Topic: The Orville

[ThePerm]

Aaaah yeah!

This show is great. But not as great as Bortus's moustache.



or this.



Another great thing about this show is where one episode might be hilarious and another terrifying.

[oohhboy]

They found the Undiscovered Flavour Country.

[ThePerm]

Wow what an episode.

[oohhboy]

That is heavy AF. How can the this show keep topping itself. This the best TV show for at least the last decade.

I love the Orville right from the pilot when people were dismissing/crying it over the jokes/Seth/Trek. I cannot describe how blown my mind is. This is a new feeling. **** everything else, inject Orville directly into my brain.

[oohhboy]

Damnnnnn, that is one hell of a season finale. I could only imagine a quarter of what these guys are capable of.

A time travel story that makes sense within their framework, consistent with the past story and has it's own answer to time travel paradoxes without pre-destination?

The sci-fi references in the episode are fantastic. The Orville hell universe is basically Star Wars. There are homages and nods to Star Trek, Stargate, Firefly, Aliens, Babylon 5, The Time Machine. The interstellar Nolan type shots are gorgeous. Those are the ones I spotted. Lady and the Tramp if you want to reach a little.

It takes a shot at itself and Star Wars with the bigass asteroid field and the Black Hole.

The Orville team are master class genius entertainers.

[Plugabugz]

That is heavy AF. How can the this show keep topping itself. This the best TV show for at least the last decade.

I love the Orville right from the pilot when people were dismissing/crying it over the jokes/Seth/Trek. I cannot describe how blown my mind is. This is a new feeling. **** everything else, inject Orville directly into my brain.

Person of Interest is right there, dude. Even you said yourself MAXIMUM NOLAN on that series finale - no show has since managed that shows transformation from average police procedural to analysis into the forms of AI, or even managed an in-depth look at AI (and there's been LOADS since), even landed its finale as well as POI has, or made a show that has gone from science-fiction to real-life as fast.

I do enjoy The Orville when i watch it but its not quite a regular thing. The show is very much a homage to TNG in particular while it story seems to be getting darker and darker towards DS9 - not exactly a bad place to go thematically.

[oohhboy]

POI got seriously constrained by the requirement it must stay as a police procedural. They had some pretty clever workarounds, weakening the procedural portion, but they really needed a couple episodes that was free of that. The budget apocalypse of the last two seasons did alot of damage no amount of creativity could fully mitigate.

POI last season was no doubt an achievement, but the potential wasn't fully realised, something the Orville will never have to contend with. Orville has so many advantages POI could only imagine. POI will always be MAXIMUM NOLAN but Orville is the new king. WestWorld had a good shot to overtake POI at the time, but that second season was just sloppy, it felt like JJ paid a visit.

Orville has achieved something I didn't think was possible, capture the full spirit of Trek, supplant it, add to it and have it's own complete universe. While you can argue STD(ST was already dead) being utter trash fire might have help boost the signal, Orville's quality is all it's own. It proved that a brand is only a brand.

The Orville is more than an homage to Star Trek, it's a love letter to sci-fi. It's beyond being a ST homage.

In an age of entertainment where we have reached a level of creative bankruptcy so horrific and insulting that it has killed many timeless franchises, excellent shows are more important than ever. Slop shouldn't be tolerated let alone rewarded.

Orville is definitely getting darker. It's the result of it dealing with society, people, ethics, relationships than this week's space hole of things. The heart of the finale is about how Kelly sees the world.

[ThePerm]

Wow Star Trek Discovery is really abbreiated STD.

I still haven't watched it to judge it.

I have CBS All Access though. Just for the Twilight Zone.

[NWR_insanolord]

It's not abbreviated STD any more than Enterprise is abbreviated STE or Voyager is abbreviated STV, oohhboy just likes to **** on the series.

[oohhboy]

Save yourself a lot of P A I N by not watching it. STD is a master class in failure. The only entertainment I derive from STD is the suffering of others watching it. It's Last Jedi level terrible bad. So bad you can't hate watch it or riff on it. Don't be a victim.

It's not abbreviated STD any more than Enterprise is abbreviated STE or Voyager is abbreviated STV, oohhboy just likes to **** on the series.

It is the abbreviation it has earned and was entirely foreseeable. Funny you don't say what the "Official" designation is.

Orville Season 2 gag reel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVSYfg7We3Q

Here are some other choice material







I don't smoke, but I want to use my sidearm to light something to smoke.

https://i.imgur.com/Ed0TUxn.mp4

[NWR_insanolord]

Save yourself a lot of P A I N by not watching it. STD is a master class in failure. The only entertainment I derive from STD is the suffering of others watching it. It's Last Jedi level terrible bad. So bad you can't hate watch it or riff on it. Don't be a victim.

It's not abbreviated STD any more than Enterprise is abbreviated STE or Voyager is abbreviated STV, oohhboy just likes to **** on the series.

It is the abbreviation it has earned and was entirely foreseeable. Funny you don't say what the "Official" designation is.

I don't know about official, but the abbreviation that's come to be used among Star Trek fans is "DSC". And I'd definitely recommend ThePerm give it a shot if you already have CBS All Access. It's a divisive show, as oohhboy's hatred and my being a big fan indicates, but you should definitely see for yourself whether you'll like it since you're already paying for it. Season 2 is a step up from the first, but as a heavily serialized show you pretty much have to start from the beginnning.

[ThePerm]

I'm going to watch it eventually. I've watched Most of TOS, I used to watch TNG, DS9, and Voyager sporadically, They're not heavily serialized so you can get away with it. There were times when I watched DS9 and Voyager every week. I've seen every episode of Enterprise. Enterprise was easiest to watch only because when I binged it I hadn't seen any episodes except the first. I think it also has a much lower episode load. Trying to rewatch DS9 is interesting because either I remember the episode well, remember it vaguely, or didn't see it at all. Probably one of the better things I could do with my time though.

[oohhboy]

I have to ask, why are you a fan of STD? It can't be Star Trek as it couldn't be further from it. Is it for continuity or story or lack thereof? Are you there for pew pew? Are you watching it for representation? Are you there for the magic fantasy skinned with pseudo technology? Are you there just because of the brand? Do you like it ironically?

I seriously don't get it. It is easily one of the worse shows I have seen this decade. So bad it has killed Star Trek, not disavowed like Enterprise was, killed.

[ThePerm]

If I were to guess without watching it: STD offers a new Star Trek, but without much continuity with the previous Star Trek 50 year continuity. You're just watching a new Space Federation show. They could have called it new Space Patrol.

Star Trek always offered an introspective weirdness that made you think about how the world works. Like how would you respond to this odd situation? This situation that could very well be an inevitable future situation? How do we start responding to it now?

That was something Voyager was mostly missing. The weirdest episode I remember from that is when they encountered Dinosaur Aliens from Earth who escaped Earth during the great extinction.

The Orville seems to offer an amazing What If? situation every week.

[NWR_insanolord]

I have to ask, why are you a fan of STD? It can't be Star Trek as it couldn't be further from it. Is it for continuity or story or lack thereof? Are you there for pew pew? Are you watching it for representation? Are you there for the magic fantasy skinned with pseudo technology? Are you there just because of the brand? Do you like it ironically?

I seriously don't get it. It is easily one of the worse shows I have seen this decade. So bad it has killed Star Trek, not disavowed like Enterprise was, killed.

I don't want to have this argument with you again because we clearly don't see eye to eye on any aspect of the show, but it's ludicrous to say it killed Star Trek. CBS is going all-in on the franchise right now, there are four or five Trek shows in development, including some very different takes on it. This is the most alive Star Trek has been in a long time.

[broodwars]

Save yourself a lot of P A I N by not watching it. STD is a master class in failure. The only entertainment I derive from STD is the suffering of others watching it. It's Last Jedi level terrible bad. So bad you can't hate watch it or riff on it. Don't be a victim.

It's not abbreviated STD any more than Enterprise is abbreviated STE or Voyager is abbreviated STV, oohhboy just likes to **** on the series.

It is the abbreviation it has earned and was entirely foreseeable. Funny you don't say what the "Official" designation is.

I don't know about official, but the abbreviation that's come to be used among Star Trek fans is "DSC". And I'd definitely recommend ThePerm give it a shot if you already have CBS All Access. It's a divisive show, as oohhboy's hatred and my being a big fan indicates, but you should definitely see for yourself whether you'll like it since you're already paying for it. Season 2 is a step up from the first, but as a heavily serialized show you pretty much have to start from the beginnning.

The traditional acronyms for the series don't use the "Star Trek" portion of the name.

Original Star Trek - typically abbreviated as "TOS"
Star Trek: The Next Generation - typically abbreviated as "TNG"
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 - typically abbreviated as "DS9"
Star Trek: Voyager - typically abbreviated as "VOY"
Star Trek: Enterprise - typically abbreviated as "ENT"
Star Trek Discovery - I've seen a few different acronyms for this one, but the most common one I've seen (outside STD) is "DIS". "DSC" does appear to be the official one per Startrek.com.

[oohhboy]

If I were to guess without watching it: STD offers a new Star Trek, but without much continuity with the previous Star Trek 50 year continuity. You're just watching a new Space Federation show. They could have called it new Space Patrol.

Star Trek always offered an introspective weirdness that made you think about how the world works. Like how would you respond to this odd situation? This situation that could very well be an inevitable future situation? How do we start responding to it now?

That was something Voyager was mostly missing. The weirdest episode I remember from that is when they encountered Dinosaur Aliens from Earth who escaped Earth during the great extinction.

The Orville seems to offer an amazing What If? situation every week.

This is pretty much how I see it. If they didn't use the ST name expecting fans would just eat whatever slop they served they wouldn't be in this situation.

Orville contains long form story telling without serialisation. You can watch any given episode and have it be a complete self contained story, 2 parters excepted. You are rewarded keeping an eye on the details if you watch them in order for the long story. One thing it fully integrated that DS9 only dabbled in brilliantly is the no clean solution. The problem would get solved but a lot of the times you get left with lingering questions of "Did we do the right thing?" "Are the long term consequences going to bite us in the ass?". Answer is "We don't know" and "8 Ball".

Voyager was such a weird beast. It was a show that was clearly meant to be serialised yet would have an on and off relationship with it's premise clearly with no plan. It was at war with its premise by being as episodic as possible making it infamous for hitting the reset button. Quality was all over the place. From the truly bizarre, strong Trek, cheesy, WTF were you thinking bad.




CBS(It's been farmed out) making Star Trek named things doesn't mean it's Trek. Only 2 projects have actually happened, STD and Picard which barely managed to get moving again without third party merchandising support getting made by the same hack frauds. Star Trek dead because the spirit is no longer there, a rotting soulless a husk.

When you have super fans severing you done goofed.

It pretty much means all you want is the name, contents be damned.

[NWR_insanolord]

There are plenty of people who are Star Trek fans who enjoy Discovery. Every series has had fans who disliked it and argue it wasn't true Star Trek, but that's not everyone. They said DS9 didn't have the spirit of Trek, and now it's one of the most beloved series among fans. Discovery takes a different approach to the series than its predecessors, which I appreciate, and so do a lot of fans.

[broodwars]

Honestly, as a fan of Enterprise, I have no grounds to call Discovery "not Trek." I will, however, say its brand of storytelling and character writing is not my kind of show, and I'll continue to happily ignore it.

I have to get back to Orville at some point, probably once the season's over.

For the life of me, I don't understand why Fox won't put this show out on BluRay, just terrible DVDs.

[oohhboy]

I ordered the season 1 sound track on Amazon which costs an arm with the exchange rate. It's still better than direct from Lala Land where shipping adds almost half to the price. I don't know what the deal is with the DVDs, not that I would have brought the Blu-Ray as I don't have a playback device and can't be be bothered to reinstall the DVD drive after the last rebuild, on top of them being DVDs, like wut??

I came to the realisation that this season we had a second season finale with Identity. They could have ended the season right there. That's sort of insane as every other show would save something like that. I can only imagine what they will come up with next.

Renewed for season 3 btw.

I had disavowed Enterprise when it first aired after a couple episodes. I did come back to it much later and man if they released that today it wouldn't last long. The first two seasons are bad but its not insultingly bad, not angry bad, not endless trash. It's very disappointing, boring and the opening montage/music isn't a good choice. It's still Trek, it does try it's best to respect, at least paid lip service and wrote themselves some sensible wiggle room with continuity issues, but you keep thinking "Who wanted this?". Like Voyager before it it didn't use it's premise much. When Enterprise did in the first 2 seasons made for the most interesting stories.

Season 3 onwards abandons the premise which made the show a lot better as it trapped them in something they weren't using. It was entertaining enough for you to go umm, ok... when it messed with overall Trek continuity. It helped they weren't constantly going back to the well trotting out legacy characters begging you to LOVE ME! I AM TREK as when they showed up they fit the story and they were consistent with their previous appearances.

Do I like it now? Very, very mixed as it has some fantastic episodes equally bad ones yet weren't insulting as each episode had some thought put into it. They weren't intentional putting out expensive looking slop expecting you to eat it because it has the Trek name, that ticking boxes enough was going to be good enough.

Enterprise tried from beginning to end to do better, not doubling down on trash. That is something I can appreciate.

[Plugabugz]

My friend has binged his way through The Orville and has two constant complaints.

1 - The Moclans are revisited far too much.
2 - John Lamarr is a terrible character who is too blank all the time.

[oohhboy]

Yeah they go Moclans a bit much. That said the sex lagoon and 5 0 0 Cigarettes is pure gold. Kyden needs to diaf. I am 100% sure the show is intentionally making him a hated character like DS9 with Kia Winn, that fucking bitch.

Maybe John is channelling La Forge too much. John's character is pretty subtle, he is a guy who has been hiding his strength all his life, acting the fool outside of his work. In a ship full of weird people someone like him is going to fade out exactly like what his character would want to do. A lot of his character comes out when giving poorly contextualised dating advice which gave us comedy gold.

The John episodes haven't been kind to him. He is a passenger in Majority Rules. New Dimensions he is more of a sub-plot even though he is earning his leadership role which he had to be pushed into. I am sure they will give him proper episodes. Mallory got 2 very excellent ones this season.

The Orville CD arrived almost 2 weeks earlier than the given ETA from Amazon not that I am complaining, seems like excessive time padding or there is a lot of variance in delivery times here.

[Plugabugz]

Yeah they go Moclans a bit much. That said the sex lagoon and 5 0 0 Cigarettes is pure gold. Kyden needs to diaf. I am 100% sure the show is intentionally making him a hated character like DS9 with Kia Winn, that fucking bitch.

Maybe John is channelling La Forge too much. John's character is pretty subtle, he is a guy who has been hiding his strength all his life, acting the fool outside of his work. In a ship full of weird people someone like him is going to fade out exactly like what his character would want to do. A lot of his character comes out when giving poorly contextualised dating advice which gave us comedy gold.

The John episodes haven't been kind to him. He is a passenger in Majority Rules. New Dimensions he is more of a sub-plot even though he is earning his leadership role which he had to be pushed into. I am sure they will give him proper episodes. Mallory got 2 very excellent ones this season.

The Orville CD arrived almost 2 weeks earlier than the given ETA from Amazon not that I am complaining, seems like excessive time padding or there is a lot of variance in delivery times here.

My friend's complaints about John is about his line readings almost as if he lacks any energy or effort most times in the way he speaks. That's an actor issue more than character. LaForge was definitely more animated (like his blunt "purpose being?" line in Insurrection) and that showed up when he was on screen. To be fair, placing him alongside Scott Grimes (who voices Steve Smith in American Dad) is a bit of a disservice because Scott is a very capable comedian.

[oohhboy]

Yeah, that direction is fair. John hasn't gotten his episode yet and they don't give him much to do. Hopefully he will get the chance to prove his chops like Grimes did giving Mallory a whole new level. Seth and co has to know it's something of a problem, they are too good to not notice.

I haven't seen his other works so that might give some insight as to why he is playing it flat. Maybe there is an outside reason like how Kevin Smith makes movies to keep Jason Mews employed so he doesn't go off the deep end.

[ThePerm]

Hopefully, in the future they'll introduce some new species.

There should be a new villain. There hasn't been anything like the Borg. If I were to do the Borg in Orville I would make it an organic villain. Something like The Thing or the Body Snatchers.

They need to introduce some new friendly species as well. I love how Moclans were a sociological marvel. I think when creating a species that should form the basis of their creation. It isn't so much the species that are different, as it is their culture.

They should go into Dann's species culture origin.