.
However, assuming I happened upon a way to transport myself into the better version of the evil mirror universe we find ourselves in, I would watch the two separate Orville/TNG shows you describe.
The whole episode felt like The Orville’s take on Star Wars – from the costumes to the main ship (boxy, visible thrusters, external antennae and satellite dishes, etc) to the score. The asteroid belt scene felt like it was lifted from Empire Strikes Back and the “resistance base” with Alara felt straight out of Yavin IV or Endor. Really fun turn for me.But yeah, I had totally forgotten about last week’s episode and so when they made the reveal that all of this was because Kelly didn’t give Ed a second date I had to just pause and laugh for a second. I wasn’t a fan with that the show almost seemed to blame Kelly’s choice to not date Ed as the reason all of these bad things had happened when she had a good reason to want to live her own life, but it all worked out.
After the first season finale, I felt like The Orville had started to figure out its place and this entire second season has just confirmed that. I’ll legit miss it if it’s not renewed! But if it’s done then it could do worse as a finale.
I’m glad we’ve cemented Alara as the Yar of the Orville. I love her as a character but Talla’s personality just has more story opportunities to explore.
Totally agree that this would double as an acceptable series finale. As it finished, I wondered if it had been told they weren’t coming back for the third season and I’d just missed the news. Led to a fair bit of googling. I was definitely glad to see Alara come back. I liked her a lot better than her replacement.
I think the episode needed a logistical reason to actually get Mercer back with the crew because I dont see one. They just needed Claire, the future medicine, the wreckage of the Orville, john’s engineering skills , and the access to Isaacs brain. Or am I missing something?
Did anybody catch the Boston album cover shout out?
Or how Kelly had the album art from Journey’s Escape in her apartment.
I did not see that. Good catch!
What’s an album?
amazing episode, amazing season ending. The story line was complicated but had no errors. Seth is a genius.
No errors? It was good, but did we watch the same show?
Dear Fox,Please renew the Orville. You owe the viewing public after Firefly (yes, still bitter), so do not mess this up. Thank you.Sincerely,Westernwolf
I’m betting it gets renewed. People underestimate the incriminating nature of the photos Seth has in his possession.
I can’t have been the only one hoping the Kaylons would succeed when they were chasing Ed and Gordon…
They definitely should have thrown more deaths in, in addition to Yaphet and Alara. It would have raised the stakes on the time-travel fix working.
Can’t say yes to that, but when they boarded the Orville and detected a single life sign, I was thinking “Dann! Oh please let it be Dann! Come on Dann! Oh wait. No Bortus yet. Damn, no Dann”
THAT would have been awesome. He’d have been blathering nonstop from having had no one to talk too for so long.
More likely they’d find him in the holodeck playing Cards Against Humanity with a simulated crew.
My brain said it would be Bortus, but my heart was praying for Dann.
Or even better: Bortus & Dann, trapped together for 7 months.
I was thinking they were opening the door to the simulator instead of the bridge, and would find Bortus on board living in another of of his porn fantasies.
Cool Cool. Of course a white will find joy in giving a strong female character autonomy over their destiny. This whole BS that the universe goes to shit just because they don’t fuck is insulting.Kind of like what you do to our intelligence when you post one of these reviews.
How is it BS? They plainly lay out why Kelly not dating and then marrying Ed (something that happened before the show starts ) led to this universe. Kelly and Ed never dateKelly never cheats on EdKelly doesn’t feel the guilt from cheating, which means she doesn’t push for Ed to be a captainWithout Ed being captain, Claire takes a different postingClaire and Issac never have a relationshipIssac completes his mission and doesn’t turn against his speciesKalon start wiping out lifeThere are valid criticisms to how Ed has been trying to weasel his way back into a romantic relationship with Kelly in the prime timeline but the whole point of this episode is to say that small changes can have large impacts. Kelly tried to change her future because she didn’t like how it shook out when she got to see it. I don’t like how mine did either in some aspects and I’d probably want to save myself the hurt but not at the expense of fucking up an entire galaxy.There is a family guy episode where Brian tells his past self to stop 9/11. Which led to an american civil war and eventually a nuclear holocaust. It’s a standard sci-fi trope that has been explored since time travel was written about.
The universe becomes undone because some basic white dude didn’t get laid.
The middle button on Kelly’s shirt was performing Captain Kirk Level heroics: “Must… Not… Break… Barely… Holding… On…”
If space ships can escape the gravitational pull of a black hole, then it appears Orvillian physics defies our own in many ways.
I can’t help wanting to seem more of the crew in this alternative timeline. It made me nostalgic for Farscape.
I hope the show gets renewed so we can discover what other 20th Century American cultural kitsch is still relevant in the 25th century multi-galactic alliance. Maybe Ed has a thing for Bewitched reruns? ( still watch the show, 🙂 )
The Orville was 7 miles deep with the corresponding pressure. I suppose it would have really messed things up if everyone died of the bends on the way up.
But flying Kaylon attack heads? Nice!
Reminds me of one of my favorite Futurama lines, when they visit the lost city of Atlanta, and Fry asks the professor how many atmospheres or pressure the Planet Express Ship can withstand while underwater: “well, it’s a space ship, so anywhere between zero and one.”
I was thinking of that line all the time they were underwater.
As long as the internal pressure in the crew spaces of the ship was maintained at one atmosphere, they wouldn’t suffer from the bends: this is why submarine crews today don’t have to worry about this condition—while the internal pressure of their sub will fluctuate, it’s on a range akin to that of an airliner’s cabin. It’s divers in the water, who are breathing compressed gases, that get the bends.
They had to flush the water out of the landing bay. That means air at a higher PSI than the water.
During the time they were pushing the water out, yes.
After that, the landing bay would have its internal pressure normalised to one atmosphere so people could breathe easy.
I mean, they also flew directly vertically when they breached the ocean surface and no one seemed to be feeling the effects of gravity. Do they just generate their own gravity regardless of whether or not they’re in space?
A minus! YAY!!
The show has improved so much this second season that it’d be a shame if it didn’t get at least one more season to grow and get more of an audience. Something tells me it would wind up being a huge hit on a streaming service if it did get canned by Fox / Disney. It was nice to see Alara again, but it was also a reminder of the fact that Jessica Szohr is a much, much better actor and I’m glad she’s the regular instead.
Agreed about Szohr. I kinda wonder if this show isn’t being considered for Disney +. It’s genre, family-friendly, and has a fan base that would likely pay to support the show. I don’t know anything about who owns what properties, or what the legality/plausibility of this scenario is, but it doesn’t sound ridiculous in my head.
Probably why Seth decided to go out with a bang and put Kelly’s cleavage front and center the entire episode.
Never forget Seth’s “boobs” song during the Academy Awards. I liked it but it sank like an anchor with that audience.
I was wondering the same thing. It seems like it would be a good fit for their streaming service and I wonder if they are in talks now to move it. I could be wrong, but I thought this show did pretty alright with ratings, does it not?
It is owned by Disney now via 20th century Fox and it would fit their portfolio but I imagine Fox in a bid to stay a network will keep it for a few more seasons just because it will likely be the backbone of their MacFarlane world still. One of the few shining examples unless Rupert really is just going to shutter Network Fox next year.
Well, it’s a Fox co-production with McFarlane’s Fuzzy Door Productions, and since Disney now owns Fox’s entertainment business, there’s no reason THE ORVILLE wouldn’t switch to Disney+ – except for McFarlane’s feelings about it. He might not want to be on a Disney streaming channel, where he’ll not only lack the sheer numbers of viewers even a mediocre broadcast program gets, but Disney might expect him to mind his Ps&Qs….
I already pay for Hulu, no way in hell am I switching to Disney+ for just one show.
I love the show. The second season was spectacular, heads above season one.I will be very sad if they do not renew it. It has become must see TV.Although it is not perfect it is extremely entertaining and cleverly done.I am a fan!
I disagree with the “much much” thing … in fact, I don’t really see the replacement as “better” at all. Wouldn’t say worse but actually like Alara as a character more. Her replacement comes off as a human who is as egotistical about things (including other cultures) as the humans. Alara seemed more her own person including going her own way in her family. Either way, “much much better”? Not in my book.
Good for you.
Uh, “just inside” the event horizon? That’s some comic book science right there.
Stop with the “Dr. Claire” business! Was this review written by a child?
Call her “Dr. Finn”, or call her “Claire”.
I like to think we’re all children at heart.
I’m a PhD, people call me ‘Dr. First Name’ on occasion. Its just a thing and in particular way more common for physicians who want to be close.
Hmm – she goes back in time, and they mis-shoot…and either she’s back on Deep Space Nine in bed with her husband Ben, or she’s chewing out Richard Castle in her office at her NYPD Precinct.
Didn’t Picard say Dr. Beverly, in The Naked Now?
Did he? Well, that is something you might say if you were drunk, and also horny for the doctor in question.
I would!
I might, too, considering that being horny for Beverly Crusher is a normal condition.
as an actual doctor, I can attest I am frequently called “Dr. Chad”…its fine
It’s fine in some contexts, and not so fine in others.
When I was a kid, I went to a doctor whom everyone called “Dr. John”, because his Italian surname was even longer than mine.
However, in a written piece, the standard manner of reference is “Dr. [surname]”, whether about a real or fictional doctor. If there were a newspaper story written about you, the writer of the story surely would not refer to you as “Dr. Chad”, apart from a parenthetical within a sentence such as “Dr. [surname], who is typically addressed by his patients as ‘Dr. Chad’, began his practice in [year].”
I’ve read that J Lee is a very accomplished musician but I’m just not feeling the acting chops for a nationally broadcast TV series. Adrienne Palicki has been killing it, cleavage not withstanding (but it is, obviously).
I love The Orville, but when they just happily dive into the event horizon of a black hole and then just as happily re-emerge, I was very, very disappointed. They even said right before diving in, that not even light can escape a black hole. So their freighter must be the SHIT.
This week on Orville DSV:
A freighter that can survive the gravitational forces inside a black hole, but not the forces down the Mariana Trench.
The only pssoible fan wank I can see for that, is that whatever the basis is for their FTL allows them to jump out. But they did seem to fly out. And, as others have pointed out, the strain on the hull should have been much worse than whatever they felt in the ocean.
The Orville: Days of Future Past?
“Yaphit’s snout poking out of the resistance base was as overt a Star Wars reference I’ve seen from the show yet. The score even had a playful flute trill almost identical to Return of the Jedi.”Yup. And the astroid pursuit. The monitors at the resistance/rebel base. There were a lot of subtle little winks at Star Wars in this one. I sort of found it a poetic way of suggesting that in an alternate universe ,Seth might have made a show that paid homage to “the other big franchise” ;). Seriously though, this show is just incredibly good. Fantastic TV
Yes, absolutely, I think it was clear that the discussion must have gone something like, “Okay, so this is the alternate universe Orville show. Obviously if the prime universe is Star Trek, this other one is Star Wars”. I think if you watch this episode with that in mind, it’s pretty much a spot on style parody/love letter, and I ate it up. The music, the rebel base (and its translucent glowing vertical maps), Alara’s sweeping cape entrance. The darker lighting. The pirate ship, which is kind of a Millennium Falcon mixed with Firefly type place. Of course, Kelly becomes Han Solo. Captain of her own ship — but, not exactly a Union vessel.
And yes, the satellite dish!If they didn’t shoot it in the same forest where the Ewoks defended the extremely similar base, then they sure tried to make it look like they did.All this and a compelling, suspenseful story to boot. And they kind of leaned into Back to the Future after all. I loved it.
I really loved this episode, but I almost feel it would’ve been more powerful if the serum still didn’t work on Kelly, but she chose to say yes to a second date anyway – the pain not necessarily making anything else less worth it, etc.
I liked that this could actually be read either way – what’s to say it definitely worked this time? I do wish they’d called out the broken mug more explicitly; that seemed sure to be an indicator one way or the other.
Why about the broken mug. The way I interpreted the scene is we saw original Kelly transported to the future. We saw the one that went to the future come back with her memories of the future intact and then that version was mind-wiped. The mug drop was from the original disappearance.
Overall it was a good episode, especially in the wake of last week’s, and I too hope the show is renewed. But yes: the whole ‘hiding inside the event horizon’ thing was kind of bull. I’m glad they paid lip service to time dilation, at least, but the event horizon is the point of no return. You can’t just go inside and stay on the very edge for a while, it is the point where you have a bad day that does not get any better. I suppose the amazing future technology of the Union has ways around it, but I have a hard time believing they could hide in there for a little while and come back out and, more importantly, THE MUCH MORE ADVANCED KAYLON COULDN’T FIND THEM. Another ice ring trick would have been fine, hiding in the accretion disk might’ve worked, whatever, but “we can hide just inside the event horizon” is nonsense.This message brought to you by Trekkies Who Should Know Better Applying Basic Astrophysical Knowledge When They Should Really Just Relax.It was good to see Alara again, even if it was just briefly, and while I like Talla more than I had expected, I really do hope Halston Sage comes back to the series long-term. I feel that her character brought a perspective to the show that’s lacking with the much more seasoned (and salty) Talla in charge of security.
The show also hinges on faster than light travel, which is impossible.
It’s okay to accept some things.
FTL is science fiction. Event horizons are science fact.It’s okay to accept these things if they’re treated appropriately.
The show uses faster than light travel based upon the Alcubierre-model warp drive, which is still theoretically possible and taken seriously enough that there are initiatives to develop it, even if it’s a long way off at best. Even so, as ONE PUNCH! pointed out, there’s accepting flights of fancy, and then there’s coming up hard against (a) science fact and (b) internal consistency. I could, perhaps, accept that they used some aspect of quantum drive to hide inside an event horizon, just as they used the quantum drive to travel through two-dimensional space last season. Whatever. It’s a little harder for me to believe that the Kaylon, explicitly more technologically advanced than the Union in virtually every way, could not find or follow them there.
“I could, perhaps, accept that they used some aspect of quantum drive to hide inside an event horizon, just as they used the quantum drive to travel through two-dimensional space last season.”
Me too. So, yea.“It’s a little harder for me to believe that the Kaylon, explicitly more technologically advanced than the Union in virtually every way, could not find or follow them there.”[40’s Era News-Anchor Voice] Guy who seems to understand quantum mechanics forgets that it’s really weird to a point that it often breaks logic, especially as it relates to observations.
Wasn’t just the door, there were loads of Star Wars references crammed in to this episode (e.g. the asteroid field, trench, resistance base design, sound and music effects, Endor and Hoth like terrain and masked introductions, making a point of reminding us the kids name was Ty, etc..) I also loved that the freighter design and its action scenes looked right out of Stargate.
but I just don’t feel like a black hole event horizon is a thing you can amble around as though it were a shrub you can duck behind. I just can’t picture a ratty old freighter being capable of escaping what light can’t.Especially given they didn’t trust the freighter to make the trip to the bottom of the Marianas Trench in one piece…
Asteroid field? Empire Strikes Back! Ice canyons? Lots of Star Wars chases!
I most assuredly would not kick alt Kelly out of my timeline for eating crackers in bed.Whoosh, that was a nice thing she had going on there.
Just renew it already!
We need this desperately, not only because it is so much fun, but cause it helps us digest the “Star Trek – the Michael Burnhum Show”.
To be honest at one point I thought it would be great if they didn’t manage to fix the timeline, but I guess it would have been too dark.
anyway, RENEW IT!
I’ll just make two minor nitpicks for this great episode of this wonderful show.First, Ed should not have been surprised at the news that Alara had been the security officer. He knows Talla, so he is obviously aware that Xeleyans possess super strength.Also, they should not have been using miles to describe the depth of the Marianas Trench. And they certainly shouldn’t have been using PSI! When they fire up the ship’s engines and leave the ocean floor, Gordon initially describes their position in meters off the ocean floor, and then switches to miles.
…also, how had Bortus been surviving for six months while the Orville was completely filled with water?
The ship was not filled with water. The shuttle bay certainly flooded when the door was opened to allow the shuttle to enter; but then it was drained. The rest of the ship continue to be airtight, even if running on low power.Regarding the ship, what I wonder is why Bortus couldn’t have made the repairs during nine months that John made in a few hours, in order to get the ship in flying condition. I realise that John is an engineer and Bortus is not; but, with all that time to himself, Bortus should have been able to study and learn enough to start making some progress on repairs.
Bortus is trying to survive long term. John is just trying to get the time device to work, and if it does everything afterwards is moot.
“what I wonder is why Bortus couldn’t have made the repairs during nine months that John made in a few hours”
Depression, at the realization of the likely truth of the state of both the galaxy and his family.
But Bortus didn’t know that Moclus had been destroyed (and that Klyden and Topa had therefore probably been killed) until Kelly told him. Indeed, he said at first that what had been keeping him going was the hope of seeing them again.
Right, but he might have suspected it. I mean, look at what happened to Earth.I would probably hide in my spaceship and go on auto-pilot too.
That bothered me too!
Minor Quibble: They showed the Earth as a dried-up wasteland one second and then made it sound like it was super difficult to get to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean the next.
This episode could have been a chance to go nuts, especially since we as the audience would not easily believe that the universe would stay filled with all the Kaylon-killed victims and destroyed planets. Instead, everyone got together right away and stayed alive until the ship blew up in the very end. There were no misdirects, no exciting moments (other than visual excitement, like the shuttle run through the ice world). If this was the end for the show, it was a fairly dull way to die.
While Orville has had it’s ups and downs during season two, the finale was some really great television, sci-fi or not. This is everything Star Trek Discovery desperately wants to be but continues to fail at.
While it was overall a well-written and well-produced episode, with a lot of fun moments, this episode just wasn’t emotionally fulfilling to me. We were in an alternate timeline, no characters from the usual “prime” timeline were present, and the way that the problem was solved would seem to have eliminated all of the versions of the characters who would ever have any knowledge that the problem had happened in the first place. Taken in concert with the previous episode, it’s an interesting bit of sci-fi play that I would have loved to see at some other point in the season, but for a really satisfying season finale, I just want to be with – or at least see events that I know will have an emotional impact upon – the characters as I know them.
It’s Renewed. Awesome