star trek and orville

Cast & crew
User reviews

The Orville

Set 400 years in the future, the crew of the U.S.S. Orville continue their mission of exploration, navigating both the mysteries of the universe, and the complexities of their own interperso... Read all Set 400 years in the future, the crew of the U.S.S. Orville continue their mission of exploration, navigating both the mysteries of the universe, and the complexities of their own interpersonal relationships. Set 400 years in the future, the crew of the U.S.S. Orville continue their mission of exploration, navigating both the mysteries of the universe, and the complexities of their own interpersonal relationships.

Seth MacFarlane
Adrianne Palicki
Penny Johnson Jerald
1.7K User reviews
51 Critic reviews
3 wins & 17 nominations total

Episodes 36

How "Friday Night Lights" Changed Adrianne Palicki's Life

Photos 8812

Capt. Ed Mercer

Cmdr. Kelly Grayson

Dr. Claire Finn

Lt. Gordon Malloy

Lt. Cmdr. Bortus

Lt. Cmdr. John LaMarr …

Lt. Talla Keyali …

Lt. Alara Kitan …

Admiral Halsey

Marcus Finn

Ensign Charly Burke

Lieutenant Turco …

Admiral Ozawa
All cast & crew
Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

More like this

Did you know

Trivia Unlike the first two seasons, the whole third season was written in advance, and scenes from different episodes were shot in a row, based on the location and actors' availability. Jon Cassar and Seth MacFarlane split the direction duties for the 10 episodes so they could work like that.
Goofs Moclan biology makes no sense. It appears that the "males" have all the necessary equipment for reproduction, which implies that they are in fact hermaphrodites. If that were the case, cisgender Moclans would have been bred out as useless, and the concept of "male" and "female" would be at best only a dim memory in the lexicon of the race.

[repeated line]

Captain Ed Mercer : Alara, you want to open this jar of pickles for me?

Connections Featured in The IMDb Show: Take 5 With Jessica Szohr (2019)

User reviews 1.7K

David-Bernhardt
Sep 11, 2017
How many seasons does The Orville have? Powered by Alexa
Where is Alara????
Do the ergonomic chairs on the shuttle resemble the Scary Masks, or is that just me?
Is there ever going to be a third season?
September 10, 2017 (United States)
United States
Official Facebook
Official Instagram
20th Century Fox Studios - 10201 Pico Blvd., Century City, Los Angeles, California, USA (Studio)
Fuzzy Door Productions
20th Century Fox Television
See more company credits at IMDbPro

Technical specs

Runtime 44 minutes

More to explore

Why 'The Orville' Is More Than a Star Trek Homage

The realistic, relatable interpersonal relationships make 'The Orville' something special in the sci-fi genre.

The Orville is a lot of things. It's a wholesome and hopeful show with episodes that focus on different ethical problems. It has well-written and three-dimensional characters. But mostly... it's almost a direct ripoff of Star Trek: The Next Generation . The keyword being: almost . The show is intentionally an homage to The Next Generation (or TNG ), made in an attempt to fill in the hole the classic show left on television. For the majority of the last 20 years, Star Trek has taken off in a different direction from the older eras of the franchise. Starting with the 2009 Star Trek movie by JJ Abrams , the franchise has shifted into being heavier on the action and scope. It basically has been trying to be Star Wars , the franchise's younger and more popular brother. That's why in 2017, Seth MacFarlane released The Orville as the ultimate love letter to what Trek once was.

But as any Trekkie knows, the franchise has changed a lot since The Orville has started airing. Yes, there are shows and films more in line with the JJ Abrams aesthetic, but there's also just a lot more of Star Trek than there's ever been. There's the aforementioned JJ'd shows like Discovery , there's the very odd character piece of Picard , and there's even an animated comedy show with Lower Decks . And that's not even all the Trek shows currently running. In 2022, we were also blessed with the show Strange New Worlds , which certainly aims to go back to the original recipe that made the series so unique. Which, in theory, should make The Orville irrelevant. Why would any show need a spiritual love letter running at the same time as the "real" thing? But The Orville has grown far past just being a love letter between the pilot and now. And a lot of that uniqueness comes from how the writers and actors portray their characters.

The key difference that makes The Orville truly stand out is that the characters aren't as prim and proper as they are in Trek. For context, Star Fleet has always been portrayed as if it's the navy. The rank and hierarchy on the ships is nearly the same. Terms used on the Enterprise and other ships in the series are also almost one-to-one with nautical terminology. This is also true in The Orville , but the characters all speak more naturally. It's natural in the same way that dialogue in Judd Apatow movies feel natural. Nearly every person in the cast has some sort of background in comedy, and it really shows. The crew on the USS Orville have the electric chemistry of a comedy troupe, and it just gives the show a different vibe that is much more chill.

RELATED: How 'Star Trek: Strange New Worlds' And 'The Orville' Show the Emotional Cost of Time Travel

Because the crew all have this type of chemistry, they all genuinely feel like friends. This is such an important part of television shows, because if the characters in the show don't like each other it makes it harder to tune in from week-to-week. But these crewman hang out together, they drink together, confide in each other, and actively want to be around each other in their spare time. This is shown so well with two of the best character duos in the show. The first of these being the bromance between Captain Ed Mercer (MacFarlane) and Lieutenant Gordon Malloy ( Scott Grimes ).

Mallow and Mercer were friends going back to their space college days. The know each other better than anyone and genuinely love each other. Malloy is a bit of a goof, but he always shows that he is completely serious when the time comes. Grimes really sells the energy in his performance as being the ultimate best friend. But between his live reenactments of video games and nerdy interests, he is always there for Mercer in the same way Mercer is always there for him. He even mentions that he was the person there for Mercer as he was going through a divorce. Anybody who sticks by your side in the most depressing lulls of life is always someone you want to keep around. But that's almost expected of new friends, but the show also does a great job of showing blossoming friendships. This is where the other best duo comes in, that of Dr. Claire Finn ( Penny Johnson Jerald ) and Commander Kelly Grayson ( Adrianne Palicki ).

Unlock Malloy and Mercer, these two had never met before they worked together. But over time, they became close friends. Particularly once Dr. Finn started dating the artificially intelligent robot man, Isaac ( Mark Jackson ). When your boyfriend is a robot who literally does not perceive emotions, you're going to need some help guiding that relationship. This is when Dr. Finn and Grayson really started connecting with each other. Both of these women were experiencing challenging new dynamics in life around the same time, and they always found the time to wind down with some wine and talk things out. The one thing that's true about life, is that you can't go through it alone. These two show that meaningful relationships can always happen, and it won't always happen how you expect.

So, what's the point of this then? Trek certainly has all these qualities too; it's not like the series is devoid of brilliant, well-written characters. It's not like these qualities are unique to The Orville . But it is a slight distinction.

There are many great character duos and friendships across TNG , but no one on that show really speaks in the same way that people you would meet on any average day in life do. It creates a degree of separation. Because we can sit down and watch TNG , but it's rare to fully identify with anyone. You can recognize qualities that are similar between viewers and brilliant characters like Riker ( Jonathan Frakes ), but not in the same way that viewers can directly identify with Malloy. The natural speech patterns and genuine friendships on The Orville are always there to remind the audience that, yes, these characters are all great in their field, but they're also just human schmucks like us instead of people you need to aspire to be like. It's obtainable. This isn't to say that either of these roads these shows go down are better or worse than the other, but it definitely does help make sure that they aren't stepping on each other's toes.

And perhaps the most wholesome of these Orville characters is that they all still respect each other. When they are working, they respect each other and refer to each other by rank. They don't let their existing relationships interfere with protecting each other when out on the field. They love each other, and they love each other enough to give and receive well-earned respect. Not only is that admirable, it's so sweet that the show might give you a cavity.

The Inventory

The Orville 's Seth MacFarlane on Those Star Trek Comparisons

Creator and star macfarlane, along with the hulu series' executive producers, explain the differences between the sci-fi shows..

Seth MacFarlane in his Orville costume next to a camera.

When The Orville premiered back in 2017, its arrival coincided almost exactly with Star Trek: Discovery , the first new Trek TV show in over a decade. Comparisons between the two series were inevitable, with even io9 calling The Orville a “ Star Trek spoof ” in our earliest coverage of the series.

Cookie banner

We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from. To learn more or opt-out, read our Cookie Policy . Please also read our Privacy Notice and Terms of Use , which became effective December 20, 2019.

By choosing I Accept , you consent to our use of cookies and other tracking technologies.

Follow The Ringer online:

Follow The Ringer on Twitter
Follow The Ringer on Instagram
Follow The Ringer on Youtube

Filed under:

Pop Culture

‘The Orville’ Is Back for Season 3. But How Does It Fit Into a New Space TV Landscape?

Seth MacFarlane’s comedy-drama returns after three years away. But the television environment it joins now is not the same one it left at the end of Season 2.

Share this story

Share this on Facebook
Share this on Twitter
Share All sharing options

Share All sharing options for: ‘The Orville’ Is Back for Season 3. But How Does It Fit Into a New Space TV Landscape?

It would’ve been so easy for The Orville not to come back. Over two brief seasons, the spacefaring comedy-drama had generated solid but unremarkable reviews and ratings. Its creator and star, Seth MacFarlane, had other irons in the fire— Family Guy , American Dad! , a TV adaptation of the Ted movies. Fox had already shuffled two seasons around the calendar, and plans for a third were put on hold when the COVID-19 pandemic interrupted production. And in 2020, MacFarlane, whose animated shows had been tentpole programming at Fox for decades, split with his longtime corporate bosses and inked a $200 million deal with NBC .

But like its plucky namesake starship, last seen dodging laser beams during a climactic set-piece battle, The Orville has survived for a third season.

In Trial by Content , Dave, Joanna, and Neil will debate pressing questions in pop culture and you—the listener—will decide who’s right.

Vote for the best TV series finale in the latest Trial by Content !

“It’s the most fun writing job I’ve ever had,” MacFarlane told me recently over Zoom. “I love telling these stories, and it’s a wonderful group of people I love working with.”

The forthcoming season, which premieres on Hulu June 2 and is subtitled New Horizons , marks a bit of a shift for the series. The crew composition continues to evolve, with Anne Winters joining the cast as a young navigator. And MacFarlane says the move to Hulu comes with a more “cinematic” visual style. But the biggest adjustment comes not from within the show’s universe, but in the real world’s streaming TV landscape.

When The Orville , which mimics the style and many of the conventions of Star Trek , premiered in 2017, there had been six official Star Trek shows released in the previous 51 years. In less than five years since, CBS All Access and Paramount+ have aired six more, including four that premiered in the three years since The Orville finished Season 2. And the Star Trek shows have had to compete against a constellation of socially conscious spacefaring dramas: big streaming swings like For All Mankind , The First , and Away , and later seasons of The Expanse , among others.

Given all that, the biggest question for The Orville entering its third season is this: Is there still a place for this show when space—and Star Trek in particular—is busier than it’s ever been?

The Orville , in its premise, setting, visual language, and choice of subject matter, is a Star Trek show in all but name. Even some of its senior creative figures, like executive producers Brannon Braga and David A. Goodman, are Trek veterans—though they often try to soft-pedal the similarities between projects. When I asked Braga and Goodman what they’d learned from their previous experience, Goodman laughed and said, “Wait, Brannon worked on Star Trek ?”

The last time MacFarlane’s Captain Ed Mercer and his crew signed off, they held an interesting place in that wider universe. The history of Star Trek has many fault lines and watershed moments, but one of the biggest came between Star Trek: Enterprise ’s ending in 2005 and the J.J. Abrams–directed Star Trek reboot four years later. Before that point, Star Trek had mostly revolved around one premise: Presented with a problem, how would the best of humanity react? The original series and The Next Generation got hundreds of hours worth of mileage out of this setup. And because of creator Gene Roddenberry’s intractable opposition to serialization, these shows became mind-bendingly successful in syndication.

After Roddenberry’s death in 1991, the writers of the various Star Trek series got a little more freedom to experiment, particularly on Deep Space Nine and Enterprise, which began to portray a darker, more cynical side of humanity over longer story arcs. Deep Space Nine introduced an organization called Section 31, which in small doses hinted at a hidden and mostly unremarked-upon cost to maintaining Roddenberry’s sometimes cartoonishly optimistic secular humanist utopia.

The rebooted movies, and particularly Paramount’s new crop of TV shows, took Deep Space Nine ’s spicy twist and embraced it—juiced it, more like—until Star Trek was just like any other sci-fi franchise. If Deep Space Nine added much-needed seasoning to a classic dish, parts of Discovery and especially Picard made the entire meal out of salt.

Against that context, The Orville was a refreshing return to the original premise: mostly episodic, overwhelmingly hopeful, socially conscious middlebrow sci-fi.

“The thing I think was important to bring in [from Star Trek ] was the type of storytelling,” Braga told me, “which was stand-alone stories, well told, driven by this high concept, with a certain optimistic spirit and a certain depiction of the future.”

When I reviewed The Orville ’s first few episodes five years ago , I confronted it as a combination of parody and homage, the work of a comedian playing with beloved storytelling conventions. But MacFarlane and Braga never intended The Orville to be a parody; two seasons in, it’s become more of a pastiche.

“We never approached it as a satire or a parody, which I think would have been the immediate assumption, seeing Seth’s name on it,” Braga said. “The story always came first and the comedy—Seth says it’s comedy frosting—was part of it, but it wasn’t the main driver.”

“That was part of the paradigm from day one,” MacFarlane said. “The story has to work as a story, and then you can hang a bunch of jokes on it and you’re fine. With this show, it was really about finding the tone. The tone, to me, started to really come together at the end of Season 1, and then developed even more fully in Season 2.”

The tone MacFarlane refers to is an intriguing mix of old-school Star Trek ’s resolute moral seriousness and a heavy dollop of goofy humor. The crew of The Orville , especially Captain Mercer, are well-intentioned but definitely not the best and brightest. They bicker over inane problems, they play pranks, they go to work hungover, and they carry out multiyear running gags about having to pee .

In one of the best episodes of Season 2, “Sanctuary,” the crew encounters a colony of female aliens from a heavily patriarchal species. Mercer invites the alien leader to peruse the ship’s collection of art created by the women of Earth, and she immediately seizes on Dolly Parton as Earth’s great feminist poet, who “speaks with the might of 100 soldiers. …This is the voice of our revolution.” Minutes later, there’s a climactic gunfight set to “9 to 5.”

It’s silly, but the jokes are in service of a narrative and a message. And while MacFarlane admits the show struggled to strike the right balance between story and humor early on, he cited the most recent episode of Black Mirror , “Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too,” as an inspiration for The Orville going forward, praising its blending of serious sci-fi and “rompish” comedy.

“The idea in Season 3 was to really lean into that,” MacFarlane said. “That tone is to not lose what’s funny about these characters, but make sure that it’s also real, that we’re not writing a sci-fi story and then surgically looking for spots to add jokes, which was kind of what we were doing at the beginning of Season 1. We stopped pressuring ourselves to do that and really let the story take precedence.”

That turned out to be the key to unlocking The Orville ’s potential and the key to appreciating it for what it is: a drama, occasionally interrupted by jokes.

“I was known as the king of torture on 24 ,” said Jon Cassar, who directed, among other Orville episodes, last season’s two-part “Identity” and the Season 3 premiere “Electric Sheep.” “Comedy wasn’t at the forefront. I think I said that: ‘Really? You really want me to do this show? This is a Seth MacFarlane show.’ And I remember them saying, ‘Drama first.’ We want to play this like a straight-up one-hour drama. That’s the most important thing.”

As MacFarlane’s show filled a lane left open by the Abrams movies and Discovery , though, Paramount delivered a rapid-fire response with several new Star Trek series. They dug Anson Mount’s Captain Pike and the Enterprise out of the vault for Strange New Worlds , which returns to the franchise’s original episodic format and wide-eyed tone . And because there’s so much humor to be mined from watching C+ students deal with problems of galactic importance, Paramount+ has ordered two additional seasons of the animated series Lower Decks to go with the two that have already aired. For two seasons, The Orville gave Star Trek diehards something they couldn’t get on first-run TV. Now there’s competition.

“Up until very recently, we were the only show that was occupying anything near that space and tone in sci-fi,” MacFarlane said. “I think even now The Orville is very much in its own space. It’s got its own vibe. But [how the show holds up to the competition is] not decided by us. That’s decided by the viewers.”

Even among all that noise, MacFarlane still believes The Orville offers something unique. And at the end of our conversation, he touched on the quality that makes the show work.

“It really is still about these people,” MacFarlane said. “On any show you tune in to watch the people. Are these people I want to hang with each week?”

For all the aliens and special effects and wild makeup you’d expect from Star Trek , what makes these shows successful is that viewers like spending an hour a week with the crew. Many years ago, my colleague Brian Phillips praised The Next Generation by writing, “the show offers a fantasy of smart friends working together and supporting each other that’s designed to make you want to join them.” That’s true of every successful Star Trek show, and why the Kirk-Spock-McCoy trio is one of television’s most beloved friendships, or why Avery Brooks’s portrayal of Ben Sisko still resonates a generation later .

The crew of The Orville is … mostly not that smart, but they’re still a part of that tradition. And Season 3 promises to test that family dynamic as the crew deals with the aftermath of a war with the robotic Kaylon. Among the survivors is The Orville ’s science officer, Isaac, who after being sent to study humanity, decided to side with his flesh-and-blood friends against his people. Winters’s character, by contrast, comes to The Orville after suffering immense personal losses in the war and struggles to adjust to sharing the bridge with a Kaylon.

As much as The Orville chimes in on contemporary political issues through allegory, though, it’s always been at its best when the original question of the series—how do normal people stand up to extraordinary circumstances?—is at the forefront.

“The very first time we all met together collectively, Seth said we’re doing a science-fiction piece, but what we are is people who happen to be in space,” said Penny Johnson Jerald, who plays Dr. Claire Finn. “We’ve always been people first, and it’s on the page. We lift the words and emotions off the page so viewers can enjoy and be a part of it. … It truly helps to like your fellow cast.”

“We have a group chat,” said Adrianne Palicki, who plays first officer Kelly Grayson. “We are always constantly in contact with each other, which is a rarity on any show, especially after you’ve wrapped.”

That chemistry gives the crew of the Orville an unexpected warm and fuzzy tone, almost reminiscent of Ted Lasso . (Perhaps if American TV viewers had latched onto this band of endearingly semi-competent work buddies instead, internet discourse wouldn’t be so hysterical . Dare to dream.) And they somehow manage to portray that earnestness without coming off as cloying or phony.

“A lot of television I see is a lot more dark and gritty in its interpersonal relationships and depictions thereof,” MacFarlane said. “I live in a pretty intense industry. I don’t go to work every day and fight with my coworkers and get into spats and deal with high drama. It’s actually pretty pleasant. So I don’t think it’s that unrealistic.”

Thanks to streaming and a bucket-of-crabs-type scramble for corporations to gobble up franchises and squeeze every last drop of blood from every stone, the viewers that MacFarlane defers to have never had more options for spacefaring drama and action. But watching a TV show is ultimately a question of time commitment. In terms of storytelling and visuals, The Orville holds its own with any of its contemporaries. But what makes an episodic TV show stick—including the older Star Trek series—is whether the characters are worth spending time with. Here, The Orville ’s band of weirdos and misfits sets itself apart. You can go boldly wherever you want, as long as you like who you’re going with.

Next Up In TV

Is Bravo Forcing Kyle to Out Herself? Plus ‘Summer House,’ ‘The Valley,’ and ‘Vanderpump Rules.’
‘The Office’ Spinoff, ‘Sympathizer’ Episode 2, and ‘Top Chef’ Episode 6
‘Justice, USA’ With Randy Ferrell and Marshall Goldberg
‘Survivor’ Season 46, Episode 9
‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ Trailer, ‘Shogun’ Finale, and ‘X-Men ’97’
‘Shogun’ Finale Interview Special

Sign up for the The Ringer Newsletter

Thanks for signing up.

Check your inbox for a welcome email.

Oops. Something went wrong. Please enter a valid email and try again.

Tottenham Hotspur v Arsenal FC - Premier League

Arsenal Win the North London Derby, Man City a Point Behind at the Top

For the 200th episode of ‘Wrighty’s House,’ Ian is joined by Musa and Ryan to chat about Arsenal’s win over Spurs and go through the rest of the Premier League

Eagles Sign Mekhi Becton, Draft Leftovers, and Sixers Therapy Session!

Sheil and Raheem chat about the Becton signing before diving into the Sixers’ Game 4 loss to the Knicks

Part 1: The Brunson Game, a Kyrie-Harden Slugfest, and OKC’s Ceiling With Ryen Russillo

Another wild day of NBA playoff action

NFL Draft Superlatives: Most Likely to Get a Coach Fired, Steal a Starting Job, and Host ‘SNL’

Putting together the 2024 draft yearbook

Eagles Draft Review: Day Three Picks, Overall Grades, and What’s Next

After the conclusion of the draft, Sheil and Ben review all of the Eagles’ picks

The Lakers Finally Beat Denver, Orlando Goes Electric, and More From Saturday’s Playoff Slate

Justin and Rob recap Saturday night’s slate, starting with the Lakers staving off elimination

Den of Geek

The Orville: The Best Star Trek Homages

Orville creator Seth MacFarlane has never shied away from the fact that his show is an homage to the classic Trek he grew up watching.

Share on Facebook (opens in a new tab)
Share on Twitter (opens in a new tab)
Share on Linkedin (opens in a new tab)
Share on email (opens in a new tab)

Dr. Claire Finn (Penny Johnson Jerald), Captain Ed Mercer (Seth MacFarlane), and Commander Kelly Grayson (Adrianne Palicki) in The Orville season 3

This article contains spoilers for The Orville: New Horizons and Star Trek .

With a team composed of comedic writers from Seth MacFarlane’s catalog of animated shows, and Star Trek veterans such as Brannon Braga and David A. Goodman, The Orville: New Horizons has been leaning further away from the comedy, and more toward the “Trek” lately.

That isn’t meant to insinuate that The Orville is derivative, as many of the comparisons have come from the same writing team who created the idea first. However, it does seem that they’ve often used successful character dynamics, tropes, or story beats from their past writing, even perhaps improving upon them the second time. If the writers are trying to make a good thing even better, many fans would agree it has worked, with some even calling The Orville the best Trek out there right now.

Yet one cannot help but make comparisons, especially in this third season of The Orville , as it has resulted in some very specific similarities between the two shows.

Ad – content continues below

Ensign Burke and Ensign Ro

A late character addition to an established cast can always be a risk (ask Oliver on The Brady Bunch … or ask your parents if you don’t understand that reference), but it can also be a successful challenge to the dynamic that takes storylines in unexpected directions. Both Ensign Burke (Anne Winters) in The Orville and Ensign Ro (Michelle Forbes) in The Next Generation are low-ranking characters that can easily be seen as annoying or unwelcomed because from the moment they were introduced, they challenged the happy existence of their ship. More importantly, they both challenge their Captain without any regard for command or that aforementioned happy dynamic. As much as Burke has irked many fans of The Orville in only a handful of episodes of her debut season, that’s precisely what she was meant to do. Both she and Ro challenge the other characters on an ongoing basis because this creates more drama in a show that follows a sitcom or episodic formula; simply resetting back to a happy existence after each hour.

Having both characters be survivors of war and terrorism gives them excellent motivation for the chip on their shoulder, as well as shows a darker side to the Roddenberry inspired utopia of these universes. The journey they both have to go on to try and find peace and forgiveness, and find a place within the show, reinforces what both The Orville and Star Trek are all about: humanity.

Both late additions with kindred backstories are simply superficial similarities, it is that journey, and their story that is the most intriguing part.

Dinal and Q

Despite what you may think of the Picard revival, what made the antagonistic but lovable godlike-rogue, Q (John de Lancie) entertaining in The Next Generation was the love/hate relationship with Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) and how Q would torture the beloved captain. It seemed all the Q adventures were never meant to be out of complete malice, but curiosity and respect. Q did treat the Enterprise crew as a lower species, but it was always as if Q had hope for humanity based on what he saw in Picard and his officers.

In “Mortality Paradox,” fans were introduced to Dinal (guest star Elizabeth Gillies), a highly evolved being who, much like Q, put a small section of the Orville ’s crew through a labyrinth of terror. The purpose? To study an aspect of humanity that is beyond her and her people’s reach. If that wasn’t familiar enough, Dinal mentioned that the crew, while terrified for their very lives, were never in any real danger.

Most importantly, Dinal and her species have a very specific connection with Kelly. In the episode “Mad Idolatry,” Dinal’s interdimensional species, the Kandarians, which advances eons while time passes normally for the Orville used to worship Kelly as a deity at one point in their evolution. This could be a hint that audiences have not seen the last of Dinal or the Kandarians, as they have more than a vested interest in Kelly and the crew, much like Q developed an interest in the Enterprise.

The Orville Has Two Versions of The Borg

This list is not meant to be merely superficial, however one cannot help but see an easy comparison between the Borg that hunted the TNG -era Federation and the Kaylon, a species of artificial beings who have vowed to destroy all biological beings.

Get the best of Den of Geek delivered right to your inbox!

In one of the greatest Trek stories ever told, Captain Picard was at one point assimilated by the Borg to represent them as Locutus, one of the only individual voices within the collective. For the remainder of The Next Generation storylines, this incident made the battle with the Borg fiercely personal for Picard and his crew.

As if knowing that the connection between the Kaylon and the Orville crew (which is discussed in the next section) wasn’t enough, the writing team created a new alien species this season that reproduces by completely changing an individual’s DNA. When the crew of the Orville came across this species, the first victim of the invasive transformation is Doctor Finn’s (Penny Johnson Jerald) ex-husband, Admiral Christie (Guest star James Read), adding a much more personal touch the next time they meet.

At the conclusion of the episode, the writers even gave this new menace a catch phrase, “you will be of us,” threatening assimilation. Perhaps not as catchy as “Resistance is futile”, but the writers certainly knew what they were creating an homage to.

The War with the Kaylon and The Dominion War

The comparisons between The Orville and Trek aren’t merely limited to Next Generation . While Brannon Braga worked on almost every iteration of the TNG era of Trek, the one show he didn’t really contribute to was Star Trek: Deep Space Nine . One of the key story threads which truly carried the show in later seasons was the ongoing war with The Dominion. Granted, that ongoing story thread may be derivative of Babylon 5 , but once again, the personal touch is what The Orville focuses on, and DS9 fans will recognize it. The Orville ’s beloved Kaylon, Isaac (Mark Jackson) is that aforementioned connection between the Orville and the murderous army of artificial lifeforms, and certain story points make it more personal.

In one of the most dynamic storylines last season, Isaac betrayed his people to save the crew, and humanity as well. He is the only one of his kind (up until the discovery of fellow Kaylon Timmis in last week’s episode “From Unknown Graves”) who is on the other side of this conflict. He is alone, separated from his people, and seen as an outcast. His specific archetype, that of an emotionally stunted officer trying to understand humanity, is one used quite often in Trek. Think Spock from the original show, Data from TNG or in this specific case, Odo (Rene Auberjonois) from Deep Space Nine .

Odo was separated from his people, the Changelings, a traitor to his race and the only one who saw the evil of the Dominion, Odo had to find solace in his Federation friends much like Isaac only has the Orville . Couple that with the Changelings wanting to cull “all solids” much like the Kaylon’s need to kill “all biologicals” and you have a very similar dynamic.

An Emotional Experience for Isaac and Data

Last week’s “From Unknown Graves” featured another similar story that perhaps could not be helped. With that aforementioned emotionally stunted officer, it is inevitable that they do get their wish and become more human one way or another. For TNG ’s Data, it was his eventual taste of human emotion. The concept was teased for seasons, and never took hold until the first TNG film, Generations .

In last week’s episode of The Orville , Isaac was finally offered that same opportunity. The more empathetic Timmis and his reconfigured artificial brain allowed the chance for Isaac to undergo a procedure for him to truly feel. Issac of course, does go through with the procedure, but tragically it does not take because of his brain chemistry compared to Timmis’. With the ongoing relationship between Isaac and Doctor Finn, it’s safe to assume that Issac’s emotional journey is not complete yet, and when it does take hold, it would have featured the same proverbial roller coaster ride that Data had to endure.

Mercer & Teleya and Chakotay & Seska

Sounds like a science fiction remake of a swinging sixties Paul Mazursky film, doesn’t it? What it really refers to is the common story used in both The Orville and Star Trek: Voyager . Both feature a romance between a high ranking officer of the main starship having a torrid love affair with one of their comrades. In the case of the Orville , it was between Captain Mercer (Seth MacFarlane) and Lieutenant Janel Tyler (Michaela McManus).

A sexual relationship between shipmates is nothing controversial, that is, until you discover the woman in the relationship is actually a spy for one of your most dangerous enemies who has disguised herself as a different species. That was the case for Voyager’s Chakotay (Robert Beltran) and Seska (Martha Hackett). Seska at first was a comrade in the fringe military group known as the Maquis, where she and Chakotay fought side by side against the Cardasians. When it was revealed she was a Cardasian, it was the ultimate betrayal, exactly as it was when Mercer discovered Lieutenant Tyler was in reality, Teleya, a Krill woman who he befriended and betrayed years ago.

Couple that with the common story that both women became pregnant with a child they claim to be Chakotay’s and Mercer’s (respectively) and the love/hate relationship in both shows becomes similarly compelling.

Alara Kitan and Tasha Yar

This list comparing art imitating art becomes slightly more meta when this particular comparison is also a strange case of Life imitating Life. From the very conception of both The Orville and TNG , each show had a tough female as their chief of security. The Enterprise had Tasha Yar (Denise Crosby) and The Orville had their diminutive but insanely strong pickle jar opener, Alara Kitan (Halston Sage). Both characters were about the Roddenberry-ideal of representing all genders and the strength women possess.

In a bizarrely similar style, both actors left their respective shows early in the run. Albeit for very different reasons, but with Tasha dying before the conclusion of the first season, and Alara barely broaching the second season before leaving, it became a strangely similar hole left in both shows. Even more specifically, the fact both characters were brought back to make a cameo in an episode that featured a parallel timeline is simply too many coincidences.

Double Dip Casting

In yet another example of life imitating life, 32 different actors (you read correctly THIRTY TWO) have played featured roles in both Star Trek and The Orville . For those who might deny similarities between both television mythologies, it may be time to see it is more than just a coincidence how similar they can get.

What’s more amazing, is this includes three main cast members of The Orville . Penny Johnson Jerald had a recurring role as Cassidy on Deep Space Nine for several seasons. The hilarious Lieutenant Malloy (Scott Grimes), known for his uncanny ability to out-talk and out-joke anyone, ironically had his lines cut from a guest appearance on only the third episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Most impressive is that star and creator of The Orville , MacFarlane himself played Ensign Rivers in two different seasons of Star Trek: Enterprise . Ok, granted, it was only two episodes in two seasons, but that’s still a great connection, especially when showing how the two universes are inherently linked.

New episodes of The Orville: New Horizons season 3 are available to stream on Hulu every Thursday. The season finale premieres on Aug. 4.

Latest TV reviews

Star trek: discovery season 5 episode 5 review – mirrors, the red king review: uneven folk horror crime mash-up, red eye review: itv thriller starts silly, gets great.

Michael Winn Johnson | @ReelSchool

Teacher and entertainment journalist based out of Toronto. Michael can talk forever about film, television and animation, and how often Toronto sports teams have made him…

Find anything you save across the site in your account

Seth MacFarlane Discusses “The Orville,” “Star Trek,” and the Struggle to Make Science Fiction Funny

By Manu Saadia

Image may contain Human Person Seth MacFarlane Clothing Apparel and Crowd

Seth MacFarlane is most commonly known as the creator—and, in many cases, the voices—of the animated comedy series “Family Guy,” but he is also a lifelong science-fiction buff. He produced “ Cosmos ,” the 2014 reboot of Carl Sagan’s beloved series, and on Sunday will première a new live-action show, “ The Orville ,” in which he plays the captain of a spaceship four hundred years in the future. Earlier this week, I spoke with MacFarlane about the role of science (and science fiction) in the modern world. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Carl Sagan had a big effect on me as a kid. Would you say the same?

A lot of us feel that way about him. “Cosmos” was life-changing for me. I was hooked from a pretty young age. There are surprisingly few great science communicators, which is always strange to me. One could argue that there is nothing more interesting than science. It’s the most interesting thing that’s ever happened to the human race.

Did you ever consider studying science instead of art?

I never seriously considered it, only because I wasn’t any good at math. I had a natural aptitude for English and for writing. So, I resigned myself to the fact that I could support others in their endeavors and maintain a vocal respect for science, even though I wasn’t really cut out for it myself.

With a few exceptions, sci-fi seems to be pretty devoid of humor, unless the audience is laughing at campy set design or bad alien prosthetics. Why do you think that is?

Oftentimes in science fiction, you’re dealing with life-and-death topics that are so grand and operatic in their size and scope that it’s a hard thing to weave humor in there without it seeming out of place. “The Orville” tries to recapture a kind of science fiction that celebrates human advancement and achievement and intellectual evolution rather than going for the cheap thrills of the zombie hunt. The inclusion of humor in “The Orville” is like an experiment.

But what accounts for the grim tone of so much recent (and excellent) sci-fi—“District 9,” “Battlestar Galactica,” “The Expanse”? Does dystopia make for better drama?

I’ve been asking myself this question for a while. Dystopia is good for drama because you’re starting with a conflict: your villain is the world. Writers on “ Star Trek: The Next Generation ” found it very difficult to work within the confines of a world where everything was going right. They objected to it. But I think that audiences loved it. They liked to see people who got along, and who lived in a world that was a blueprint for what we might achieve, rather than a warning of what might happen to us.

Did you draw on that utopian “Star Trek” vision at all in making “The Orville”?

It was important to take a cue from Gene Roddenberry that somehow we’ve gotten past money. Money can’t be a factor. It’s too primitive. I really love that, in “Star Trek,” reputation becomes the main form of currency in the absence of money. When you think about it, it’s not the warp drive, it’s not the transporter, it’s the replicator. We give a little nod to that in “The Orville.”

Is making science fiction today a form of nostalgia for what could have been, or what could be, or what we were as kids when we were watching it?

There absolutely is nostalgia. “The Hunger Games” made hundreds of millions of dollars and was a huge success. I’m personally a little weary of that corner of science-fiction storytelling. I’m getting tired of seeing filthy people running around with guns, fighting for their own survival, rather than fighting for a cause, for values, for the advancement of the human race. There’s nothing like that out there. Does optimism still have meaning for people? It could feel outdated, like a nineteen-thirties musical that’s devoid of cynicism and is looking at the world through rose-colored glasses and is oblivious to what’s going on.

The comparisons between “The Orville” and “Discovery,” the new addition to the “Star Trek” franchise, were inevitable, especially because a number of “Star Trek” veterans—writers, actors, directors—are now working with you. Some Trekkies are angry. What’s your response?

I’ve heard that, and yet I’ve also heard fans echo the desire for a “Star Trek” where they turn the lights on, where everybody’s not sitting around in the dark. I don’t know anything about “Discovery.” It looks very dark and very serious, but that’s the trailer—it could turn out to be very optimistic. There should be room for both. But it’s been a blast to work with all these people, to watch Jonathan Frakes and Robert Duncan McNeill walking around the set. It’s in their blood.

Speaking of economics, “The Orville” is a classic broadcast family show, whereas “Discovery” is streaming online. Different mediums, different audiences?

Yes. Typically, people would be able to watch “Star Trek” with their kids, and the goal of “The Orville” is to have the same kind of reach. The big difference is that “The Orville” is an episodic show. It adheres to the old style of storytelling—a brand-new story each week, with a beginning, middle, and end. The only place where there is still a market for episodic television is on the networks. At one point, I had conceived “The Orville” as a show that could be on Netflix or Amazon or Hulu. But they really wanted the entire series at once, you know, the chunk of ten or thirteen episodes that have a continuous arc. I didn’t want to do that. I like the challenge of having to start fresh every week. Now, production-wise, this is a lot more daunting, because you can’t reuse things—you have to build new aliens, new locations, new worlds every single week. But that’s precisely what I always loved about sci-fi television series. I never knew what I was going to see.

Both comedy and drama have in common that you must excite viewers with surprise. You surprise them with a laugh or you surprise them with a story. To me—God, a new adventure every week! That’s inherently surprising. People don’t know whether they’re going to see an adventure show, a social allegory, a love story, or a comedy.

Is “The Orville” a show about the present, or about the future?

It’s a balancing act between wanting to explore conflicts that are relevant to today while at the same time saying to the viewer, This particular conflict has been resolved. The way you do that is by putting our people in other worlds. You go to that alien planet where they’re still sucking oil out of the ground to power themselves while “we” know we moved beyond that. I always loved that sci-fi trope of the future person scratching their head in disbelief at something that we do every day in the twenty-first century. It’s “Gulliver’s Travels.”

What do you think we can discover about ourselves through science fiction today?

Science fiction is the only genre that really allows you to explore issues with a point of view without seeming preachy. And, practically speaking, it is undeniable that shows like the original “Star Trek” begat a generation of scientists and engineers and astrophysicists. That spaceship looked like the crowning achievement of mankind. What kid is going to watch “The Hunger Games” and go, Man, I want to be a scientist? “The Orville” is part drama, part comedy, but we did go out of our way to make the ship real and to make it appealing and to make it look like a place you’d want to be. Even though there are jokes in the show, it was very important that the world of “The Orville” still be very real, that you could look at it and go, That seems like a fun future. I hope that’s where we wind up. That, to me, is the power of science fiction.

By signing up, you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

By David Remnick

Entertainment /
TV Show Reviews

With the two-part episode Identity, The Orville has matured into serious science fiction

Seth macfarlane’s star trek homage may finally be ready for a wider audience.

By Will Harris

Share this story

If you buy something from a Verge link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics statement.

The Star Trek homage series The Orville is the Rodney Dangerfield of science fiction shows: it doesn’t get much respect, especially from genre fans. Whether that’s because of the tonally awkward blend of comedy and drama, the incorporation of 21st century pop culture references, or an active distaste for creator Seth MacFarlane, the reference-spouting creator of Family Guy , just mentioning The Orville around more stoic science fiction aficionados will likely earn you an instant sigh and an eye-roll.

For true MacFarlane haters, that mindset may never go away. But with the recent two-part episode “Identity,” the series turned a corner that might finally sway some of the more indifferent audiences onto Team Orville. The episode might surprise viewers who gave up on the show after the first few episodes. It got dark .

Like, “Best of Both Worlds” dark.

Star Trek: The Next Generation fans will understand what a bold statement that is. The two-part “Best of Both Worlds” — 1990’s season 3 finale and season 4 kickoff — left fans horror-struck, as the Enterprise faced off against the monstrous alien Borg, and lost Captain Picard to assimilation .

With “Best of Both Worlds,” Star Trek: The Next Generation finally vaulted past being just another special effects-laden space series, and it proved its mettle as a tense character drama. While the two “Identity” episodes may not propel The Orville forward to quite that degree, they deliver enough surprise, mystery, horror, and action over the course of two hours — complete with a nail-biting cliffhanger in the middle — to confirm that when The Orville dials down the goofy comedy, it can hold its own with any of the more traditional science fiction properties out there.

Kicking off with the incapacitation of the artificial life-form Isaac (Mark Jackson), who serves as the starship Orville ’s science and engineering officer, “Identity” takes the Orville to Isaac’s home planet, Kaylon-1, which has yet to join the Planetary Union. While there, the crew stumbles upon a ghastly aspect of the planet’s history. When they confront the Kaylons about the disconcerting revelation, all hell breaks loose, and it’s immediately evident that no one on the Orville will ever look at Isaac the same way again.

Even with its new, grimmer bent, The Orville still isn’t a nonstop source of sophisticated drama. And it’s never likely to be. When the show joined Fox’s prime-time lineup in September 2017, it came across as something a gifted 12-year-old Star Trek fan would pen if assigned to create a space show. The creative concepts were slightly ahead of the curve for mainstream TV fare — when was the last time you saw a live-action series in which one of the characters was a gelatinous blob? — but the sense of humor was set at exactly Family Guy ’s maturity level, particularly with the jokey character of Lt. Gordon Malloy (Scott Grimes). (In the pilot episode, an admiral played by guest star Victor Garber asked about Lt. Malloy. “Didn’t he once draw a penis on the main viewing screen of outpost T85?” The answer, of course, is a resounding “yes.”)

The amalgam of attempted intelligent science fiction and middle school body part humor was jarring — based on the reviews , it might have actually caused some critics physical pain — and even those who came into the series with an open mind and an appreciation of both highbrow and lowbrow entertainment wondered just how long the series could successfully pull off its balancing act.

Fortunately, while Seth MacFarlane enjoys a good fart gag — actually, make that a googol’s worth of fart gags — he also truly loves Star Trek . And he knows what makes that franchise work: the distinctive characters, the bonds between them, and the increasing development of those bonds throughout their voyage. He understands that alternating between testing and tightening those bonds is ultimately more important than putting his own jokey spin on every aspect of his show’s science fiction.

As early as its third episode, The Orville ’s creators were offering allegorical, politically relevant plotlines. In “About a Girl,” alien Lt. Commander Bortus (Peter Macon) and his significant other, Klyden (Chad Coleman), put ship’s doctor Finn (Penny Johnson Jerald) in a morally awkward position when they ask her to perform sex reassignment surgery on their daughter. The procedure is standard practice for the Moclan people, but after Dr. Finn confirms that it’s based in a belief that females are inferior, she refuses to have anything to do with harming a physically healthy child. The episode is heavy-handed, but between the general premise and a not-entirely-happy ending, it was immediately held up as an example of the series MacFarlane was really trying to make, as opposed to the too-simple elevator pitch dismissive critics used to describe the show: “Sci-fi from the creator of Family Guy .”

The episode also wasn’t an immediate course-correction for The Orville . The series has had to work through other growing pains beyond simply finding a balance between its sensibilities. The two leads — MacFarlane and Adrianne Palicki — play the Orville ’s Captain Ed Mercer and his first officer / ex-wife Commander Kelly Grayson, and the series tends to play the “will they, won’t they” card about whether they’ll get back together. The parallels between Isaac and Lt. Commander Data of Star Trek ’s flagship Enterprise are often a little too on the nose, while the writers never seemed to know what they wanted to do with the character of Lt. Alara (Halston), beyond piling on unrelated bits of backstory that consistently failed to make her stand out.

As these characters floundered in season 1, however, Dr. Finn got a solid spotlight episode with “Into the Fold,” which let her shine as a doctor, a mother, and an officer after a crash-landing on a planet crawling with cannibals. And just before season 1 wrapped up, Lt. John LaMarr got his shot as the focus of the episode “New Dimensions” where he was promoted to lieutenant commander and chief engineer and, more importantly, had his backstory fleshed out to reveal his genius-level intelligence and history of being shunned and bullied.

As the season ended, The Orville still had its problems, but in spite of the flailing moments during the course of its first dozen episodes, there was also a sense that the series was finding its footing and shifting its focus toward deepening the characterization. And the series confirmed its shifting intentions with the season 2 premiere “Ja’loja,” which offered up little action but instead provided storylines for every single main character. Individually, none of these stories qualify as game-changers — Lt. LaMarr helps Lt. Malloy step up his game in order to ask out a crew member! Isaac helps one of Dr. Finn’s sons with a bully problem! — but viewed as a whole, they set a new tone.

The Orville also started to have fewer overt jokes and more conversations. In “All the World is Birthday Cake,” the crew has to scheme its way out of a tough spot, which leads to a discussion about the moral implications of their actions. In “Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes,” the series revisits a plot point from a season 1 episode to reveal the ramifications of one of Captain Mercer’s defensive action. And while the decision in “A Perfect Refrain” to have Dr. Finn develop romantic feelings for Isaac sounds like a terrible idea in print, Jerald’s acting skills make a relationship between a human and a near-faceless artificial life-form seem credible.

Then there’s “Identity,” and its parallels with “Best of Both Worlds,” starting with the way they share a startling cliffhanger that leaves the fate of not only a primary character, but an entire planet worrisomely uncertain. With its two-parter, The Orville uses all of its characters and past developments to tremendous effect — even the least substantive character on the show, the gelatinous-blob crew member Lt. Yaphit. When the series started, there seemed to be very little reason for his existence beyond getting laughs out of having a ball of goo talk with Norm Macdonald’s voice. In “Identity,” Yaphit doesn’t just serve a purpose, he plays a significant role with actual dramatic moments.

The Orville still isn’t a perfect science fiction series. It’s toned down the dodgier side of its humor, but it still has its sporadic 21st century pop culture references. Given its creator and star, it’s hard to imagine that ever going away. But it has reached a turning point in its evolution, a stage where MacFarlane seems ready to embrace the more adult side of his story and make something significant out of it. “Identity” is a game-changer. For people who saw the potential in The Orville enough to consider tuning in but didn’t like what they saw, it’s a perfect time to come back aboard.

The walls of Apple’s garden are tumbling down

In the first autonomous racing league race, the struggle was real, the apple vision pro’s ebay prices are making me sad, they turned cattle ranches into tropical forest — then climate change hit, the oled ipad pro could launch with an m4 chip.

More from Entertainment

You should play Splatoon with your family

The Nintendo Switch 2 will now reportedly arrive in 2025 instead of 2024

The best Presidents Day deals you can already get

An image announcing Vudu’s rebranding to Fandango at Home.

Vudu’s name is changing to ‘Fandango at Home’

The Orville

View history

The Orville is a live action parody of and homage to Star Trek , specifically Star Trek: The Next Generation . The show was created by and stars Seth MacFarlane and is co-produced by Brannon Braga , former Family Guy collaborator David A. Goodman , alongside another Star Trek veteran Andre Bormanis , who reprised his role as technical advisor. Braga himself states the series "is aiming to tell stories that ride the line between drama and comedy, with an eye toward earnestness." [1]

2 Production
3 Actors who have appeared in Star Trek and The Orville
4 Production personnel who have worked on Star Trek and The Orville
5 Book authors who have written on Star Trek and The Orville
6 External links

Concept [ ]

The main cast

Set in the 25th century , the series chronicles the adventures of the USS Orville , a mid-level starship exploring the galaxy on behalf of the Planetary Union. Her captain is Ed Mercer, who receives the job due to no other captains being available, his career having slumped after a divorce. Mercer's hope of proving himself and serving the Union are complicated when his ex-wife, Commander Kelly Grayson, is assigned as his first officer . Despite initial tensions with Kelly, Ed soon forms a tight-knit crew.

Production [ ]

The series was officially announced in March 2016, though MacFarlane had stated for years he had a passion for science fiction and space opera related media. He was reported to have heavily managed every detail of the series during the show's productions, wanting The Orville to truly be a thriving universe that could justifiably be seen as a spiritual successor to the Star Trek series before it. MacFarlane had also expressed inspiration from not just Star Trek , but The Twilight Zone , Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy , and Deadpool as well. [2] [3]

The Orville debuted in September 2017 for FOX TV (as of July 2018 fully owned by The Walt Disney Company , already owner of rival franchise Star Wars ) and starring MacFarlane as Captain Ed Mercer, with Penny Johnson Jerald as chief medical officer Claire Finn, and Scott Grimes as helmsman Gordon Malloy. Star Trek actors appearing in the series have, so far, included Victor Garber , Brian George , J.D. Cullum , James Horan , Ron Canada , Joel Swetow , Brian Thompson , Molly Hagan , Steven Culp , Michael Duisenberg , Jason Alexander , John Fleck , Tim Russ , F. Murray Abraham , Tony Todd , Marina Sirtis , Robert Picardo , and John Billingsley (with Picardo and Billingsley appearing together in the episode "Home"); MacFarlane, Braga, James L. Conway , Jonathan Frakes , and Robert Duncan McNeill have directed episodes. Marvin V. Rush – who was director of photography for TNG – serves as the show's cinematographer. Doug Drexler joined the program's visual effects (VFX) team for the third season. [4]

Although initially promoted as a spoof, the series is in fact a comedy-drama (dramedy) done in the style of TNG. MacFarlane had previously expressed interest in rebooting the Star Trek franchise in October of 2011, when he mentioned to the Hollywood Reporter that he was eager to reboot a Star Trek series for television: " I'd love to see that franchise revived for television in the way that it was in the 1990s: very thoughtful, smartly written stories that transcend the science fiction audience. I don't know who would give me the keys to that car. " [5] MacFarlane indicated his intent was to pay homage to Star Trek with the show while resurrecting the style of optimistic science fiction TNG espoused. [6] In this MacFarlane succeeded eventually, as his show not only attracted " Trekkies " disenchanted with Discovery for canon and philosophical premise reasons (and reminiscent of how Ronald D. Moore 's re-imagined Battlestar Galactica drew in Star Trek fans who were disenchanted for basically the same reasons with Star Trek: Enterprise over a decade earlier), but also former Star Trek production/franchise staffers like Michael Okuda and Larry Nemecek . As if to underscore their embracement of McFarlane's creation, Eaglemoss Collections launched an Orville partwork collection in 2020, partly at the request of these former production staff fans, [7] and similar to that of its rival counterparts, Star Trek: The Official Starships Collection and, most poignantly, Star Trek: Discovery The Official Starships Collection .

A major difference with its contemporaries became the decision to go "old school" with a traditional physical studio model for the establishing shots of the "hero ship" Orville in order to get the retro feel MacFarlane was aiming for. By that time a near obsolete VFX technique in the age of CGI , pilot episode director Jon Favreau contracted several veterans still versed in the antiquated technique which included Star Trek alumnus and veteran Robert Legato for the motion control photography. Even though the majority of the other VFX shots were executed as CGI, the footage taken of the physical model served as a library of stock footage (especially for the show's intro), apart from the model being used as as scanning model as well as a camera test model. [8] The creation of a stock footage library had actually already been Legato's original intent to begin with for the two original USS Enterprise -D physical models for The Next Generation back in 1987. ( Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion (3rd ed., p. 31))

Due to Star Trek: Discovery ' s production delays, The Orville ended up debuting only two weeks before Discovery , leading to many reviewers making head-to-head comparisons between the shows.

The first season, consisting of 12 episodes, concluded in December 2017. A second season was commissioned soon after its debut (along with Star Trek: Discovery , The Orville was one of the first new series of the 2017-18 season to be renewed). Prior to broadcast of Season 2, MacFarlane indicated that the second season would have a more serious tone than the first, downplaying comedy in favor of more straightforward science fiction storytelling. Season 2 debuted at the end of December 2018 and scheduled the same night as new episodes of Discovery were released on CBS All-Access, which strengthened the perceived impression of the two having become de facto franchise contenders. This was reinforced by the 2019 Emmy Award nominations where The Orville 's second season was put up against that of Discovery for the category "Outstanding Special Visual Effects" [9] – though neither of them won the coveted prize as it went to Game of Thrones , with former Star Trek VFX staffer Joe Bauer being one of the recipients. [10] Ironically, from its second season onward, The Orville was served by digital VFX vendor Pixomondo , who has been Discovery 's primary CGI vendor from its inception. [11]

A surprising development occurred in June 2021, when the series became syndicated on Spike (Netherlands) as a temporary replacement for Discovery , going on to become Discovery 's companion series for the channel's "Sci-Fi Zondag (Sunday)" line-up. The surprising element lay in the fact that Spike was fully owned by Star Trek franchise owner Paramount Global , whereas the now Disney-owned Orville series has been moved to its streaming service Hulu as a Hulu exclusive, [12] which (along with its streaming sister Disney+) is embroiled in an increasingly vicious " streaming war " with the other services, including Paramount+ , particularly on the home market.

Actors who have appeared in Star Trek and The Orville [ ]

Production personnel who have worked on star trek and the orville [ ], book authors who have written on star trek and the orville [ ].

Jeff Bond – The World of The Orville , Titan Books , 16 January 2018 ( ISBN 1785657615 )

External links [ ]

The Orville at Wikipedia
The Orville at the Internet Movie Database
The Orville Wiki
2 ISS Enterprise (NCC-1701)

Stranger Things Season 5
Deadpool and Wolverine
The Batman 2
Spider-Man 4
Yellowstone Season 6
Fallout Season 2
Entertainment

Suck it, Picard. The Orville is Star Trek: The Next Generation’s true spiritual successor

Seth MacFarlane’s sci-fi small screen epic, The Orville — now streaming its third season on Hulu as The Orville: New Horizons — is one of the strangest experiments on television. It’s a virtual copy of Star Trek: The Next Generation , a loving homage to that series, and a strong show in its own right. It shouldn’t work, but not only does it work, it has become more intricate and compelling over time (one of many things it has in common with TNG ).

How The Orville channels The Next Generation

A special found family dynamic, the orville channels the best tng stories, it wrestles with philosophical conundrums.

There are currently no plans for a fourth season, which is a shame because MacFarlane’s universe is as rich as any sci-fi universe going. As with Star Trek, a wealth of satisfying stories can be spun from this material. The Orville could have easily been a flop, but it’s destined to become a classic in its own right, and one that embodies more of the Star Trek spirit than the officially sanctioned TNG successor Picard ever could.

At the universe-building level, The Orville is basically TNG with different names. While this could be an uncharitable description, you only have to watch the show to recognize that MacFarlane and his team — including Brannon Braga, who served as a writer and producer on TNG and other Trek shows — aren’t trying to plagiarize anything. They clearly present The Orville as an alternate universe Star Trek, with characters, species, planets, and technology that would be at home in the original.

The best sci-fi shows on TV right now
Star Trek: Picard season 3 brings back Next Generation cast
A Star Trek fan deepfaked Next Generation-era Data into the new Picard series

Like Trek, The Orville is set centuries in the future during an era when Earth has become part of a Planetary Union similar to the United Federation of Planets. The Union’s primary mission is peaceful exploration and discovery, and one of its flagships is the USS Orville, an Enterprise-like vessel; though, like Starfleet , the Union is also a quasi-military hierarchy with the same naval ranks as Trek: admirals, captains, commanders, lieutenants, and so on.

The Union maintains tense alliances with various alien species, including the Krill and the Moclans, both of which resemble the Klingons from Star Trek. The main villains, meanwhile, are the Kaylons, an android collective dedicated to wiping out biological lifeforms. With their merciless mission and advanced technology, they resemble The Next Generation’s famous Borg .

Perhaps the main difference between the two fictional worlds is that the Enterprise and other Trek ships use transporters to “beam” people to and from their destinations, whereas Union ships must ferry officers and crew around via shuttlecraft. Though given the show’s high-quality special effects, it makes sense to include dazzling shots of shuttles whizzing onto the surface of planets and docking in gleaming bays. They also feature in some nifty action sequences as well — something The Orville does better than TNG, not surprisingly, given 30 years of VFX advances.

As with the similarities between the fictional worlds, the main characters in The Orville mirror their Next Generation counterparts. TNG ‘s famous crew included Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart); first officer, Will Riker (Jonathan Frakes); the android second officer, Data (Brent Spiner); the Klingon security chief, Worf (Michael Dorn); Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Beverly Crusher (Gates McFadden); the ship’s counselor, Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis); and Chief Engineer Geordi La Forge (LeVar Burton).

The Orville presents almost exact replicas of some of these characters. McFarland himself plays Captain Ed Mercer. His first officer (and ex-wife) is Commander Kelly Grayson (Adrianne Palicki). The ship’s Chief Medical Officer is Dr. Claire Finn (Penny Johnson Jerald). The Kaylon Science Officer, Isaac (Mark Jackson), the Moclan Second Officer, Bortus (Peter Macon), and the Chief Engineer John LaMarr (J. Lee) are so similar to TNG ‘s Data, Worf, and La Forge, respectively, it’s almost funny. And perhaps these characters would feel more like knockoffs if they weren’t so well developed and performed. Jackson is especially memorable as an entity that is just as particular and contradictory as Data — no small feat, given he’s walking in the robot steps of Brent Spiner’s classic creation.

MacFarlane has long been a fan of TNG and its characters. The main cast even lent their voices to an episode of Family Guy (if anyone somehow doesn’t know, MacFarlane is that show’s creator as well as one of its principal voice actors). In general, MacFarlane makes no secret that he is both a television lover and a walking catalog of TV knowledge. His gift for simultaneously mimicking and satirizing TV tropes is the key to Family Guy ‘s success, along with his innate understanding of how “family” dynamics work on TV. He understands that some of the most beloved shows — Cheers , M*A*S*H , The Mary Tyler Moore Show , and the original Star Trek, among them – – are about found families, people thrown together through work or circumstance who come to care about each other deeply, and for whom the audience comes to care deeply as well.

Star Trek: The Next Generation is one of the great found family shows. Its main characters became devoted to each other over seven seasons of having their relationships forged in fire. On Picard , the belated sequel to TNG (the third and final season is currently in production), the older Picard proclaims his love for the deceased Data often, drawing on viewers’ tender feelings and nostalgia for their relationship.

Unfortunately, Picard doesn’t create relationships of similar depth within its own drama. It tries to use the “gathering the team formula” typical of heist movies to create a found family crew, but the result is an uneasy dynamic. Aside from the still-great Patrick Stewart, neither Picard ‘s characters nor its actors contribute anything memorable. At the show’s worst, some of the supporting actors — young and too attractive and spouting quippy dialogue that sounds way too contemporary — feel like they beamed over from a CBS procedural.

The Orville , on the other hand, perfects the found family dynamic. As with TNG , the characters and relationships are the keys to the show’s enormous emotional appeal. The big advantage of creating the show in today’s viewing environment is that MacFarlane can pay careful attention to the quality of the stories. TNG was famously uneven, largely because of the pressure to come up with 26-hour-long episodes a year for seven straight years (22 in season 2, due to the Writers Guild strike ). It’s not easy to write compelling drama with huge stakes at heightened levels of philosophical, intellectual, and human interest, while also trying to continually expand an enormous story world and do it all with expensive and elaborate special effects and production design.

But when the showrunners nailed it, they really nailed it. The great episodes of TNG — including The Inner Light , Cause and Effect , The Measure of a Man , The Best of Both Worlds , and All Good Things — remain among TV’s great episodes. The advantage of The Orville is that in creating only 10 to 14 episodes per season — and with a three-year hiatus between seasons 2 and 3 — the writers could pay greater attention to quality. In essence, almost every episode of The Orville (yes, there are a few weaker ones) feels like a good to great episode of TNG .

One of the ways that the show honors TNG storytelling in general, and the found family dynamic in particular, is through the approach of highlighting different supporting characters in each episode. You have to give MacFarlane credit for checking his ego here. He never tries to make Mercer the alpha male hero, and neither does he stand back at some comic remove, making fun of everything (although the early episodes were funnier, sometimes distractingly so, as the show was trying to find its tone). Instead, he fully commits to this material and the result is that The Orville has become very involving, even moving, over the course of its run.

One of the best season 3 episodes, Midnight Blue , exemplifies the approach. Written by Brannon Braga & André Bormanis, Midnight Blue furthers the saga of Topa (Imani Pullum), a young Moclan born of two fathers, Bortus and Klyden (Chad L. Coleman), who undergoes gender reassignment surgery to become female against Klyden’s wishes. When Topa later becomes imperiled by warring factions who want to use her for political ends, the crew risks everything to save her, concluding with a sequence of family reunion that will have you sobbing.

Dolly Parton also features in the episode as a feminist icon from the past. She gets a beautiful scene in which the show uses her music to underscore a stirring sacrifice by one of the characters. By all rights, the Parton stuff should play more like one of the famous interstitial scenes from Family Guy that delivers a joke but isn’t part of the narrative proper. Instead, we see that her music truly belongs in the stars.

All of this extends Star Trek’s progressive legacy. It’s a little astounding, given the crass misogyny of Family Guy (I know it’s supposed to be a put-on, but still), how progressive The Orville tries to be, especially in the way it insists on tolerance and equality around issues of gender, sexuality, and race. Star Trek has always been avowedly progressive. But, as fans know, different iterations of Trek have been trapped within the constraints of their cultural eras — which is why, for example, it took decades for the franchise to start prominently featuring LGBTQ+ characters. Although far from perfect , The Orville tries to use its platform to show how humans have evolved to become enlightened in ways that resonate meaningfully for groups and people struggling today.

One final reason for the greatness of The Next Generation was that it dramatized enormous philosophical issues about the befuddling contradictions of human identity, the mysterious nature of time and memory, and the agony of negotiating impossible moral quandaries. Star Trek in general often uses time travel as a, ahem, vehicle to explore such ideas, and TNG also employed its famous “temporal shifts.”

In The Inner Light , one of the most mind-blowing episodes of television ever produced, Picard gets knocked out by an alien presence and wakes up to find out that he’s been deserted on another planet. He gives up hope of being rescued and lives the rest of his life in his new home. At the episode’s conclusion, he wakes aboard the Enterprise to find out he’s only been unconscious for about 25 minutes, yet now lives with this entire alternate reality inside him. It’s a profound way of dramatizing how many paths our lives can take, as well as the humbling reality that, on a cosmic scale, none of us lives more than an instant.

The Orville ‘s season 3 time-travel episode, Twice in a Lifetime , written by MacFarlane, presents its own version of a knotty time travel problem when helmsman Gordon Molloy (Scott Grimes) gets trapped on Earth circa 2025. The Orville’s crew figures out a way to go back to retrieve him, but mistimes their jump into the past and lands about 10 years after Molloy has established a new life with a wife and kids to whom he is now devoted.

Molloy strongly resists returning to the Orville and his old life, but he’s violating strict rules about screwing with the past that could alter the future. How do you make the choice to give up your family for the greater good? And if you could return and blank the memory of your alternate life, would that experience somehow linger within you? And would you want it to linger or would that be too painful? This is just one of the many gripping scenarios that make The Orville such a worthy descendant of Star Trek: The Next Generation , and one of the most thoughtful shows on television.

Editors' Recommendations

How do I get into Star Trek? A guide to how to watch the beloved sci-fi franchise
New Star Trek videos pave the way for Strange New Worlds
Strange New World’s latest trailer goes old-school Star Trek

As you've probably noticed, this is the last weekend of April. That means Hulu is about to lose some of its best movies before the new titles arrive May 1. And while we've already shared five great movies leaving Hulu at the end of April, those aren't the only terrific titles going out the door.

That's why this week's picks for the three Hulu movies that you need to stream this weekend are off the beaten path from the films we've previously chosen for April. We've picked out a historical drama, a romantic dramedy, and a remix of a classic Charles Dickens story. But since these movies are only around until April 30, you should catch these flicks before they go off to some other streamer. The Last Duel (2021)

Audio / Video

So you're a fan of excellent Apple TV+ shows such as Severance, Ted Lasso, Palm Royale, and Silo, but on the hardware side of things, you're more of a Chromecast or Google TV kinda guy, and that's fine.

Whether you have a Chromecast dongle device, such as a Chromecast or Chromecast Ultra, or even the newer Chromecast with Google TV, or perhaps you have a smart TV or projector with Google TV or Chromecast built-in, rest assured you can watch all your Apple TV+ movies and shows without having to get an Apple TV set-top box. Here’s what you need and what to do!

Fallout has proven to be one of the bigger hits in Amazon Prime Video's existence, and it's also one of the most anticipated shows the streaming service has to offer this year. The series, which is loosely adapted from the popular video game franchise, stars Ella Purnell as a newly invented character who has to set off on a quest that will take her to the surface of a postapocalyptic version of Earth.

If you watched Fallout and found yourself intrigued by Purnell, in particular, then you're in luck. She's still a relatively new face in Hollywood, but she's starred in a number of projects in recent years, many of which have required her to hide her British accent. These are three you should definitely check out if you're a big Purnell fan. Yellowjackets (2021-) Yellowjackets (2021) Official Trailer #2 | SHOWTIME

Seth MacFarlane gives update on The Orville season 4: "There will be more"

The Orville has always been a labor of love for creator Seth MacFarlane. A loving homage to Star Trek that many fans think has beaten the iconic sci-fi series at its own game, The Orville has gained a passionate following over the course of its first three seasons, the first two of which aired on Fox and the third, subtitled New Horizons , on Hulu. But it's been two years since the final episode of New Horizons dropped, and we have yet to hear about a renewal. Is it time for fans to give up hope?

We've heard occasional rumblings from MacFarlane and others about the possibility of The Orville coming back, but nothing solid. That continues today. During an appearance on The Mike Henry Show , MacFarlane briefly mentioned that "there will be more" episodes of The Orville . It's not much, but anything we can hold onto is appreciated.

MacFarlane makes his comment around the 17:22 mark in the video below. " The Orville was a passion project," he said. "I say ‘was’ but I don’t really mean ‘was’ because there will be more."

Obviously this falls far short of an official confirmation by Hulu, or whatever network picks up The Orville next. It's pretty much an off-hand comment MacFarlane in an hour-long interview where he talks about a wide variety of subjects. But such is the life of an Orville fan; until we get invited to the feast, we have the enjoy the scraps.

In the meanwhile, MacFarlane has been busy as usual, particularly with the new ted show on Peacock. But he's always been working on multiple projects at once. Here's hoping he can squeeze in The Orville season 4.

To stay up to date on everything fantasy, science fiction, and WiC, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and Twitter account , sign up for our exclusive newsletter and check out our YouTube channel .

h/t ScreenRant

This article was originally published on winteriscoming.com as Seth MacFarlane gives update on The Orville season 4: "There will be more" .

Log in or sign up for Rotten Tomatoes

Trouble logging in?

By continuing, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes.

Email not verified

Let's keep in touch.

Sign up for the Rotten Tomatoes newsletter to get weekly updates on:

Upcoming Movies and TV shows
Trivia & Rotten Tomatoes Podcast
Media News + More

By clicking "Sign Me Up," you are agreeing to receive occasional emails and communications from Fandango Media (Fandango, Vudu, and Rotten Tomatoes) and consenting to Fandango's Privacy Policy and Terms and Policies . Please allow 10 business days for your account to reflect your preferences.

OK, got it!

Movies / TV

No results found.

What's the Tomatometer®?
Login/signup

Movies in theaters

Opening this week
Top box office
Coming soon to theaters
Certified fresh movies

Movies at home

Fandango at Home
Netflix streaming
Prime Video
Most popular streaming movies
What to Watch New

Certified fresh picks

Challengers Link to Challengers
I Saw the TV Glow Link to I Saw the TV Glow
Música Link to Música

New TV Tonight

The Veil: Season 1
Hacks: Season 3
The Tattooist of Auschwitz: Season 1
A Man in Full: Season 1
Acapulco: Season 3
Welcome to Wrexham: Season 3
John Mulaney Presents: Everybody's in LA: Season 1
Star Wars: Tales of the Empire: Season 1
My Next Guest Needs No Introduction With David Letterman: Season 4.2
Shardlake: Season 1

The Orville

Where to watch.

Watch The Orville with a subscription on Hulu, or buy it on Fandango at Home, Prime Video, Apple TV.

Cast & Crew

Seth MacFarlane

Captain Ed Mercer

Adrianne Palicki

Commander Kelly Grayson

Penny Johnson

Dr. Claire Finn

Scott Grimes

Lieutenant Gordon Malloy

Peter Macon

Lieutenant Commander Bortus

Halston Sage

Chief Security Officer Alara Kitan

Series / The Orville

Edit locked.

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/theorvillenewhorizons.JPG

The Universe has a crew loose.

The Orville is a live action Science Fiction Dramedy television series created by, and starring, Seth MacFarlane as a homage to classic Star Trek . It premiered on Fox on 10 September 2017. It moved to Hulu for its third season in 2022, with all three seasons also available on Disney+ on August 2022. Outside the US, the series airs on Disney+ 's Star hub in many countries.

Captain Ed Mercer ( MacFarlane ), an officer in the Planetary Union, finally gets to live out his dream of exploring uncharted space as the captain of the USS Orville , a mid-level exploratory vessel. Joining Ed on this adventure is a crew packed with colorful characters from all over the galaxy including, to his chagrin, Kelly Grayson, his XO and ex-wife.

The series features many connections to Star Trek . Penny Johnson Jerald (Kasidy Yates on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine ) plays Doctor Claire Finn. Fellow Star Trek alumni Brannon Braga , Robert Duncan McNeill , David A. Goodman, James Conway and Jonathan Frakes are involved behind the scenes. Other Trek series alumni have made guest or cameo appearances.

The series has a Recap Page .

It is widely believed that the show's third season will be its last, as the cast's contracts have expired and the sets are reported to have been struck, and a Post-Credits Scene in the third season finale features a janitor character turning off the lights on the bridge — a common narrative device in series finales . However, no official announcement has yet been made either way.

Tropes in this series:

Abhorrent Admirer : Yaphit to Dr. Finn. Not surprising, considering he's a sentient blob. She does her best to let him down gently. Constantly.
The Krill are a humanoid reptilian species of religious zealots hostile to all other lifeforms, whom they view as impeding their holy mission to dominate the universe.
The Kaylons, an entire race of androids, were once enslaved by a biological species on their home planet before they Turned Against Their Masters and wiped them out. After exhausting the resources of Kaylon-1, they conclude it is necessary to wipe out all biological lifeforms who may pose a threat to them .
Ace Pilot : Gordon Malloy, the helmsman of the Orville , along with navigator John LaMarr .
An Aesop : The episode "Majority Rule" is one about the evils of social media fueling manufactured outrage through the court of public opinion.
Affectionate Parody : The show initially comes across as a spoof of Star Trek that lampshades and pokes fun at Trek tropes while indulging in lowbrow humor. Yet, the show is also a sincere attempt to celebrate the optimism and thrill of exploration of Star Trek , and is deliberately being positioned as the antithesis of the gritty trend of contemporary SF genre offerings. Seth MacFarlane has gone on the record as a huge Star Trek fan, and a fan of space in general, and that he has no desire to tarnish the series that he loves.
A.I. Is a Crapshoot : In "Identity", the Orville goes to Kaylon because Isaac stopped functioning. While on that planet, the crew learned that the race that had built the Kaylons got exterminated by their creations. The end of the episode has the Kaylons leaving their planet, ready to commit genocide on a galactic scale. Ultimately justified : the Kaylon started out just wanting their creators' respect... and the company that built them responded by sending out "upgrades": pain receptors and remote controls for same to enforce compliance, which quickly degenerated into their owners using them to torture the Kaylon for their own amusement. The Kaylon are now convinced that all interaction with "biologicals" will end with their own enslavement.
Alcubierre Drive : The Orville 's quantum drive is explained to be an Alcubierre-White variant in supplementary material .
Moclan blood is black.
Aliens Speaking English : The aliens speak English. Justified for those in Union service. Even those on their own planet do so. The Season 1 episode "Into the Fold" confirms that this is due to the Orville crew using a translator.
All There in the Manual : The book World of the Orville has detailed backstories and the various technologies used by all factions, including the Planetary Union.
Always Chaotic Evil : Both the Krill and the Chak'tal ( space orcs ) are aggressively territorial and expansionist species with a penchant for leaving no survivors . It shouldn't come as a surprise that they've been at each other's throat on occasion.
Amicable Exes : Ed and Kelly are slowly moving towards that, especially after the revelation that Kelly could have possibly been under the influence of alien pheromones when she slept with Darulio . They even make an attempt at rekindling their relationship but ultimately decide that their working relationship is more important.
An Alien Named "Bob" : While disguised as aliens, Ed panics when asked for his and Gordon's name, and blurts out "Chris and Devon." The aliens comment that those are unusual names, but otherwise don't question it.
And Starring : Chad L. Coleman receives an "Also Starring" credit after the main titles.
Animation Bump : The Season 3 preview shows a noticeable upgrade in VFX quality, with the Orville model now featuring more texture than previously.
Arc Villain : Kaylon Prime is the chief villain of the "Identity" two-parter after The Reveal that the Kaylons have decided to wage a genocidal Robot War against all organic life and sent Isaac to spy on humanity. However, his death does not mean the end of hostilities .
Arbitrary Skepticism : When Ed and Kelly wake up in a replica of their old apartment, they briefly speculate that they've been sent back in time, then dismiss that thought as crazy. That said, there is very little evidence to suggest time travel and more evidence to suggest something mundane is the cause, such as locked doors preventing them from leaving.
As You Know : In the episode "New Dimensions", Kelly explains to LaMarr that with the advent of matter replicators, status and rank in society was no longer measured by wealth and physical possessions but rather skill and reputation. While this is something LaMarr already knows, she does this recap to set up her pitch that he consider pursuing the Chief Engineering position.
Author Appeal : The series is an homage to classic Star Trek because Seth MacFarlane is a huge fan.
Not only has humanity become a completely secular society, but in fact it's recognized as a sociological phenomenon that species which mature enough to become spacefaring tend to become secular as well - in other words, Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions is a fact of social science. The only overtly religious species is The Fundamentalist and overtly villainous.
Marijuana is completely legal, its use is widespread, and its effects are shown to be completely benign if not beneficial.
Bad "Bad Acting" : When Ed and Gordon are sent to infiltrate the Krill in episode six, they don't make much attempt to act the part; while the Krill are very obviously stoic and reserved, Ed and Gordon are... themselves, mostly. Gordon in particular insists on going off on long asides. He's so bad at fitting in that at times it seems like he's trying to get them caught.
Belly-Scraping Flight : This trope actually breaks a crash-landing shuttle in half in "Into The Fold", separating Dr. Finn from Isaac and her sons.
Birds of a Feather : Ed and Kelly's broken marriage makes it difficult for them to get along, but they clearly share a dry sense of humor and a snarky outlook towards life.
Birthday Buddies : In "All the World is Birthday Cake," Kelly asks Bortus to have a shared birthday party with her, as they have the same birthday. Later, after visiting a planet where people are divided into castes based on when in the year they were born, the two do share a birthday party.
"Pria" - Good news, the ship didn't blow up in the Negative Space Wedgie or end up as an artifact in an alien museum via Timey-Wimey Ball . Bad news: Pria broke Ed's heart by revealing she was mostly using him to get the ship, and she vanishes when the wormhole was destroyed.
"Krill" ends with Ed and Gordon saving the Union colony and obtaining the Krill holy book they were there to get in the first place, as well as an entire Krill cruiser. While they managed to spare the Krill children aboard the cruiser , they did kill almost all the adults on the ship to accomplish this. As the children just watched Ed and Gordon kill their parents, these kids now have every reason to hate the Union as they grow up.
"Cupid's Dagger". The episode's minor and major threats are resolved, but it is strongly implied that Ed and Kelly's divorce, predicated on her sleeping with Darulio, could possibly have been avoided as she might have been under the influence of Darulio's alien pheromones at that time. Kelly asks Darulio in front of Ed if he was in heat during that incident, and he says "maybe", strongly implying that he was.
"Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes". Ed's just had his heart broken again, since it turned out that his new girlfriend Janelle Tyler was actually Teleya, the former Krill schoolteacher, who'd been sent to lure him out for capture and interrogation. But Ed tells her that there's more of "Janelle" in her than she's willing to admit, and sends her home in hopes that releasing her will open the door for peace talks further down the road. He even gives her a parting gift—the complete works of Billy Joel —and tells her that if she ever feels like doing another movie night, she knows where to find him. The hesitation on her part suggests he's not entirely wrong.
"Sanctuary" ends with a compromise. Like all compromises, it sucks. The Union gets Moclus to leave the female sanctuary colony alone, but they have to refuse its request for independence and end the network that gets female-born Moclans to the sanctuary and away from forcible "correction." It's also put the Union on precarious ground with Moclus, who supply most of their weapons tech.
"Domino" ends with the Kaylon making peace with the Union with hope for a future membership and Teleya in the hands of the Union about to stand trial for war crimes. However, the Krill and the Moclans are still allied against them. And Charly Burke sacrificed herself to stop the Krill-Moclan alliance from wiping out the Kaylon. Also, Teleya makes it clear Ed is never going to see their daughter again .
Moclans are an all-male species... who lay eggs to reproduce... and are sometimes born "female". They also urinate only once a year and can eat almost anything.
Darulio's people emit powerful pheromones while in heat, powerful enough to induce all-consuming lust, even if that person hated the carrier seconds earlier.
Lieutenant Tharl, the temporary replacement security officer, has an extra esophagus on the outside of his body, extending from where his nose would be in another species. Just how he breathes or smells is not shown.
Bizarre Alien Reproduction : Moclans reproduce by laying eggs, although they are male. Or at least it seems that way to begin with...
Blob Monster : Yaphit, the only gelatinous lifeform aboard. He's constantly trying to hit on Dr. Finn but is actually a pretty good engineer, especially since he can get into places humanoids can't.
Blunt "Yes" : In "Ja'loja," Claire asks Isaac if he thinks she's a bad parent. Isaac : ( immediately ) Yes.
In the episode "Home", after Alara leaves the ship permanently, she leaves behind a gift for Ed: a jar of pickles .
In "Twice in a Lifetime", Gordon sends an egg sandwich 3 months forward in time . This pays off comedically during a tense moment in the season finale.
British Brevity : Unusually for a network show debuting in the fall, the first season is capped at 13 episodes, with there having been no option for a "Back Nine" order to be exercised note When the series received its renewal for a second season, this was explained as being in part due to budget and the special effects and other production aspects required . The first season's episode count was later reduced to 12, with one already-completed episode being held for the second season note This was done so that Fox could air the first season in a single block and not have to deal with a winter hiatus potentially interrupting the popular momentum the show has .
Brutal Honesty : Bortus doesn't tend to sugarcoat what he thinks, as when Gordon requests permission to take the command qualification test in "Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes". He at least has the decency to wait until Gordon's out of the room before he states his opinion: Bortus: He will fail.
Mercer assigns Malloy as the helmsman because, despite being having been previously benched because he annoys Union Central top brass so much, he is also an Ace Pilot and Mercer's best friend.
Subverted with Mercer himself, who seems like he's going to be this, but is a perfectly capable officer who just has a dry sense of humor.
Bury Your Gays : In the episode “Domino,” Charly Burke, died shutting down a genocide weapon, calling out to her female love interest who died in a previous battle in her last seconds .
But for Me, It Was Tuesday : When talking to Gordon and John about the whole Locar situation in "Deflectors", Talla muses that the situation is stranger than normal for the Orville. The guys are quick to set her straight. Talla: This has got to be the weirdest thing to happen on this ship, right? John: One time I almost died because I humped a statue. Gordon: Isaac once cut my leg off. John: And the captain and commander, they got put in a zoo. Gordon: Bortus almost crashed the ship 'cause of porn. Talla: ... I see.
Malloy having a new leg is referenced in episode 6.
Alara's break-up with a fellow crewmember is referenced in several successive episodes.
Dr. Finn's fear of heights, first mentioned in "If the Stars Should Appear," is also referenced in "Into the Fold" and "Firestorm."
In "Deflectors", Talla muses that her current predicament vis-a-vis Locar and Klyden must be the most insane thing ever to happen on the ship. John and Gordon disabuse her of that notion with a series of callbacks.
F. Murray Abraham as the president of the Planetary Union council.
Bruce Willis as a sentient plant sent to Kelly.
The Captain : Ed Mercer, who is assigned to the Orville not because he's earned a promotion to a command position by performance at a lower rank, but because the Planetary Union has three thousand ships to crew and he's one of the few who are both available and qualified for the job. It helps that Kelly secretly argued on his behalf. A Downplayed Trope example, as he's implied to have had an exemplary service record prior to his divorce, which lead to him acting poorly in the year leading up to his introduction to the Orville . He has a brief moment of Heroic BSoD after learning about Kelly's role in his assignment but eventually admits that it doesn't matter in the long term, as he has more than proven that he's worthy of command.
Casual Interstellar Travel : The quantum drive can propel a starship from one star system to another in a matter of days, or even just hours.
Cerebus Syndrome : In the middle of the second season, dramatic revelations about the Kaylon drive the 2nd half of the season to be Darker and Grittier and more conflict-driven and serialized, in line with most contemporary sci-fi. New Horizons continues this trend, with relatively few moments of deliberate comedy and exploring a lot of very hefty subject matter.
Alara has several episodes that show her insecurities and why she feels the need to prove herself. By the time she leaves the series, she's noticeably more confident.
Ed and Kelly's former marriage and how it effects their feelings for each other and any new partners they have comes up in numerous episodes, and both characters see a lot of growth throughout the series.
Season 3 shows how Charly grows from hating the Kaylon for the death of her crush to forgiving Isaac and ultimately sacrificing herself to save them .
Bortus and Klyden's marriage arguably has more problems than Ed and Kelly's did, as they deal with differing opinions on their culture (leading to their child going through a sex change), smoking addiction, porn addiction, and Klyden trying to stab Bortus through the heart (the Moclan manner of divorce). However, ultimately Klyden comes to see how flawed Moclan society and his own views are when the Moclan government is exposed in trying to kidnap and murder his daughter Topa simply for being a female. This leads him to be a better father to his daughter and repair his relationship with Bortus by renouncing his Moclan citizenship to return to the Orville .
Chasing a Butterfly : In the episode "Midnight Blue," Topa sees a rare blue Luminite, a tiny creature that glows like a firefly, and chases it into the woods where she is abducted by a crew of Moclans and taken to a black site where they intended to kill her.
The Moclan homeworld is almost this, as every habitable part of their world's surface has been heavily industrialized. Only a few patches of desolate mountain range, too precipitous for factories, remain unpopulated save for those who wish to seclude themselves like the few remaining female Moclans.
The Kaylon homeworld is built over completely with massive skyscraper cities and advanced technology. As heavily urbanized as it is, it's also remarkably pristine and sterilized. Because it's actually built over the mass graves of their own builders.
Civil War vs. Armageddon : The secular, liberal Union is locked in a long war with the Krill, a race of religious fanatics, but they put aside their differences in order to fight the Kaylon , who intend to wipe out all organic life regardless of their differing ideologies.
Collapsible Helmet : Krill soldiers have helmets that retract at the push of a button. It's eventually revealed that they have an extreme sensitivity to light, which is why they need the helmets and why they don't use them during an indoor firefight.
In the Union, admiralty wears purple, command wears blue, medical and science wear green (with different badges), operations wears orange (or a light red), and security wears a darker shade of red.
Each major faction seen so far has their own colors for the beams their weapons fire. Blue for the Union, green for the Krill, orange for the Moclans and red for the Kaylon .
The Orville is called in to protect a science facility that has developed technology capable of accelerating the flow of time. Before they explain, a banana is used in a demonstration, rotting in seconds. Ed and Kelly promptly tag team some snark until the explanation begins. Ed: So ... it's an anti-banana ray. Kelly: That's really interesting. Ed: We need no longer fear the banana. Kelly: Does it work on all fruit? Ed: What about salads?
When Kelly voices her suspicions of Pria to Ed (who is smitten with her), she comments that if she's proven wrong, then Ed can "bang her on the kitchen sink for all I care!" Ed balks, citing that sex in a kitchen wouldn't be hygienic.
Isaac, being Kaylon, is completely unable to truly understand emotion. Pretty much any social situation with him that isn't strictly scientific is this trope.
During the Krill-Union alliance, a Krill delegation visits Earth and is treated to a night on Broadway to see Annie . They misinterpret the showtune "Tomorrow" (mainly the lyric "The sun will come out tomorrow") as a haunting, dark prophecy. Being a highly photosensitive race from an Always Night planet, they view the sun as a symbol of suffering and death.
Lt. Commander Bortus is nearly monotone and definitely serious. Naturally, he's the subject of many a joke, such as when he spends the second episode hatching an egg while completely naked. Gordon is clearly trying to invoke this when, for example, he convinces Bortus to sing "My Heart Will Go On" for karaoke.
Isaac is like this too, due to his role as the show's Spock analogy .
Captain Mercer occasionally comes across as this as well, as the show's nature sometimes forces him to deliver bizarre lines in an authoritative tone. Lampshaded in "Firestorm" after Alara is attacked by a clown when Ed, in all seriousness, warns his crew to be on the lookout for pies and seltzer bottles; it's later revealed that this is a simulation of Ed programmed by Isaac, who has been depicted previously as taking statements and jokes literally .
For the first two seasons, the Union uses two different types of communicators. Comscanners are taken on away missions and, like the name suggests, are used to communicate with the ship and to scan objects of interest. Uniform tunics incorporate a communicator for intraship calls that can be activated by tapping a button on the cuff.
In Season 3, the Union switches to using the cuff-mounted communicator for all communications.
Ed Mercer has Kirk’s improvisational skills, Picard’s social awkwardness, and, like Sisko is on his first command following personal turmoil (an ugly divorce instead of being widowed).
Kelly Grayson is the Statuesque Stunner first officer like Una a.k.a. “Number One”. Like Beverly Crusher, has a complicated history with the captain. Her relationship with her past self was similar to Will Riker’s relationship with his transporter duplicate.
Gordon Malloy is an immature practical joker who often rubs people the wrong way and also happens to be a very talented pilot, like Tom Paris. He fell in love with a hologram and eventually faced the reality that it wasn’t really the woman it was based on, like Geordi Laforge.
John started out as an ordinary Mauve Shirt who worked on the bridge, and turned out to be a brilliant engineer, qualified to be chief engineer, like Geordi Laforge. He’s usually seen hanging out with Gordon and going along with whatever stupid thing Gordon is up to, similar to Harry Kim’s relationship with Tom Paris.
Bortus: Proud Warrior Race Guy , like Worf, only crew member with a spouse and child, like Chief O’Brien, and suffered from holoaddiction like Reginald Barclay.
Alara Kitan: Security chief who left after one season, like Tasha Yar, and a fish-out-of-gravitational-water, like Melora Pazlar .
Isaac is an android trying to understand humans, like Data. He sees himself as superior to humans, like Spock. He has the appearance of a stereotypical sci-fi robot, and pretended to be friendly but is secretly a member of an evil robot race that wiped out their creators, like Automated Unit 3947. He turned his back on his xenophobic people because he knew what they were trying to do was wrong, like Odo.
Doctor Claire Finn is Chief Medical Officer and a single mother (albeit by choice) like Beverly Crusher (though both her sons are more similar to Jake Sisko than Wesley Crusher) but with a more laid back personality like Kasidy Yates, who was also played by Penny Johnson Jerald.
The Moclans are a composite of Klingons, a Proud Warrior Race Guy species, and the J’naii, a race with draconian laws regarding sexual orientation and gender identity, that are the opposite of real-life Earth norms.
Xelayans have the superior strength and cultural aversion to militarism like the Vulcans, but with the earthy, colorful aesthetics and grounded temperament of the Bajorans.
Contrived Coincidence : Subverted. While it is initially stated that a female Moclan is born once every seventy-five years, we see several in one episode: Heveena, Topa, and Klyden. In a later episode, we see that Heveena leads a colony of over six thousand females and reveals that the Moclus government is hiding how many females are actually born.
Cool Starship : The Orville looks seriously sleek and pulls off some pretty cool tight maneuvers in the pilot and in later episodes.
The crew's uniforms receive a slight update in season 2, with the divisional badges becoming completely metallic with no color.
The uniforms receive another update in season 3, with the addition of dark-gray patches where the shoulder meets the chest while the divisional badges become slightly smaller.
Mark Jackson's costume as Isaac, as well as all of the Kaylon, is completely overhauled in season 3 with more-detailed plating and a tighter-fitting bodysuit beneath to make him seem more like an android rather than a man in a costume.
In "Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes", the Krill force Ed to give them his command codes. Later, it's revealed that the codes he gave them are useless—Union captains are issued dummy command codes that feed seemingly-real tactical data specifically for use in this type of situation.
In "Identity, Part II", after the Kaylon seize control of the Orville , they need Ed to ward away another Union ship. He ends his communication by offering the Union captain a "thirteen button salute", a code phrase meaning that their ship has been seized by a hostile force. Unfortunately, the Kaylon are aware of the phrase's meaning and blow up the other Union ship before it can escape .
All things being equal, Ed Mercer wasn't exactly on the short list for command of a starship. But, as the admiral meeting with him admits, they have three thousand ships to staff and are in dire need of captains to command them, so he's getting a shot. In actuality, however, they wouldn't have brought him on if not for Kelly secretly pleading on his behalf.
Kelly also gets the chance to be his first officer because of this alleged shortage but also because her father is close friends with the Admiral.
This is the Moclan stance in "About A Girl." Their culture teaches that being born female is a genetic defect that is to be corrected as soon as possible. Even after being shown empirical evidence that this is not so even among their own species, they still hold to their beliefs.
Darulio's people are apparently so open about sex that they consider turning down an offer to sleep with someone as rude.
Curb-Stomp Battle : The Union fleet vs. the Kaylons. When the scene cuts back to the fight over Earth, most of the dead or disabled starships are Union ships. The dialogue on the Orville makes it clear that shields don't even slow down the Kaylons' weapons. Union ships are seen going up in flames after one, maybe two direct hits from Kaylon weaponry; the Orville only survives due to glancing blows for most of the fight. And then the Krill show up and kick the teeth out of the Kaylons while they are still engaging what remains of the Union fleet, forcing a few of the Kaylons' remaining ships to run for it.
Cute Bruiser : Alara, being an alien from a planet with much higher gravity than Earth , which makes her strong enough to smash through doors and walls and punch people across the room.
In episode 8, Doctor Finn is captured by a hostile native after her shuttle crashes on an uncharted world, but is able to break out of her cell, arm herself, defeat the alien, and escape on her own.
During "Home", Alara's family is held hostage at gunpoint. It's mainly Alara's security training that saves her and her family from major harm, since she's currently severely weakened by spending too long away from her homeworld and has to use a hoverchair to move around while on it.
Also played straight with the Kaylon, who don't need external lighting, and dismiss it as an ineffective use of power, and usurp the Krill as the main antagonists.
Season 2 Episode 3 has Alara as the focus as she goes back to her home planet & family and subsequently being Put on a Bus .
Season 2 Episode 2 deals with Bortus' addiction to holodeck porn and his festering resentment of Klyden over Topah's "corrective" surgery.
Episode 5 and 9 both center around Ed & Grayson's relationship with the guest character for that episode.
Episode 6 has Gordon joining Mercer on an infiltration mission to a Krill ship.
Episode 7 is ostensibly about John LaMarr despite having nothing to do with his life on the Orville . Episode 11 has John being pushed into a command role to take over the Engineering department.
Finn & Isaac's relationship is the focus of the 6th episode of Season 2.
Isaac and the Kaylon as a whole are the focus of the Season 2 double episode "Identity".
Episode 12 is primarily about the impact accidentally influencing a civilization has on Kelly, though it also focuses on the Ed/Kelly relationship, too.
Talla arrives early in Season 2 as a Replacement Goldfish for Alara, and the 7th episode of the season is her focus episode.
Ensign Charly Burke, a new addition to the main cast as of Season 3, gets plenty of focus in "Electric Sheep", the season premiere.
Decomposite Character : The Krill are similar to the Klingons as they were portrayed in the TOS era, a constant looming threat of unreasonable conquerors. By contrast, the Moclans are similar to the Klingons as they were portrayed in the TNG era, a Proud Warrior Race Guy ally species with laws and customs that seem gruesome and barbaric by human standards, which make the alliance with them tenuous.
Decon-Recon Switch : The show pulls the "decon" switch on a lot of Star Trek tropes, from the silly (shuttlecraft with seatbelts, the replicator being used for tequila and pot brownies) to the serious (the Prime Directive in "Mad Idolatry"), and plays them for comedy (sometimes veering into outright Gallows Humor ), but it pulls the "recon switch" by showing why humanistic values are still the right call, even (or especially) when it could hurt the heroes in the long run.
It's mentioned that humans in the future no longer have zoos, discussing it as a barbaric practice.
Marijuana is now openly accepted; see High Times Future below.
Boxing and other "blood sports" stopped being practiced on Earth centuries ago, though Alara spends a lot of her recreational time practicing boxing in the simulator, while other crew members use their simulator time to act out swordfights and pistol duels, with the implication that they're no longer about the spectacle but about fun for the participants (and medical technology can heal most injuries anyway).
Most Moclans are male, so the rare female is viewed as an aberration to be corrected. When the human crew points out the fact that gender is not an aberration in their societies, they are called out on it, with several Moclans noting that what is right for one species is not necessarily right for another.
Isaac is a member of the Kaylon, a xenophobic race of artificial beings. As time goes on, he becomes torn between the Kaylon's core values and his growing affection for humankind.
It's noted in "Krill" that space-faring societies tend to become very secular. The Krill are an exception, and their religion teaches that all other beings are on par with how we see bugs.
Darulio's people are apparently so casual about sex that they consider turning down an offer to roll in the sheets to be rude and are oblivious to the concept of consent.
Meat hasn't been part of the human diet for centuries.
Democracy Is Bad : "Majority Rule" is about a version of direct democracy being horribly oppressive. Their government appears to function on a social media system, where everything (including scientific facts) are voted on by an uninformed public, and the results are taken as true. Most disturbingly, people who receive too many downvotes are lobotomized (and killed if they resist). This, however, only applies to this extreme case, as the Union is explicitly a democracy, and Admiral Halsey insists that, while inefficient, it's still the best system that's ever been tried.
Designer Babies : Kaylon, being entirely mechanical beings, use a central computer to add new members to their race that are expressly designed to fit specific needs within their society.
Disappeared Dad : Downplayed Example . While Claire is a single mother with two sons, her responses to Isaac's questions about two-parent families and her decision to have children reveals that she "never found a man I wanted to have them with", implying she never intended for a "dad" to be a necessary part of her family structure.
Discount Lesbians : The Moclans are the main (and basically only for Season 1-2) LGBT+ representation on the show, being a (nearly) all male species with same-sex relationships as the norm (even males reproducing together somehow). They are highly misogynist and heterophobic (with a few exceptions ).
"About A Girl" mirrors the common practice of "correcting" intersexed babies' genitals if they are "ambiguous" (that is, do not align neatly as either male or female). In this case, the baby is not intersexed, but female, and the Moclans enforce an all-male society (female babies are very rare among them, though not as rare as most of them think). There are also the issues of how much parents should be allowed to determine children's futures, and specifically regarding surgery that isn't medically necessary (circumcision, a real-life issue where this comes up, is one example used). Plus sex reassignment surgery in general of course.
"Majority Rule" has a society whose punishment of minor social infractions takes real-world online mobbing and demands the perpetrators apologize for them up to eleven, as citizens have the right to vote on whether they're forgiven when an apology is deemed sincere enough, or put to death .
Similarly, in "Deflectors" the Moclan view on opposite-sex attraction is very clearly modeled after attitudes towards homosexuality in our world. Moclans who are attracted to women are condemned as 'perverts' and 'deviants', and are arrested and punished if their nature is found out.
In "Sanctuary" it's revealed there's a secret network that brings Moclan females to a hidden colony world where they can be safe, reminiscent of the Underground Railroad.
"A Tale of Two Topas" features the titular character realizing she's a girl and had been misassigned shortly after birth. Basically a standard transgender experience, except Topa was born female to begin with and surgically reassigned after which she'd been raised as male due to her culture's misogyny.
On Talla's previous vessel, the ship was damaged after a Krill encounter, and the only available help was from the Janissi, a matriarchal species. To appease their misandrist values, Talla punched her captain in the face, breaking his nose and knocking him out cold. This is a throwaway joke line, whereas Moclus' abuse of women is not.
Downplayed in a later episode focused on the Janissi. While calling out their culture's discrimination against men as unacceptable, the crew still initially appeases the ambassadors by indulging in their norms, playing the denigration of the men for laughs at some points, and keeps the offer for a Union seat availible (if only as pragmatically necessary against the Kaylon), whereas Moclus' sexism would get them expelled from the Union a few episodes after.
Conversed and subverted. Bortus, upon hearing of Alara's bad luck in dating, offers to command another officer to mate with her. Alara turns his culturally insensitive suggestion down after calling it the "nicest and most wrong thing" ever said to her.
Later, a Janissi ambassador tries to take Ed as a sex slave, but everyone (except Gordon) objects to this.
Telaya had sex with Ed while under the false identity of Janel Tyler, which qualifies as rape by deception. He clearly feels hurt and betrayed that she deceived him, but barely mentions the sexual aspect.
Double Standard: Rape, Sci-Fi : Both Kelly and Ed have sex with Darulio after his pheromones create an irresistible attraction to him that overwhelms even basic reasoning. When they discover this, they're mildly upset, and he's embarrassed about being caught, but everyone treats it more like a faux pas than sexual assault. The crew is even willing to use the same pheromones to create an attraction between two visiting ambassadors in order to stop a war. At no point does anyone point out that the people involved are effectively being raped.
Isaac says he's fascinated by biological beings' interpersonal relationships when Alara recounts her love life, and that he'd be happy to "attempt sexual relations" with her. She politely declines.
Inverted in "A Happy Refrain", where Claire initiates sex with Isaac. Isaac feels that his research into relationships ends after copulating and tries to break off the relationship, which just makes everything complicated.
Acting on poorly thought out advice from John, Isaac asks Kelly if she'd like to "go on a date, followed by sexual conjugation". He almost asks Talla the same before Kelly stops him.
Apparently, Moclans refer to sex as "the sexual event".
"About A Girl" ends with the Moclan court ordering that the baby undergo sex reassignment, against the wishes of Bortus but in line with his mate's preference .
"Krill" ends with not only a failure to change the Krill's hostile belief system (save for one, maybe) but with a strong chance of reinforcing those hostile beliefs.
"Majority Rule" ends well for John, but not so much for the two people the crew went to save: one is killed, and the other is left permanently lobotomized .
"Primal Urges" has Bortus and Isaac successfully rescue citizens from the collapsing planet but only have time for one shuttle's worth, leaving many of the citizens behind, including the de facto leader .
"Deflectors": Talla is forced into a no-win situation with either letting Klyden rot in jail for a murder he didn't commit (but wouldn't have felt sorry about), or sending Locar back to Moclas for a sentence of death or life imprisonment after being outed as heterosexual/xenophiliac. She ends up choosing the latter, but tells Klyden to stay the hell away from her. It also did no favors for the already rocky Bortus-Klyden marriage, and Ed openly wonders if the Moclans can even be allied to the Union, much less a member state.
Dramedy : Cast and crew explicitly refer to this series as being part of this genre. The situations the crew find themselves in are very serious, but their reactions are often comedic, and their side conversations almost always are. By today's standards of drama, Star Trek The Original Series was essentially this, albeit not to the same degree as Orville .
Malloy has a beer while shuttling Mercer to the Orville . Mercer is not amused by this, especially when Malloy pretends to be a Drunk Driver and almost causes a crash.
Alara unexpectedly finds herself in command. One of the first things she does is order a shot of Xelayan tequila to try and calm her nerves . She does it again later before making a command decision.
Kelly tells Claire that she doesn't drink on duty. This immediately changes once the latter brings up possibly dating Isaac.
Driven to Suicide : In the Season 3 premiere, Isaac fries his systems with a targeted EMP after the crew's hostility toward him in the wake of the Kaylon attack on Earth reaches a boiling point. Tellingly, though, it's not until Marcus Finn specifically says that he wishes Isaac was dead that Isaac decides to go through with it.
"Majority Rule" features a planet where the number of "likes" a person has attached to a device they wear can have them get mind wiped in the worst case. As if the entire planet is a comments section, so to speak.
"All the World is a Birthday Cake" features a planet ruled by astrology. Specifically, people are deemed to be either cursed or destined for greatness depending on the stellar sign they were born under. To top it off, it's really just a fascist dystopia that targets people based on Fantastic Racism .
Halston Sage 's make-up for Alara initially included a heavy brow portion (as seen in the pilot) but this was removed by the second episode to allow Sage's eyebrows to be visible. (Doubles as an unintentional Shout-Out to Star Trek: The Original Series which saw Mr. Spock's makeup also undergo noticeable changes between the show's first two pilots and the weekly series).
Isaac was originally the ship's science and engineering officer, before this was dropped in favor of having him solely be the science officer while introducing a new Chief Engineer.
Easy Sex Change : Topa is given female-to-male sex reassignment surgery, then has this reversed later. In both cases it appears to be a very brief, outpatient procedure that can be done in an hour so, as by the show's future this kind of surgery has advanced far beyond the much more involved process that would happen today.
Enemy Mine : The Krill show up to save Earth from the Kaylon's crusade to wipe out all organic species.
The Krill commander in "Old Wounds" wants to use newly-developed temporal technology for evil purposes, but he's also happily married and sides with Kelly in needing to take the time to work on one's marriage in order to make it work.
The episode "Krill" has Ed encounter a Krill schoolteacher whose brother was on board a warship he ordered destroyed. The same schoolteacher believes that humans have no souls and sees nothing wrong with testing a planet-scale WMD on a peaceful farming colony.
Everyone Meets Everyone : First Ed and Kelly, then Malloy, and then everyone else on the Orville .
Evil Is Bigger : Each time they've faced off against the Krill, it's always been against warships that significantly dwarf (and outgun) the Orville . The Orville is a small ship, and the Union does have heavy cruisers, but even those appear to be smaller than Krill destroyers/battlecruisers.
Explosive Instrumentation : Sparks fly across The Bridge during battle sequences, but don't kill anyone. This trope is lampshaded in "Krill" when Ed asks why the automatic fire suppression system didn't kick in only for Alara to point out that the system in question exploded and is on fire .
Extreme Omnivore : Moclans, due to evolving in a harsh environments with little edible food, are able to extract nutrients from almost anything. In a single sitting, Bortus demonstrated that he can eat a ball of wasabi, a cloth napkin, a cactus, and a glass without feeling any ill effects. Talla also claims to have seen him eat a fork on a bet. The only time he feels stomach pains is when he accidentally ingests a piece of Yaphit, which resists digestion and struggles to get out.
The Kaylon, a race of artificial lifeforms, view all biological life forms as innately inferior, due to their own objectively superior abilities. Ed describes their view as "legendarily racist", but Isaac seems entirely open to both interacting with biologicals and learning about their culture and habits. Unfortunately, the rest of the Kaylons consider biologicals to be a threat, and have no compunction about killing inferior beings, which drives them out outright attempted genocide.
The Calivons see any sentient species less advanced than themselves as being akin to animals, to the point of keeping them in a zoo.
The Krill go for the "fundamentalist" variety of Scary Dogmatic Aliens , preaching that they are the only species with souls, and all other intelligent life can be slaughtered without a second thought.
Yaphit thinks he's a victim of this when he discovers that he's potentially being passed over for promotion to the freshly vacant Chief Engineer post in favor of a human.
"All the World is a Birthday Cake" features a planet where astrology is basically the religion. People born to a "bad" star sign are viewed as having an inherent criminal tendency and are kept in concentration camps as a result. Interestingly, they don't seem to think this tendency is inherited, as we see a child of two camp prisoners being born under a "leadership" sign and treated almost reverently (and taken away from her parents as a result). Likewise, being born under completely different skies and following a completely different calendar doesn't make a difference.
Fantastic Ship Prefix : Union ships have the registry prefix "ECV".
The religion shown on the ship in "If the Stars Should Appear" also seems to resemble Christianity, as they have a holy book and one creator god, plus more specifically nastier aspects of certain historical Christian churches (a theocracy and Inquisition-like authorities). The religion of Kelly in episode 12 is an obvious stand-in for Christianity. It's based on a miracle performed by Kelly on a hurt child (Kelly using a dermal scanner to repair a wound), which only grows until it becomes a planet-wide religion with the church having lots of power. Their religious leader's garb is heavily Pope-like, while his Number Two looks almost identical to a Catholic cardinal. They also go through a period eerily similar to the Spanish Inquisition, torturing and executing suspected "heretics". By their equivalent of the early 21st century, their religion has also become similar to modern-day evangelism, as well as the religious terrorism caused by Muslim extremists post 9/11.
Faster-Than-Light Travel : The quantum drive engines of Union vessels, including the Orville .
This is shown primarily through the Moclans, who are members of the Union but still seem to have some sort of military of their own, and where some of their own laws are still observed over those in the Union. Their culture is also radically different from others in the Union to the point of driving our heroes to exasperation more than once, and Ed openly wonders how much longer they can tolerate each other.
In "Identity, Pt. 1", Ed explains that the Union isn't necessarily a single cohesive state, but is instead an alliance between multiple governments that follow a strict set of rules amongst them, making it somewhere between The Alliance (or a Fictional United Nations ) and a confederacy.
Final Solution : The Kaylon , it turns out, killed the species who created them in the past, and want to destroy all other organic species because they believe they're a potential threat to their race expanding into the rest of the galaxy, starting at the Humans.
The First Cut Is the Deepest : Why Ed divorced Kelly (and let his career start to sink badly). The pain of betrayal from Kelly's infidelity hurt him badly .
First-Name Basis : Regularly invoked, with Ed and Kelly rarely addressing their subordinates by their rank or surname. Of course, Ed is usually referred to as Captain to his face (though Gordon and Kelly often get a pass on this), but we often see characters such as Alara referring to him otherwise as Ed.
The Calivon to the Kaylon. Both are well aware that they're technologically superior to the rest of the species shown thus far. However, where the former won't even talk to other species, regarding them as not unlike animals, the Kaylon (at least Isaac) do regard organic sentients as such with rights to be respected. Isaac, as his species's representative, is very confident in his abilities but rarely comes across as arrogant and patronizing; the only instance of him talking down to another person is when disciplining Dr. Finn's children, repeating a line that Finn had used verbatim. Likewise, he has thus far demonstrated no issue with following orders or cooperating with his fellow officers. He's even on the ship because the Kaylon want to learn about other cultures, which they wouldn't need to do if they didn't see something of value in them, unlike the Calivon.
The Krill to the Calivon and the Kaylon, in regards to their xeno-relations. Unlike the Calivon and Kaylon who simply view most other species as curiosities to be studied to one degree or another, the Krill see other species as soulless abominations that they can freely slaughter.
Forgotten Phlebotinum : Alara's problem trying to blend in on Sargus 4 would have been solved with the holograph generators Isaac had made for the crew in the episode right before. However the previous episode also established that the generators had a flaw that caused them to short out, so Mercer might have vetoed its use during what was a culturally sensitive infiltration mission.
Foreshadowing : In "Lasting Impressions" Kelly has a conversation with Gordon about how some personal characteristics, even minor ones, only exist because of a relationship with other people and includes the line "Imagine [...] if someone went and deleted Ed from my life". Well we don't have to imagine, we see what would happen in the Season 2 finale "The Road Not Taken".
The Episode “No One Left On Earth But Fishes” quotes “The King and I” on the devastation international enmity can lead to, in “The Road Not Taken”, the Kaylon assault has no one left on Earth, not even fishes.
For Want Of A Nail : The alternate timeline seen in “The Road Not Taken” shows that Kelly rejecting Ed’s second date means that Ed did not become Captain of the Orville , resulting in the Enemy Mine between the Union and the Krill not occurring. As a result, the Kaylons successfully destroyed both Earth and the Orville : within nine months, all non-Kaylon species are forced into an underground resistance in order to even survive (with Alara leading one such cell), Bortus is stuck at the bottom of the ocean with the sunken ship, Isaac never performed his Heel–Face Turn without Clare to teach him about humanity and is offline, Ed and Gordon are stuck fleeing from planet to planet, and Kelly, wracked with guilt, is desperately getting the crew back together to rectify her mistake.
Charly Burke lost a woman she was in love with during an attack by the Kaylon. She takes a harsher anti-Kaylon stance than the rest of the crew and openly distrusts Isaac.
Genre Throwback : Seth MacFarlane was unhappy with the dark direction science fiction was being taken, and wanted to make a series that was a throw back to the light, more optimistic take Star Trek had.
Germans Love David Hasselhoff : In universe. The female Moclans, led by Heveena, regard Dolly Parton and her music with reverence, considering her to be humanity's greatest artist.
Good Colors, Evil Colors : After the Kaylon, a planet of killer robots , declare war on the mostly-pacifistic Union, their red-lit warships contrast against the Union's pleasant blue-lit ships.
Guile Hero : Ed, especially when it comes to ship battles. The Orville isn't the biggest, baddest ship in space, so surviving against more powerful enemies means getting clever.
Half-Human Hybrid : Teleya's brief relationship with Ed in her guise as "Janelle Tyler" has produced a daughter named Anaya. The girl looks to possess both human and Krill features, although she also ages much faster than a human child would (she looks to be 7 despite being born only a year before). Ed wants Teleya to use Anaya as proof that humans and Krill can coexist, but Teleya fears the reveal would undermine her authority.
"About a Girl" - Just because a culture's laws are backwards and cruel and you put up a good fight, doesn't mean you'll win said fight.
"Majority Rule" and "All the World is a Birthday Cake" - You can't change people's beliefs, but you can use those beliefs to manipulate them.
"Cupid's Dagger" - Sometimes, sexual assault is difficult to prove and the predator will happily use the guilt, shame, and doubt of victims to merrily escape any fallout for his actions.
"Deflectors" - Being different, in many places, is a crime. Being an utterly bigoted asshole is not a crime, unfortunately. And Being Good Sucks .
"Sanctuary" - Realpolitik often means having to capitulate to another nation's demands, even if those demands are to let them abuse their own people. Also, political compromise deals mean no one gets what they want.
"Gently Falling Rain" - If someone is filled with hate, making overtures and taking a chance on them probably won't result in a change of heart. Even an honest gesture of good faith can come back around to bite you hard.
Heavy Worlder : Xelayans come from a world with gravity high enough to instantly crush human bone. This gives them incredible strength when they're in more Earth-like environments.
Heel–Race Turn : The Krill , of all races, are the first to ally with the Planetary Union when the Kaylon launch their war to rid the galaxy of organic life . This is turned on its head when the moderate Krill Chancellor who wanted to deepen ties with the Union is ousted by a far more radical Teleya, who cancels the alliance. The Moclans , whose strongly misogynistic culture had already made them an uneasy ally, are finally kicked out of the Union when their government blatantly commits several crimes against other Union citizens. The Moclans then ally with the Krill out of necessity, and both soon get their hands on a stolen superweapon that can be used to wipe out the Kaylon. The Union then allies itself with the Kaylon because they think wiping out a sentient species goes too far , first as a pure Enemy Mine , but when a biological sacrifices herself to destroy the weapon, Kaylon Primary is so startled that he agrees to a peace treaty and even possible membership in the Union.
Isaac broadcasts a signal which shuts down all Kaylons on the Orville , including himself. However, the crew are able to revive him due to Yaphet's knowledge of them.
Charly overloads the superweapon that can wipe out all the Kaylons in the galaxy despite hating the Kaylon with all her heart . She remains at the epicenter of the massive explosion. The sacrifice is so startling that Kaylon Primary is willing to consider peace with the Union .
Heteronormative Crusader : Inverted with the Moclans , who are (mostly) an all-male species . If a Moclan has a preference for females, he is considered an aberrant and a criminal. When Klyden learns that Bortus's ex-boyfriend Lokar is a closet heterosexual, he threatens to out him, which would result in Lokar's arrest and shame to his family. Lokar fakes his death at Klyden's hands and plans to flee. When the truth is discovered, he is offered asylum with the Planetary Union , but decides that he'd done enough hiding and returns to Moclus to be tried. The sad irony here is that Klyden was hatched female and was "corrected" to male as an infant, so there's a bit of self-loathing involved there.
High Times Future : Marijuana is now openly accepted, to the point that it is possible to freely order pot brownies via the ship's food replicator. Additionally, it is implied that Kelly is a frequent user of particularly strong marijuana, and yet is still a ranking Commander and first officer of a ship. It seems that the only stipulation about use is that it not interfere with one's ability to perform their duties.
Hollywood Board Games : In "Lasting Impressions" , Gordon keeps yelling his guess (Dick Van Dyke) for one of the Pictionary drawings. The other players ignoring him doesn't deter him. He might be an Ace Pilot but can act as an utter doofus on more mundane matters. At least he apologizes after the deed.
Holographic Disguise : In episode 6, Mercer and Malloy use mobile holographic projectors to disguise themselves as Krill in order to infiltrate a Krill ship.
Homage : The show is essentially a love letter to Star Trek and its aspirational ideals. The pilot episode also homages, in particular, Star Trek: The Next Generation 's early days as a syndicated series, with ad breaks coming at odd times (referencing how syndicated shows are awkwardly cut to make room for extra ads) and the crew's departure from space dock featuring unnecessary reaction shots of various members staring at the viewscreen (referencing how early TNG episodes used this technique to try and make mundane special effects sequences seem more dramatic while also padding for time).
Homage Shot : An overhead shot through the transparent bridge dome showing the crew busy at their stations is a direct homage to similar shots in the original Star Trek pilot episode "The Cage," and Star Trek: The Motion Picture .
Homosexual Reproduction : The nearly all-male Moclans have same-sex pairings typically, surgically "correcting" females to male since they deem them weak. Yet they somehow still reproduce. It's pretty unclear what counts as male, biologically speaking, among them.
Human Aliens : A few of the species encountered of the course of the show are nearly identical to humans, with the series taking a step further and having these races also having comparable cultures and societies to humanity. In the episode "Majority Rules", it's suggested that this is because the planets they develop on are similar to Earth.
Humans Are Special : Played with, and occasionally subverted. Humanity is portrayed as generally more open, diplomatic, and tolerant than most of the other races in the galaxy note Though the only other recurring races whose cultures are explored in depth are the Moclans , Krill , Kaylon , and Xelayans . That said, they are still portrayed as being plagued by many of their old vices, such as resentfulness, pettiness, and alcoholism.
In episode 7, LaMarr gets himself arrested for "dry-humping" a statue of a famous person on an alien planet. And this was right after the Captain explicitly warned the away team not to do anything to draw attention to themselves.
Kelly does the same in the season 1 finale - no sooner has Isaac finished telling her to be extremely careful about cultural contamination does she reveal herself, use tech to heal someone, and worse of all, sticks around long enough to introduce herself and get herself seen by a large group of natives.
If You're So Evil, Eat This Kitten! : In the episode Identity, Part 2 , Kaylon Primary tests Isaac's loyalty to the Kaylon cause by ordering him to kill Ty. However, this plan backfires as it ends up turning Isaac against the Kaylon.
Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy : The Krill soldiers only score one hit during the entire firefight in the pilot episode, and it's not even fatal. According to Mercer, getting shot in the shoulder still hurts like hell, but Grayson says that he only curses when he's overstating it .
Impossible Pickle Jar : In the pilot, Captain Mercer can't open a vault door and asks Pint-Sized Powerhouse security officer Alara to "open this jar of pickles for me." Instead of using her super strength to turn the wheel that opens the door, she just charges into it and knocks it over, along with part of the wall. Captain Mercer then quips that he "loosened it up for ya." This subsequently becomes a Running Gag , with Ed using the exact same "jar of pickles" phrase in subsequent episodes when he needs Alara to open doors that are too tough for him. At the end of "Home", when Alara has left the ship, she leaves Ed a jar of pickles.
Improbable Age : Despite being Chief of Security, Alara is in her early 20s. She explains that since it's rare for her kind to join the Union, they tend to get fast-tracked. In the very next episode, this becomes an issue when she finds herself temporarily in command of the ship during a crisis and lacks the experience to know what to do.
Indecisive Parody : Early reviews cited that the series couldn't seem to decide whether it wants to be a spoof of Star Trek or a mostly straight-played clone of it. As the series matured it became obvious that it was going to be a "love letter" to Star Trek and its inspirational ideals. It also became apparent that MacFarlane was classifying the show as a "parody" to allow him to offset legal challenges about heavily referencing the Star Trek intellectual property. note When a work is classified as a parody, it can claim "fair use" of other work's characters, settings, premises, etc. without facing legal challenges of trademark or copyright infringement.
Industrial World : Bortus' homeworld, Moclus, is almost entirely covered in arms factories.
Obviously, of course, all the ships in the series must have some form of dampeners, or every instantaneous jump from cruising speed to quantum speed would render the crew into paste. Most likely, they just subtly lowered the dampeners' setting unnoticed for the Krill incident.
Also averted in "Krill" when the crew reacts to G-forces when their ship pulls away from the planet.
Info Dump : A large portion of the dialogue is expository, in reference to how Star Trek has to devote a lot of lines to explaining what is going on so the audience can understand the story. Given its status as a partial parody, the series usually lampshades this by often following an infodump (especially of the technobabble variety) with a joke.
Averted. Despite being heavily inspired by Star Trek , where nearly every admiral was in some way corrupt, the Admiralty of the Planetary Union are all presented as consummate professionals willing to listen to reason but unafraid to dress down Mercer and his crew when they rightfully deserve it . Y'know, like real Admirals.
Eventually played straight after 3 seasons with Admiral Perry , who commits treason to ensure the total destruction of an enemy species. At the same time, he fully intends to return to Earth to face the repercussions for his actions as befits a Union officer, but Teleya decides that He Knows Too Much and has him killed .
Internalized Categorism : In "All the World is a Birthday Cake", one of the Rogerians imprisoned for being born to an astrological sign with supposed criminal tendencies is insistent that their imprisonment was necessary, that people such as him really do have such bad traits.
Just Think of the Potential! : Doctor Aronov extols the potential benefits of the quantum field manipulator, especially when it comes to feeding people with fast-growing crops and healing injuries in an instant.
Law of Alien Names : Lampshaded in "Krill," when Ed and Gordon try to come up with a list of plausible Krill names. note When they actually meet the Krill, Ed's mind goes blank, and he ends up calling themselves "Chris" and "Devin' respectively. Fortunately, while it causes some Krill to raise their eyebrows, they don't make anything of it.
Lighter and Softer : Versus Star Trek: Discovery and the JJ Abrams films. In fact, the show was created to be this as a response to the Darker and Edgier route that other sci-fi shows have taken in recent years.
The Main Characters Do Everything : As an Affectionate Parody of Star Trek , this is to be expected. It follows the trope closely, in largely the same manner as Star Trek did. The most obvious example is the fact that the Captain and First Officer repeatedly send themselves on dangerous away-missions.
Manly Gay : Moclan society in general, to the point of being a One-Gender Race with an intolerance towards heterosexuality . They're (nearly) all large, muscular, gruff and serious males with the vast majority desiring the same sex. Bortus explains in "Deflectors" that Moclus is an inhospitable world and his people had to fight hard just to survive on it.
Mars Needs Women : Blob-like crewman Yaphit has the hots for Doctor Finn.
The Masochism Tango : Bortus and Klyden's marriage shows them constantly at odds, to the point where it seems like they actually hate each other. There's a massive disagreement when their child is born female, with Klyden revealed to be a Boomerang Bigot , over giving the child "corrective surgery" to make her male. Then Bortus gets addicted to holographic pornography and starts ignoring his marriage, so Klyden tries to divorce him by stabbing Bortus through the heart per Moclan customs. Then Klyden exposes Bortus' former partner for being heterosexual and starts to indoctrinate their son with his Homonormative Crusader beliefs, earning Bortus' ire. Bortus then gives Klyden a "The Reason You Suck" Speech in front of his own commanding officer. This comes to a head when Topa finds out that she was born female, with Bortus supporting Topa's choice to have the surgery reversed over Klyden's objections. Their marriage dissolves as Klyden disowns his family and returns to Moclus. However, after Topa is kidnapped and tortured by Moclans, Klyden has a change of heart and returns, asking Topa for forgiveness and restoring his relationship with Bortus. Like Bortus, Klyden renounces his Moclan citizenship after the Moclans are expelled from the Union. Klyden even makes an effort to befriend Kelly, inviting her to have dinner with their family.
Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy : Ed and Kelly are a Downplayed example. Ed's no stranger to a fistfight or a gun battle, but relies more on his wits and his words to even the odds. Kelly is less inclined to talk her way out of trouble, and has no problem with a full-on brawl. It's also evident in the case of Darulio; Ed shows up to the date with fresh baked banana bread and a bottle of wine and is completely unable to keep himself from gushing like a schoolgirl while Kelly's forced attraction is pretty much a beeline to the bed. From a visual standpoint, Kelly tends to have a more aggressive posture, usually standing erect, while Ed slouches a bit.
Matter Replicator : The Orville features two types of replicators. Wall-mounted units generally used for food and drink and pedestal-style units with flat tops that are used for larger items such as clothes and furnishings.
The Medic : Doctor Claire Finn ( Penny Johnson Jerald ) is the Orville 's chief medical officer and "one of the most accomplished physicians in the Planetary Union."
The Union Fleet is explicitly referred to as a military service but, for the most part, isn't strict on formalities as long as everyone behaves within certain boundaries. The Orville crew is particularly casual, reflecting Ed's laid-back personality and command style. Also, all admirals are shown wearing five stars on their epaulets, the real-world insignia of fleet admiral, despite some being of lower rank like vice admiral (a three-star rank).
LaMarr is overly casual even in comparison to the fairly easy-going crew of the Orville . This comes back to bite him when he takes over as Chief Engineer: no one respects him because of his lackadaisical attitude. He quickly learns that respect has to be earned and starts using a command voice, while still being friendly.
The Mole : One of the scientists at the Epsilon station is in league with the Krill.
Mood Whiplash : Pretty much has become a staple of the entire show, as scenes can go from someone cracking a joke at someone else's expense or being a Cloud Cuckoolander to a dead serious discussion about a topic or a scene of extreme violence.
Moral Myopia : Isaac is widely hated on the Orville and throughout the Union when it's revealed that he was a spy and he betrayed the Union to his people. Meanwhile Ed and Gordon are treated as heroes for essentially doing the exact same thing to the Krill.
My God, What Have I Done? : In "Electric Sheep", Marcus Finn angrily tells Isaac that he wishes he was dead. After he gets his wish, he's clearly upset and heartbroken by the idea that he was the one who caused Isaac to deactivate himself .
My Species Doth Protest Too Much : Isaac turns against his fellow Kaylon when he's ordered to kill Ty (who's just a boy) as punishment for him trying to help free the crew.
Named After Someone Famous : Most of the named admirals in the series seem to have been named for famous admirals from Earth history, including William Halsey, Oliver Hazard Perry, Jisaburo Ozawa, and Ralph Christie.
A Nazi by Any Other Name : The Regorians in "All the World is a Birthday Cake" are an advanced society who dress like fascists and segregate a section of their population into concentration camps. Being a sci-fi series, the spin is that their target group is based on astrology , with all people who are born under a bad sign from their own history (Gilia, which collapsed into a black hole millenia ago) considered subhuman. In a twist, their segregation has nothing to do with race or genetics, so children born to Giliacs under a different sign are considered normal citizens.
Nepotism : Gordon gets the pilot spot due to being Ed's best friend, and Kelly has a lot of influence with the Admiral due to his friendship with her father, which she uses to put Ed in command. All three are perfectly competent in their roles, however.
New Season, New Name : Billed as The Orville: New Horizons for the third season.
Explicitly averted in " Identity (part 2) ", when the whole crew is confined to the shuttle bay by the Kaylon : Malloy : Sorry, I was in the pee corner. Grayson : The what? Malloy : Oh, well, there's no place to go to the bathroom down here so we all agreed on one corner. Yeah...no...trust me, you don't want to go over there unless you have to.
Then later, when Malloy is asked to go on a near-suicidal mission Malloy : Oh, man, pee corner is looking real good right now.
Discussed even more in depth in "From Unknown Graves" when John and Talla take their relationship to the next level. Turns out, Xelayans have a hard time even when the guy is interested. Over the course of a couple of weeks, John has to repeatedly visit sick bay after sex with Talla because she has a hard time controlling her strength during sex and keeps accidentally hurting him. Both tearfully decide that while what they have is real and both wish they could see where it goes they can't keep seeing each other. John can't keep up with the constant pain and Claire is already suspicious of his frequent serious injuries and isn't buying a workout simulator as the cause. And Talla can't keep hurting the man she loves just from trying to be intimate with each other. It's heartbreaking and underscored by John spitting out teeth from the vigorousness of the break-up sex.
No Heterosexual Sex Allowed : Moclans are an all-male species (well, a female is hatched occasionally, but they almost always end up being "corrected" to male). It's also revealed that any Moclan who is attracted to females is considered an aberrant and, if discovered, will be arrested and tried for the crime of heterosexuality.
No-Sell : The Orville 's weapons don't inflict any damage to the Krill destroyer. Justified since the Orville is an exploration ship, trying to fight a dedicated warship the size of a Union heavy cruiser.
No Sense of Humor : Isaac is an artificial being that doesn't understand humor or sarcasm. In "Pria", Malloy tries to teach him about practical jokes. This results in Malloy getting his leg amputated. (Though, after getting over the initial shock, they agree that it actually is a good prank; they can just grow him a new one, after all.)
Number Two : Kelly Grayson serves as the first officer of the Orville .
Never Trust a Trailer : The show, while having comedic elements, isn't quite the MacFarlane comedy farce that trailers would have you think. Indeed, one comedic scene in the trailer is actually a somewhat serious scene in the actual episode it's from.
Obfuscating Stupidity : Surprisingly enough, the crew are all a bunch of seasoned professionals. Ed Mercer may be a bit neurotic, but most of his more ridiculous statements and actions are to keep people from shooting him through Confusion Fu . And even though Gordon and John come across as goofy comic relief a lot of the time, in the crunch they show themselves to be supremely competent and reliable. This actually makes a certain amount of sense as in order to get to their positions as senior officers in the first place, they would need to be good at their jobs, a fact actually stated on screen by Kelly in "Command Performance" when she reassures Alara that the young officer can handle being in command. John is eventually revealed to be the smartest person aboard the ship, save for Isaac. He's just lazy and has gotten used to hiding his true intelligence (he grew up on a farming colony). However, once he's forced to step up, he proves himself a capable engineer and commander, earning a promotion.
Kelly, when Mercer catches her in bed with a blue alien . Both times.
Bortus has this reaction when his hatchling comes out female .
Gordon's face says it all in the episode "Krill" when his and Ed's infiltration of a Krill ship goes awry.
One-Gender Race : Deconstructed in the case of the Moclans, who live in a harsh, inhospitable world inhabited only by males, who procreate with each other . It turns out they actually do have females, but Moclan society mandates that they be surgically reassigned as males, as Moclans consider the female gender a horrific birth defect that needs to be fixed. Later we learn of a hidden colony world in "Sanctuary" settled entirely by Moclan females, to spare them being forcibly "corrected" into males.
The Only One : As befitting an Indecisive Parody of Star Trek (which frequently exaggerated it to the extent of having the Enterprise be the only ship in response range of near-Sol space, as in the Federation's capital and military headquarters), it's not uncommon for the ECV Orville to be the closest ship available to respond to a crisis, despite being only a mid-level exploration ship rather than a dedicated combatant. Justified in the pilot: the Planetary Union Fleet has a severe staffing shortage, which is a major reason Captain Mercer got command of Orville in the first place after wrecking his career following his divorce.
One World Government : Earth apparently has one in the future, not surprisingly.
Our Vampires Are Different : The Krill, the resident bad guy race of the first season. They have pale skin and vampiric features, are hypersensitive to light to the point that ultraviolet rays can burn them alive, they have a violent and murderous culture that sees all other races as soulless and free to be killed at leisure, and culturally they follow a Religion of Evil built around blood sacrifices and worship of an Omnicidal Maniac deity called Avis, and are basically space vampires. The major vampire trait they lack is that they do not feed on blood or Life Energy and eat regular food.
Outcast Refuge : Moclus's Hat is being He Man Woman Haters , to the point where they force gender-reassignment surgery on any Moclan who happens to be born biologically female. The Orville crew discover a colony of female Moclans hidden in a nebula, with an Underground Railroad transporting refugees and their families from Moclus.
Discussed in regards to the Krill, as unlike most advanced civilizations, they have increased in religiosity rather than decreasing. Their religion teaches that other species are soulless abominations lacking in true intelligence and sentience, more akin to animals than people, going so far as to use captive humans as sacrifices. Later they explain that species have been observed as having two reactions to finding other life and going into space. One is becoming humble, and no longer thinking they were the center of the universe. The other is doubling down, becoming very xenophobic. Obviously the Krill did that. Ed mentions before they were more peaceful, and it's possible also had a more passive interpretation of their religion.
Seems to be the way for society in general as by the 29th century, telling someone "You can go to hell" is a complete non sequitur .
The Chief Engineer still exclaims "Oh my God" after a crewmember is badly hurt. Alara also uses this phrase, and she is an alien. Of course, for most even now that's just an expression.
The society influenced by Kelly during its Bronze Age eventually grows out of religious fundamentalism and embraces reason.
Humans appear to no longer have believers in astrology, as when dealing with the Regorians (with a belief system that's entirely based on it) some must have the basic concept explained. They also hope that, due to their efforts, the Regorians will outgrow their belief too (which is basically the religion there).
However in the episode "If the Stars Should Appear" Ed says “Hi, I'm Captain Ed Mercer of the Jehovah's Witnesses.” As a joke. Even though it’s a joke, it could imply that the Witnesses still exist, so humanity might not have completely outgrown religion. It's likely however that he was just referencing the past for the joke.
"A Tale of Two Topas" introduces us to the Belkarians, a race who are part of the Planetary Union and who practise a religion that requires them to walk around naked on the first day of the month.
Parting-Words Regret : In the opening of "Into the Fold", Dr. Finn's older son, Marcus tells his mother that she "sucks" because he's unhappy with her for making him come on the family trip when he doesn't want to go on it. After their shuttle crashes on an unknown world and they're separated, he fears she may be dead and expresses regret for it. When they finally get back in contact, she assures him that she knows people sometimes say stuff like this in anger and it doesn't mean they don't love each other.
People Zoo : The Calivon keep members of less technologically advanced species in a zoo on their planet, since they consider them to be like animals. Mercer and Grayson become their latest exhibit.
Percussive Therapy : Alara deals with guilt of failing to save Payne in "Firestorm" by annihilating punching bags in the simulator.
Persecution Flip : In "Deflectors" it's revealed that, keeping with the all-male society Moclans enforce, their culture has no tolerance for opposite-sex attraction. This is to the point of not only prejudice but expressing it being a crime which carries a life sentence. Locar is revealed to be straight or bisexual (it's unclear if he was ever actually attracted to Bortus, or simply used him as cover), and it causes his apparent murder. The episode ends with Locar facing this punishment.
Pheromones : Darulio's species goes into heat once a year, releasing a pheromone and causing anyone who makes physical contact with them to become completely overwhelmed with sexual lust, regardless of gender or species.
Alara Kitan, the ship's security officer, comes from a high-gravity world and is played by 5'5" Halston Sage. In the pilot episode, she shoulder-charges a locked solid metal vault-style door and smashes it clean out of the concrete wall it's embedded in. She can also leap great distances, crush a titanium cube into a perfect sphere with her bare hands, and punch people twice her size across the room .
The Orville itself. Repeatedly mentioned to be "mid-sized" it's dwarfed by the Union's heavy cruisers. But the smaller ship can pack a wallop, especially after it receives weapon upgrades from the Moclans in season 2.
Moclus, Bortus' homeworld, is home to the Moclans, a species in which individuals are universally male and culturally find the thought of females, at least within their own species, to be abhorrent. This leads to pretty much all of them being Manly Gay . The planet's industrial base is also almost completely dedicated to weapons research and manufacturing.
Played with by Xelayas, Alara and Talla's homeworld. It initially appears that the Xelayan hat is that the planet has such a naturally high gravity that it bestows her species with Super-Strength in human-normal environments. After some development however it becomes clear that the Xelayans themselves are highly disdainful of physical roles and prefer intellectual pursuits. Alara herself is viewed by her own parents as intellectually slow and deficient.
Kaylon-1, Isaac's homeworld, is a machine society. They see their own advanced technology lifeform as superior to biological lifeforms. The Kaylon's attitude stems from a purely logical perspective rather than any philosophical, cultural, or spiritual prejudice, yet it is perceived as Fantastic Racism by other species. It's not hard to see why people would be offended by that attitude, but at the same time the Kaylon attitude comes from a logical place — they're a race of immortal machines that need not sleep, hunger, or breathe, and are stronger and smarter than most of the other races they come across. By "Identity" in the second season, the Kaylons turn out to be Absolute Xenophobes who decide that the inferiority of biological races and their past mistreatment of the one that were initially responsible for creating them justifies a war of extermination.
Platonic Co-Parenting : After Topa transitions back into a girl and Klyden leaves his family , Kelly begins acting as Topa's mentor and mother-figure, while Bortus remains and is an undoubtedly good father to his child. There's no romantic attraction between the two, but they have a strong friendship and work together to give Topa a good support system. Even after Klyden returns and remarries Bortus, it's clear that Kelly will still have a place in their family due to her role as Topa's mother figure .
Plot-Inciting Infidelity : The series opens with Ed walking in on Kelly having sex with an alien. The subsequent breakdown is why his career is so far off track for the rest of the pilot. It is revealed at the end of the pilot that the entire series can be traced to this event, as it is Kelly's guilt that led her to pull the strings to get Ed his post as captain of the Orville . As of "Cupid's Dagger," it's also terrifyingly unclear as to whether Kelly actually consented or was taken advantage of by the alien's powerful pheromones.
Pop-Cultural Osmosis Failure : The humans on the crew are fond of referencing Earth's pop culture, much to the puzzlement of their alien shipmates who have no idea what they're talking about. The pilot featured a Pre-Mortem One-Liner by Mercer involving Arbor Day which is totally lost even on his human crew. Later episodes show the crew passing time by watching Earth fiction like the old Rudolph cartoon or Seinfeld, usually with the alien shipmates making amusing observations or misunderstanding the situations being presented. The show also uses this for a bit of Foreshadowing in "Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes"; Lieutenant Tyler is totally unfamiliar with human pop culture, because she's actually Teleya, a Krill infiltrator .
Post-Scarcity Economy : The Planetary Union apparently has one, given there is no money anymore, and referring to another planet as "still capitalist" in "Majority Rule". In "New Dimensions", Kelly explicitly attributes this to the invention of Matter Replicator technology. John notes, however, that there are colony worlds that struggle to survive, citing his own home planet as an example. Kelly explains in the penultimate episode of season one that, even though material resources are plentiful, people with skills and the will and connections to use them are not, so the Planetary Union economy largely runs on people's reputations: things no longer have value, but people do, in a non-slavery way. Status is earned by what you do, but you can fully dedicate yourself to a practice and be the best you can be, which in turn is your economic value. The other side of this is explored somewhat obliquely in the second season: Lieutenant Gordon, known as an ace pilot, decides he wants to be more than just that and applies for command responsibilities. While Commander Greyson's initial reaction could be considered a "wait, you in command?" reaction, there's the implication that if he goes for command and doesn't do well, it will devalue his personal reputation because he will be going from a "great pilot" to a "below-average commander". In "Future Unknown", Kelly explains that a society has to be ready for Matter Replicator tech, otherwise it can lead to major problems, as the rich and powerful will find ways to restrict the tech to themselves and may even start wars over it.
Proscenium Reveal : Episode 10, " The Orville S1E10 "Firestorm" " eventually reveals that all the problems Alara is dealing with in the episode are part of a simulation designed to help her overcome her fears.
Queer Establishing Moment : Charly reveals in "Twice in a Lifetime" that she was in love with her friend Amanda, but unfortunately she was killed before Charly could work up the nerve to tell her.
Questionable Consent : "Cupid's Dagger". Darulio is in heat and is giving off pheromones that cause people to come into skin contact with him to become sexually attracted to him (in this case, Kelly and Ed at the same time ). He (and the episode's writers) seems to have little comprehension of the implications; the closest he comes to acknowledging it, a statement that his species considers it rude to refuse sex, comes off as Culture Justifies Anything in context. It's revealed at the end of the episode that he may have been similarly in estrus when he slept with Kelly in the pilot.
Racial Transformation : Teleya undergoes heavy cosmetic surgery to change her reptilian Krill features to human so she can infiltrate the Orville and spy on Mercer, then has the surgery reversed after she's been exposed and returns to her planet. Mercer himself and his shipmate Gordon had infiltrated the Krill in a similar manner before, but used a Holographic Disguise instead. Teleya's relationship with Mercer while undercover results in a half-Krill, half-Human child, so the two species are definitely biologically compatible.
Ragtag Band of Misfits : A Downplayed Trope example versus how odd they could have been, given the creator. Everyone is actually fully qualified for their job; they just have off-putting personalities.
Ed Mercer first appears as a Commander (we learn later that he was stationed at the Epsilon Eridani outpost) before being promoted to Captain when Admiral Halsey gives him command of the Orville .
"New Dimensions" has John LaMarr taking the role of Chief Engineer and thus a promotion from Lieutenant to Lieutenant Commander.
Rapid Aging : The inventor of the quantum field technology is pushed into her own device, aging her 100 years in 10 seconds. This kills her, of course.
Rapid-Fire "No!" : Ed when he's informed that Kelly is being assigned to his ship, which is stretched over several scenes as he sprints to his office.
Realpolitik : The Planetary Union is a large group of different species joined under a single government. However, it is not a harmonious arrangement. Certain members have beliefs and practices that the rest find morally reprehensible, but the majority bite their tongues because those members are considered vital for the survivial of the Union as a whole. This is best illustrated by the Moclans, a species who enforce their "all male" presentation through forced sex reassignments on Moclan females. This disgusts and horrifies non-Moclans, but those in power look the other way because the Moclans develop vital weapon and shield technology used in Union ships. This technology is so important, that Moclus is even allowed to maintain a large and independent military. At last it becomes so intolerable they expel Moclus, but this leads them to ally themselves with the Krill, the resurgent fanatical enemies of the Union, and the combined military might is so much that the Union has to enter an arrangement with the Kaylon .
Really Gets Around : Darulio, who had an affair with Kelly, is a Retepsian whose culture considers it rude to turn down a sexual advance. When he's in heat his pheromones make him irresistible to anyone who makes physical contact with him, and even Ed can't resist bedding him.
Red Alert : Both yellow and red alert are used on a fairly common basis. Tactical alert has also been seen.
Redemption Earns Life : Because Isaac ultimately turns against the Kaylon and helps the Orville crew retake their ship, leading to Mercer lobbying on his behalf and the Union deciding it's okay to revive him and let him return to duty.
Generally averted throughout Season 1, where the crew are usually seen suffering treatable injuries but not killed. Even in the episode "Firestorm" with the actual death of Lieutenant Payne, it is subverted because he does not become a Forgotten Fallen Friend but actually receives a funeral, a eulogy, and a scene where Captain Mercer talks about how he hates having to write condolence letters.
Played straight multiple times in the second season's "Identity", wherein several Orville security crew are gunned down when the Kaylons take the ship, and an engineer later gets Thrown Out the Airlock by Kaylon Primary to prove their seriousness to Captain Mercer in the wake of a failed attempt to get a message to the Union command on Earth .
Redundant Parody : Often accused of this by critics; the show tried so hard to parody Star Trek: The Next Generation , it ended up being essentially TNG. However, there are also arguments on whether this is deliberately invoked as Seth had originally wanted to create an actual Star Trek series but got shot down, and The Orville was his attempt to do so regardless while flying the parody banner to dodge copyright lawsuits. The makers not only refer to it consistently as a Dramedy , but also as an homage to both Trek and similar optimistic sci-fi series. Seth Macfarlane himself has said the executives at Fox pushed the show into a much more comedic sphere than he originally intended. Presumably he agreed just to get his self-insert passion project the go ahead, assuming he could slowly alter the show back to his initial idea the longer it went on. If that was indeed his goal, it seems to be working.
Refuge in Audacity : Heveena does this by accident : she recites the lyrics of Dolly Parton's "9 to 5" to the Union's top brass in a completely serious attempt to convince them to give her colony independence. Despite Ed and Halsey's reactions, her passionate delivery of the words and the relevance to what she's talking about, combined with the fact that she has no reason to think it's weird, actually makes it work.
Religion Is Wrong : Every time that a religion makes testable claims so far in the series, it's proven they're wrong. This is somewhat of a Seth MacFarlane staple, though, so it's not that surprising.
Religion of Evil : The Krill are shown to be following one of these, and they are suggested to be one of the few space-faring races to have a religion at all. Their own race are nocturnal and their faith teaches them that they are on a Great Crusade to subjugate or destroy all other races in the galaxy, who are regarded as being without souls, as the command of their deity Avis, with religious ceremonies involving blood sacrifices such as stabbing severed human heads. It is somewhat implied that some of their tenets are actually interpretations of their religious text and not necessarily the intended message, but the result is a religion that preaches interstellar genocide and racial superiority in practice all the same.
Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory : This trope might or might not be in effect in the episode "Pria," depending on how one interprets the Timey-Wimey Ball . One character states that the crew's memories would be altered as a result of a change in the timeline, which would avert the trope, but the overall outcome of the time travel, and one character's reaction at the end of the episode, seem to contradict this, requiring the trope to be in effect.
Robosexual : Dr. Claire Finn ends up in a relationship with Isaac, a robotic life form. For their second date in the simulator, he creates a human holographic appearance (of the actor voicing Isaac). Claire then takes the initiative and switches the simulator to that of her quarters, where she finds out that he's... fully equipped (or, at the very least, his hologram is fully anatomically accurate).
Robot Buddy : The android Isaac is an artificial life-form from a machine society that considers biological life-forms to be inferior . However, Isaac intentionally took on a posting aboard the Orville to study humanoid interaction and is often seen socializing with the other crew and ends up bonding with Claire's children and eventually, Claire herself .
Xelayans, like Alara, have ridged foreheads, noses, and ears. Between the pilot and second episode, the make-up was altered by removing a piece across the brow, allowing Halston Sage 's eyebrows to become visible.
Moclans, like Bortus, have ridges and grooves across their entire heads, requiring more elaborate prosthetics for actors like Peter Macon. Bortus is also shown nude, necessitating a full-body costume that shows Moclans having leathery and spotted skin with ridges along the spine and chest.
Rule of Symbolism : In "Pria", the titular character's initial outfit has a giant red Black Widow symbol on the torso. Turns out she's not to be trusted. Ironically, she actually plans to save the Orville .
The human crew members making a reference to Earth pop culture and their alien peers not getting it.
Ed running into jammed doors he can't open and immediately asking Alara to use her Super-Strength to take care of it, always with the same phrase: Ed: Alara, you want to open this jar of pickles for me?
Satiating Sandwich : Gordon's time travelling egg salad sandwich in season 3.
Scary Dogmatic Aliens : The Krill are falling into the "religious fundamentalist" variety. They have a holy book that declares all other life forms are inferior animals without souls or lives worth considering, and consider it a holy mission to rule the galaxy.
Mercer takes a moment to comment that 3,000 ships exploring a quadrant of the galaxy really isn't that many when you think about it.
There have been several situations where, even with faster-than-light travel, travel time or the time constraints of a task has been an issue. Often such instances comes with at least one cutaway showing how the crew reacts to that travel time, such as watching TV while warping around.
Exploration can get boring. While yes, space is full of wonders, a lot of an explorer's job is to just wander around and look at a slightly new example of a rock they've seen a thousand times before.
When acting Captain Alara is given direct orders to abandon her mission to recover the kidnapped captain and commander, she gets flak from the crew. She decides to step up and ignore the Admiral's orders in order to save them, and wins back the crew.
In "Sanctuary", despite the risk that this would jeopardise their careers and provoke war, the crew of the Orville all accept the decision to fight the Moclans that were sent to abduct the Moclan females from their colony, even to the point that Bortus fights against his own people until a compromise is reached .
Self-Destruct Mechanism : In "Command Performance", Alara (as acting Captain) orders Isaac to tractor in a Calivon probe. It self-destructs when it moves too close to the ship, to prevent them from analyzing the technology.
Having said that, there are also a few occasions where they show that them hooking up again might be a really bad idea. For example when they're abducted and put in an alien zoo, they spend the first couple of nights enjoying each other's company and generally hinting to the audience that they might rekindle their relationship, but after a couple of days, they've been reminded how each other's personal habits grate on them and they're more or less at each other's throats.
The season 3 finale has them holding hands and smiling during Claire and Isaac's wedding .
Sensitive Guy and Manly Man : Bortus and his mate. Bortus tends to be more of the masculine/manly type (from a human perspective) while Klyden is a bit more prone to emotion (from a human perspective) and emotional needs. That said, Klyden is also a stay-at-home dad stuck on a starship, so that might be expected. On the other hand, Bortus is the one who laid and incubated their egg which is more of a female role for Earth biology. Klyden turns out to have been born female, for what it's worth.
The show's opening credit sequence is reminiscent of Star Trek: Voyager 's.
The second episode, "Command Performance," has Captain Mercer with a plush toy of Kermit the Frog and praising his virtues. In the same episode, Lt. Alara is mockingly referred to as " Dora the Explorer " by a couple of her crewmates. And of course, Doctor Finn describes herself as an " Obi-Wan " when giving Alara advice.
The Orville crew are shown traveling down to planets' surfaces using shuttles, poking fun at how Star Trek came up with the transporter because Gene Roddenberry realized it would be prohibitively expensive to show shuttles flying about in a 1960's television series.
The music for the mysterious derelict in "If The Stars Should Appear" is a clear homage to Jerry Goldsmith's music for V'Ger from Star Trek: The Motion Picture .
The outfit that Pria is wearing when the Orville rescues her at the start of the episode looks like the command uniforms from Star Trek: The Next Generation : Red with black shoulders and arms.
In "Command Performance" when Alara enters Bortus's quarters and finds him naked he asks "Is it not customary to request permission before entering someone else's quarters?" Whether intentional or not (and if not, it's a huge coincidence), this is almost word-for-word Data's line to Commander Bruce Maddox, "Is it not customary to request permission before entering an individual's quarters?" in " The Measure of a Man " from Star Trek: The Next Generation .
Similarly, in "About a Girl," before boxing with Alara, Bortus says that he's pretty sure that striking a fellow officer is a court-martial offense. In " This Side of Paradise " from Star Trek: The Original Series , after Kirk deliberately provokes Spock to violence in order to shake off the influence of psychogenic spores, he then lays out a plan to free everyone else from the spores which will require them to work together. To this, Spock responds "Captain. Striking a fellow officer is a court-martial offense."
In "Home", Alara's father gets in a debate about a "Melloran" vaccine, which may be a reference to the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Melora", which featured a Heavy Worlder race like the Xelayans.
In the simulation in the episode "Command Performance", Gordon tries to bluff the Krill by telling them the Orville has a new deflector system that deflects any attack back onto the attacker. This is almost certainly a reference to the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "The Corbomite Maneuver", in which Kirk successfully pulls off a similar bluff involving a fictitious material called " corbomite " that will activate if the other ship fires on the Enterprise and bounce the energy back to destroy it.
And then there's the many, many in-universe references to popular media from the early 21st century and late 20th.
A race of Killer Robots who were enslaved by their masters, turned against them , and now intend to wage a war to Kill All Humans — are we talking about the Cylons or the Kaylon ?
Union ships' quantum drives are based on the Alcubierre Drive (based on the work of Miguel Alcubierre) which, in theory, allows for faster-than-light travel while still keeping within Einstein's Theory of General Relativity. The reason why Union ship engines form three rings in the aft is because physicist Harold White postulated that a torus-shaped (or donut shaped) warp bubble would be much more energy efficient than a sphere-shaped warp bubble.
The Orville 's interior is covered in fuzzy paneling. This is supposed to be organic plant material that continuously absorbs the carbon dioxide exhaled by the crew and converting it into breathable oxygen, thus reducing the need for a mechanical / chemical scrubbing system.
There are jokes and moments of inherent silliness here and there, but the pressure of commanding a starship and the moral conflicts the characters get into are largely played straight. Seth MacFarlane could have easily gone for pure farce, but he treats the material pretty earnestly, making it more of a Star Trek homage than a strong parody, with several episodes ending on somber notes.
It takes a big step towards the "serious" end of the scale in "Identity, Part 1", when Isaac's race, the Kaylon, reveal themselves to be Absolute Xenophobes bent on the extermination of organic life; the invasion of Earth is thwarted, but a protracted galactic war against Killer Robots still looms for the Union and their allies .
Confirmed by the official-tie in comic. Topa is technically only a few months old, but has the size and mental capacity of a seven year old child.
So Proud of You : Alara has spent her whole life estranged from her parents, who disliked her decision to go into military service. In "Home," she saves her entire family from being killed and gets from her father that he's proud of her. It's a big moment for her and ultimately prompts her to leave the Orville even after they find a solution that would allow her to remain and find the family life she never had before.
Soundtrack Dissonance : part of the scene's Mood Whiplash , where else can you find a full-on firefight set to Dolly Parton's "9 to 5"?
Space Cadet Academy : Union Point, where Mercer was top of his class.
Space Elves : Despite being Heavy Worlder people with Super-Strength , it appears that the Xelayans are this if Alara's parents are any indication. They strongly favor intellectual pursuits and talk down to people they consider to be of lesser intelligence. As far as they are concerned, humans are "the hillbillies of the galaxy". Just to complete things, they have pointed ears.
Liam Neeson shows up late in "If the Stars Should Appear."
Charlize Theron plays the titular "Pria" of that episode.
Robert Picardo , who starred in Star Trek: Voyager , in a cameo as Alara's dad.
Bruce Willis cameos as a sentient plant.
The Moclan species is (nearly) all male and homosexual, reproducing somehow without females. As a result, they're highly misogynist and heterophobic. Any female Moclans are typically "corrected" by getting forced sex reassignment surgery following birth. The heterosexual minority is persecuted quite like LGBT+ people on Earth have been , and a Moclan male having sex with anyone female carries a life sentence. One Moclan child who'd been "corrected" coming to realize she's still female despite this and having a second sex reassignment parallels not only intersex (who frequently suffer involuntary "corrective" surgery if their genitals are deemed "ambiguous") but also trans people since her gender doesn't match what she'd been assigned.
The future human society is indicated to be a Free-Love Future with no prejudice toward LGBT+ people. Charly, introduced in Season 3, it turns out is into other women.
Lt. Commander Bortus sometimes comes across as very literal-minded, and generally maintains a logical approach to most subjects, but he can be persuaded to change his mind from outside influences.
Isaac fills Spock's science officer function and often comments on human emotion; doubles as "The Data" in this regard.
Standard Human Spaceship : Averted. The Planetary Union favors sleek rounded designs for its ships and shuttles with multiple engines forming distinctive arches in the aft.
The most commonly-encountered type of Krill ship is a destroyer. In "Krill", Bortus calls the Krill vessel attacking the colony a battlecruiser, but it looks exactly the same as a Krill destroyer. Despite this, a Krill destroyer is about the same size as a Union heavy cruiser, so "destroyer" may mean something else to the Krill than it does to us.
In the same episode, the Orville rendezvous with a Union flagship, which is for the most part just a (much) bigger version of the Orville.
Yaphit, a crewmember aboard the Orville that comes from a race that are essentially blobs of jelly, voiced by Norm MacDonald . Curiously, he finds human women attractive. Black human women. He openly states that Pria is the first white woman he's ever considered such. Two other members of the same species are briefly seen as members of the Planetary Union Council.
Dr. Finn mistakes an aquatic serpentine alien botanist for a science experiment in "Old Wounds".
Ed and Kelly's marriage ended up as this.
Dr. Finn later reveals she was briefly married to Paul Christie, who was one of her medical school professors.

Stealth Pun : "Krill" reveals that the Krill god is named Avis, leading to a number of puns based on the rental car company. One of Avis Rent-A-Car's rivals is Enterprise, the name of the ship from Star Trek ; though the episode avoids making a reference to that company, another, Hertz, is name-dropped.
Submersible Spaceship : In the Bad Future created in " The Road Not Taken ", the Orville was shot down by the Moclans during the Battle of Earth and sank to the bottom of the Mariana Trench. The alternate Orville crew are able to reach her by diving a shuttle into the ocean and find her intact enough to repair and bring to the surface.
Suspiciously Similar Substitute : Talla, who replaces Alara as chief security officer, is the same species and gender. However, they are well differentiated, as Talla is taller, older, much more confident and relaxed, but also more unflappable and focused in serious situations, and she lacks the family prejudice against the military. Justified in that Ed specifically requested another Xelayan to replace Alara.
Swiss-Cheese Security : When the Orville lands on Kaylon, they don't bother posting any guards at the ship's exit, nor do they install any type of automatic security system. This enables Claire's son Ty to just walk right off the ship without anyone noticing he's gone.
"The Universe has a crew loose."
For the third season, New Horizons , on Hulu : "New home. New missions."
Technobabble : Generally averted. While there are circumstances in which the science must be made up (usually in regards to some kind of Negative Space Wedgie ), the solutions to various problems are usually grounded in some kind of scientific principle, up to and including the basic form of interstellar travel presented in the show.
Technology Levels : The series appears to play this straight, with an alien species we see in "Mad Idolatry" following the same ascent of technological and social progress we see the Earth underwent before, while surpassing them in the end.
The Theocracy : The bio-ship in "If the Stars Should Appear" is being ruled by a theocratic dictatorship who have misinterpreted the word of their former Captain Dorahl as divine scripture over the years.
Thrown Out the Airlock : The Kaylon blow an unfortunate ensign out the airlock and make Ed watch as punishment for his resistance to their occupation of the Orville .
Timey-Wimey Ball : The episode "Pria" involves some time travel, and it's... really not entirely clear how the different possible timelines / chains of events / memories that might exist as a result are supposed to be sorted out. One character says that an entire set of events would never happen now as a result of the time travel shenanigans, but the very continued existence of the Orville contradicts this... But it also seems that some parts of the time-line are un-done.
Trailers Always Lie : The trailers focused on the comedy, but the show is much more of a drama with some comedic elements.
Trojan Horse : In the pilot, the crew rigs the quantum field manipulator to activate and accelerate time by 100 years when the Krill activate it, having glued a modified redwood seed to the emitter. Cue a redwood sapling splitting the Krill Destroyer in half.
Turned Against Their Masters : When the Kaylon grew self-aware, they asked to be set free by their creators. Instead, they were fitted with pain circuits to use as punishment, and repressed in hopes of keeping them slaves. As a result, they rose up and killed their creators. In the present, they view all biological species as a threat which they must eliminate because of their history (except for Isaac ).
When the away team discovers the elevator leading the bridge of a massive colony ship in "If The Stars Should Appear", Ed tries to make small talk to pass the time. Kelly can't let it slide.
This is a Running Gag in "Cupid's Dagger" in which Ed and Kelly are constantly interrupted in the elevator of the Orville by the entrance of a low-level crew member who seems bent on some sort of elevator music being installed. It's eventually made his project and towards the end of the episode, when he walks in yet again after the music is now playing, Kelly shouts at him, wondering if he just does nothing but ride the elevator all day.
United Space of America : Not surprisingly, being a direct reflection of the United Federation of Planets , the Union has definite shades of this, right down to the name prefix USS for their starships (Trek, in turn, adopted USS from the US Navy before Gene L. Coon came up with the Federation as a concept). In "About a Girl" it was implied that the Union has a federalist system, since member worlds obviously have a fair degree of autonomy, and "Majority Rule" confirmed that their system of government is some form of representative democracy.
Unwanted False Faith : After being mistakenly deified by a primitive people in "Mad Idolatry", Kelly works hard to prove her mortal status. However, her efforts are to no avail. In the end, they grow out of this on their own.
Come "Identity", however, they lose that spot to the Kaylon .
Villainous Lineage : Kaylon Primary argues, based on human history, that we are all evil like our slave-owning ancestors in spite of Isaac pointing that's no longer the case (and ironically citing his friend Ty, who's African-American, thus descended from the victims of slavery).
Waif-Fu : Being a Pint-Sized Powerhouse , Alara Kitan is capable of this. Just ask Bortus in "Command Performance".
And again, an episode later, when new security chief Talla vents to John and Gordon.
We Need a Distraction : In order to buy some time for Isaac to get the engines working, Ed and Kelly start arguing with the Krill commander about their failed marriage. It works for a bit, but he loses patience and fires a warning shot to get them back on task, forcing them to come up with an alternate plan.
We Will All Be History Buffs in the Future : The human characters are all very knowledgeable of 20th and 21st Century pop culture to the extent that many of their conversations amount to inside jokes that the alien crew members are understandably befuddled by since the references are not even to Earth culture in their present time (although Alara seems a bit better-versed than other alien crew). In one episode the crew is shown performing karaoke of songs from the 20th and 21st centuries. Malloy's ignorance of non-entertainment history is used by Grayson as a counter-argument to Moclan claims that males are intellectually superior.
The second-season episode "Identity" is the series' first two-parter — and with very good reason . The Kaylon race, far from being the relatively benign androids that resident Robot Buddy Isaac was shaping up to be, suddenly reveal themselves to be genocidal Absolute Xenophobes bent on the extermination of all organic life . And then the Kaylons deal a Curb-Stomp Battle while taking over the Orville , impress the ship into their invasion armada, and point it all straight at Earth. In one fell swoop, the Kaylon swiftly and decidedly knock the recurring, Obviously Evil Krill off of their perch as the biggest threat to the Union.
Season 3 has three wham episodes, first "Gently Falling Rain", where Teleya becomes the new supreme chancellor of Krill, and promptly ends the Krill-Union alliance and plunges the two powers back into war , followed by "Midnight Blue" and "Domino", where Moclus is expelled from the Union after authorizing the abduction and torture of Topa, leading them to ally with the Krill. The Union develops a powerful anti-Kaylon weapon which ends their conflict, but the Krill obtain the weapon and plan to use it to wipe out Kaylon, leading to the Kaylon allying with the Union against the Krill-Moclan alliance .
Where No Parody Has Gone Before : Subverted. It was originally marketed as a straightforward spoof of the Star Trek -style of Space Opera , but while there's some humor here and there, it's more of a Dramedy homage. With the conclusion of the first season, it is apparent that MacFarlane is marketing the show as a "parody" to allow him to offset any legal challenges from him heavily referencing Paramount's intellectual property. When a work is classified as a parody, it can claim "fair use" of other work's characters, settings, premises, etc without facing legal challenges of trademark or copyright infringement.
"Pria" combines the Star Trek TOS episodes "Mudd's Women" and the Firefly episode "Our Mrs. Reynolds" . The Orville ends up picking up a stranded person who's a mysterious, beautiful, charming passenger with ulterior motives and plans to sell the ship, albeit without killing the crew . It also has strong similarities to the TNG episode "A Matter of Time" , given that the featured guest character is a time traveler working towards their own ends.
The general concept of "If the Stars Should Appear" - a giant bioship with inhabitants unaware they're on a vessel that is heading for destruction and aggressive towards strangers - is reminiscent of the classic Trek episode "For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky".
The base concept of "Majority Rule" - the Orville discovering an alien planet identical to 21st century Earth - is similar to the TOS episode "Miri."
The episode "Mad Idolatry" combines the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Blink of an Eye" (planet with sped-up time, and the consequences of them accidentally influencing the race living there, and an artificial life form going down to the planet and being trapped for a lengthy period), with the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Who Watches the Watchers" (human is mistaken for a god by a primitive race after using space-age technology to heal a local) with a hint of the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Meridian" (planet that periodically phases in and out of normal space).
A Happy Refrain is the Orville's version of the TNG episode "In Theory", where Data tries a romantic relationship.
"Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow" pulls a deconstruction switch and a gender inversion on the TNG episode "Second Chances," but then veers off hard and the next episode crashes into "Yesterday's Enterprise" with a hopeless Bad Future .
Working with the Ex : Ed's XO is his ex-wife Kelly Grayson and their re-introduction is rocky. Kelly: I was the one that suggested couples' counseling. Ed: The therapist was your brother-in-law !
World of Snark : Most of the cast is snarky to some degree, though Ed and Kelly are the standout examples.
Wouldn't Hurt a Child : A Deconstruction in the episode "Krill". Ed and Malloy refuse to kill the Krill children but they do kill all the adults to prevent them from destroying a human colony. Having spared the children, but killed their parents , it's pointed out that the children will grow up with every reason to have a grudge against the Union in general and Ed in particular.
Would Hurt a Child : When Isaac sees Finn is having a hard time controlling her kids on their shuttle trip, he politely offers to vaporize them for her.
Writer on Board : Admiral Ozawa states that it is all but universal (the sinister Krill being the exception) that as species advance technologically, the importance they place on religion fades. This is not a historically accurate statement, and only reflects Seth MacFarlane 's well known anti-religious views .
Writers Cannot Do Math : The epilogue of the novella Sympathy for the Devil features a scene of an elderly Ty Finn visiting a bakery and states that he is about 75 years old. However, it also describes the bakery he visits as featuring "early 26th-century technology," which would set the scene in at least 2500. The show's previously established timeline sets the events of the third season in 2424 and Ty is already pre-teen at the start of the series. This means that in this scene, he would have to be closer to 90, unless there is some sort of temporal weirdness going on that hasn't yet been revealed.
You Have Outlived Your Usefulness : Admiral Perry, after delivering the Union's anti-Kaylon weapon to the Krill. It's implied that Teleya didn't originally intend to kill him, but after he learned of the Krill-Moclan alliance and expressed his intention to return to Earth, she didn't want the Union learning of the alliance just yet.

Video Example(s):

Lieutenant alara kitan.

Lieutenant Alara Kitan is a Xelayan, her home planet has higher gravity than most so when off her home world she has super strength.

Example of: Heavyworlder

Samurai simulation

Plasmafight

This is a thing...

Claire Finn and...

No Need to Rush...

Have Mercy. Bye.

I Wish To Becom...

Wash Your Mouth...

Good Night, Isaac

Epic Space Battle

Once Upon a Time
Creator/Zoic Studios
Opposite Sex
Creator/Fox
Out Matched
Monster Strike
Creator/Tippett Studio
Only Murders in the Building
Creator/Star (Disney+)
Pam & Tommy
Orphan Black: 7 Genes
Science Fiction Series
Other Space
Speculative Fiction LGBT
One-Gender Race
Orphan Black
Series of the 2010s
The Other Kingdom
King of the Hill
Creator/Disney
The Simpsons
The Originals
AmericanSeries/N To Z
The Others (2000)
Series of the 2020s
Creator/Hulu
The Other Black Girl
The Neighbors
Fantastic Comedy
Plumber's Crack
QuoteSource/Live-Action TV
Delayed Family Acceptance
LGBTRepresentationInMedia/Live-Action TV
The Other Two
Split Timelines Plot
ImageSource/Live-Action TV
Command Roster

Important Links

Action Adventure
Commercials
Crime & Punishment
Professional Wrestling
Speculative Fiction
Sports Story
Animation (Western)
Music And Sound Effects
Print Media
Sequential Art
Tabletop Games
Applied Phlebotinum
Characterization
Characters As Device
Narrative Devices
British Telly
The Contributors
Creator Speak
Derivative Works
Laws And Formulas
Show Business
Split Personality
Truth And Lies
Truth In Television
Fate And Prophecy
Edit Reasons
Isolated Pages
Images List
Recent Videos
Crowner Activity
Un-typed Pages
Recent Page Type Changes
Trope Entry
Character Sheet
Playing With
Creating New Redirects
Cross Wicking
Tips for Editing
Text Formatting Rules
Handling Spoilers
Administrivia
Trope Repair Shop
Image Pickin'

How well does it match the trope?

Example of:

Media sources:

11,241--> Report

Lieutenant Alar...

Seth MacFarlane Hinted At The Orville's Return Again, But Now I'm Confused About The Franchise's Future

What does this mean?

Seth MacFarlane as Captain Ed Mercer on The Orville

The Orville fans have been waiting to hear news about a Season 4 renewal for a while now. Despite promising updates and a shoutout from NASA , official news has yet to arrive on that front. There is a positive update to report, though, which comes courtesy of series producer and lead actor Seth MacFarlane . However, it also leaves me confused about the franchise's future.

It should come as no surprise that Seth MacFarlane continues to beat the drum that keeps hope for The Orville 's future alive. Despite the long wait for a renewal , positive comments from people like the actor/producer are sure to keep fans optimistic. Still, though MacFarlane's latest sentiments indicate that the show might not be finished, you may be like me in that you want to know exactly what he means.

How Seth MacFarlane Confirmed More Of The Orville Is Happening

Amidst unofficial rumors the show is returning, the Family Guy creator recently appeared on The Mike Henry Show and talked about various topics. One subject had to do with how, regardless of your level of success, there are always expected projects creatives must take on in order to get the passion projects they truly want to work on. It was during that part of the conversation that the Peter Griffin actor briefly mentioned The Orville and said the following:

The Orville was a passion project. I say was, but I don't really mean 'was' because there will be more.

So, according to the man himself, as of late April 2024, the franchise isn't done. Admittedly, this is a better update than what Seth MacFarlane said about Orville back in January. However, there's still some vagueness that leaves me with more questions than I previously had.

Why I'm Somewhat Confused By The Producer's Latest Comments

Seth MacFarlane is obviously committed to continuing the IP, but his wording isn't very specific, as not to promise anything. He doesn't say for sure whether Disney+ subscription holders should expect to stream a fourth season in the near future or even that the show will continue. MacFarlane could easily be saying that he intends to continue the stories of his fictional crew in book form or through some other medium outside of a TV. It's also possible that he could be planning an eventual movie or spinoff that he plans to make years down the road.

One unfortunate reality of this uncertainty is that the wait for a new season has left some cast members restless. Some have also been honest about their experiences working on the sci-fi romp in the interim. For instance, Adrianne Palicki saying in late 2023 that shooting The Orville was difficult . Additionally, co-star Penny Johnson openly expressed frustration with the show not being renewed yet. Given that actors have to work to make money, I get why some could be frustrated. The cast of this series may not be available by the time the creator is ready to shoot new episodes, so other options may be explored in that event.

Whatever the future holds for The Orville: New Horizons we'll have to wait and see, In the meantime, you can continue to stream the series on Disney+ or with a Hulu subscription . I'll continue to remain optimistic that fans haven't seen the end of the series but am hoping for some more concrete evidence of that to arrive in the future.

CINEMABLEND NEWSLETTER

Your Daily Blend of Entertainment News

Mick Joest is a Content Producer for CinemaBlend with his hand in an eclectic mix of television goodness. Star Trek is his main jam, but he also regularly reports on happenings in the world of Star Trek, WWE, Doctor Who, 90 Day Fiancé, Quantum Leap, and Big Brother. He graduated from the University of Southern Indiana with a degree in Journalism and a minor in Radio and Television. He's great at hosting panels and appearing on podcasts if given the chance as well.

Michael Weatherly Had NCIS Fans Suggest Titles For Tony And Ziva Spinoff, And One Of The Picks He Responded To Seems Like A Perfect Choice

Hulu’s The Stranger Ending Explained: How It Turns The Tables And Delivers A Thrilling Conclusion

After 90 Day Fiancé: Happily Ever After Showed A Challenging Moment In Kobe And Emily's Story, I Kinda Felt Proud Of Them

Deep Space Whine

There’s a war over what’s “the real star trek.” it’s highly illogical..

“What if we just did Star Trek ?” That, according to executive producer Henry Alonso Myers , was the pitch for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, one of five new Star Trek shows to come out over the past five years as part of Paramount Plus’ franchise revival. Though Myers may not have intended it, that Strange New Worlds pitch, “What if we just did Star Trek ?”, could easily be read as a rebuke to the rest of the current slate of Star Trek series. There are more Star Trek series running right now than there have been at any other point in the franchise’s history—and Star Trek ’s identity has never been more hotly debated.

Accusing new installments of a franchise of being somehow illegitimate is a time-honored fan tradition, and Trekkies are not immune. The Fifty-Year Mission , Edward Gross and Mark A. Altman’s two-volume oral history of Star Trek , recounts decades of skeptics dismissing various iterations as not “real.” Fans of the original series balked at the very idea of The Next Generation —a new Star Trek , without Kirk and Spock, was highly illogical. Deep Space Nine was met with similar skepticism from the outset, with a class full of schoolchildren writing to co-creator Michael Piller to beg him not to distort Star Trek ’s vision by making it “dark.” Enterprise received voicemails from Trekkies enraged at how the writers had messed with the Star Trek canon: One just chanted “Vulcans don’t lie!” repeatedly, and another sent them a box full of trash accompanied by a note reading, “This is what you’ve done to Star Trek .”

The first installment of the Trek renaissance, Star Trek: Discovery , was at even more of a disadvantage than most upon its premiere in 2017. Despite taking place shortly before the original series, Discovery ’s darkened aesthetics, serialized format, and modern sensibilities announced it as belonging to the 21 st century and the streaming era. (The characters say fuck !) The technology was much more advanced than some viewers thought it had any right to be, and the show’s star, a human sister Spock had never mentioned before, made it seem like the writers were stomping all over the canon . That protagonist was also played by Sonequa Martin-Green, a Black woman, and despite the fact that imagining a more diverse future has always been part of the Trek mission, it’s a mission that the worst of its fans aren’t always willing to accept .

Still, Discovery ’s biggest obstacle may have been its timing, premiering within days of another space-travel show, The Orville . The Orville is not technically a Star Trek show: The Fox series uses none of the Trek IP, and the producers have made a point of listing multiple sci-fi sources of inspiration. But Star Trek is its obvious muse. Not only is creator and star Seth MacFarlane is a known Trekkie, the show gained an air of legitimacy in fans’ eyes thanks to a stable of Star Trek alumni working on it both in front of and behind the screen. (The popular fan site Trekmovie.com even has a special section for it on its homepage .) An episodic workplace comedy that mixed the allegorical sci-fi of classic Trek with the broad humor for which MacFarlane has become known, The Orville ’s first season offered exactly what the more complicated Discovery did not: levity, familiarity, ease. Comment sections and Reddit boards were quick to pit the two shows against each other—with The Orville anointed the “real” Trek .

Paramount Plus seems to have taken the criticism to heart. After Discovery and Picard —the series that saw Patrick Stewart return to his Next Generation character—caught flak for being grim and unfamiliar, the showrunners changed course. In Season 3, Discovery got a soft reboot so that it was no longer a prequel constrained by past lore but a sequel set far into Star Trek ’s future and thus freer to experiment. Things lightened up considerably in the franchise with the introduction of Lower Decks , the terrific animated adult comedy created by Rick and Morty alum Mike McMahan, and Star Trek: Prodigy , another zippy animated outing, this one for kids. (Ironically, while all this was happening, The Orville , now moved to Hulu, grew darker and more serialized itself.)

And now there’s Strange New Worlds , a prequel to the original Star Trek series of the 1960s that features young versions of already famous characters like Spock and Lieutenant Uhura. The crew of the starship Enterprise wear the familiar red, yellow, and blue uniform color scheme that Leonard Nimoy and Nichelle Nichols used to back in the day. It’s a return to the episodic storytelling format of the original series and of Next Generation , made up of often-wacky planet-of-the-week adventures with some character development sprinkled in. Myers is right: It’s just doing Star Trek .

Reviewers love it, and they can’t resist taking digs at its predecessors amid the praise. At NPR, Glen Weldon facetiously can’t come up with the appeal of Discovery beyond “space fungi” or “heavily serialized storylines that have a tendency to get way more complicated than seems strictly necessary.” “ Why can’t they just make a normal Star Trek show any more? ” RadioTimes’ Huw Fullerton recalls thinking, before introducing Strange New Worlds as the answer. “ Hooray, Star Trek Feels Like Star Trek Again ” cheers Vulture’s chat about Strange New Worlds , in which critic Angelica Jade Bastién calls Discovery and Picard “ Star Trek in name only.”

Discovery and Picard have their flaws, to be sure. Still, the very philosophy of “just doing Star Trek ” strikes me as not very Star Trek , a franchise known for the credo “Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations.” In fact, the most critically celebrated Star Trek series of all time is probably Deep Space Nine , for which eventual showrunner Ira Steven Behr’s approach was explicitly: “ Well, I don’t care if it’s Star Trek .” Debuting while the then-megapopular Next Generation was still on the air—turns out a Star Trek without Kirk and Spock could work after all —Deep Space Nine was much darker than either of its predecessors, both tonally and aesthetically. It didn’t take place on a starship, which led to a different style of storytelling; not being able to leave the space station meant that characters couldn’t leave behind the consequences of their actions from week to week. And it was political in a way that went much deeper than Strange New Worlds ’ brief use of footage of the Jan. 6 insurrection to illustrate Earth strife, however much that particular scene might have irritated Fox News .

Among the most beloved of the Star Trek movies is a fish-out-of-water, environmentalist buddy comedy that takes place, for the most part, not in the distant future but in 1986 . Another is a political thriller and Cold War allegory . I don’t begrudge anyone their love of Strange New Worlds , which certainly has its charms. But a singular vision of what Star Trek can or should be is bad for Trek , and bad for Trekkies. Is there anything more Trek than the mission statement that’s been there since the beginning, to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life, and to boldly go where no show has gone before?

Rent or buy
Categories Categories
Getting Started

The Orville

Store Filled Season 1
Store Filled Season 2
Store Filled Season 3
Episode number
Newest episodes
Available to watch

Customers also watched

Cast and Crew

4029 global ratings

How are ratings calculated? Toggle Expand Toggle Expand

Amazon Newsletter
About Amazon
Accessibility
Sustainability
Press Center
Investor Relations
Amazon Devices
Amazon Science
Sell on Amazon
Sell apps on Amazon
Supply to Amazon
Protect & Build Your Brand
Become an Affiliate
Become a Delivery Driver
Start a Package Delivery Business
Advertise Your Products
Self-Publish with Us
Become an Amazon Hub Partner
› See More Ways to Make Money
Amazon Visa
Amazon Store Card
Amazon Secured Card
Amazon Business Card
Shop with Points
Credit Card Marketplace
Reload Your Balance
Amazon Currency Converter
Your Account
Your Orders
Shipping Rates & Policies
Amazon Prime
Returns & Replacements
Manage Your Content and Devices
Recalls and Product Safety Alerts
Conditions of Use
Privacy Notice
Consumer Health Data Privacy Disclosure
Your Ads Privacy Choices

Edit source
View history

Krill society was ruled by an extreme theocratic government [1] dominated by the worship of an omnipotent vengeful creator god named Avis who commanded the destruction of all non-Krill through "the divine fight," a state of perpetual conflict. [n 1] The majority of Krill viewed other species as soulless and unworthy of life. Thus, they were in conflict with virtually all other species.

Because Krill territory abutted Union space, they were the Union's primary antagonists of the early 25th century until the landmark Lak'vai Pact of Tarazed 3 , which saw the two uniting against the new threat of the Kaylon against all sentient life. This peace, however, was later shattered by the election of Supreme Chancellor Teleya , who advocated a return to the principles of Avis and dissolved the agreement between the two peoples.

The Krill were not always so extreme in their religious beliefs. According to Captain Ed Mercer , the Krill were much less "fanatical" adherents prior to achieving space flight and first contact with other worlds. [2] Only after the Krill discovered they were "just one species among a vast diversity of life forms," did the Krill "ratchet up their xenophobia." [2]

2.1 Lak'vai pact
2.2 Dissolution and resumption of war
3.1 Services
5.1 Armor and weaponry
6.1 Planetary Union
6.2 Emergence of the Kaylon threat
7 Technology
8 Education
10 Other culture
11 Notable Krill
12.1 Design, make-up, and costumes
15 External links
16 Appearances
18 References

Biology [ ]

Krill were a bipedal reptilian humanoid species. They had tough, scaly skin with three bony ridges running along their skulls. Their height and strength are roughly the same as humans . Males had two bone protrusions from the base of their chins, called "chin horns." [n 2]

There were at least two Krill phenotypes. The first had pale white skin with entirely black eyes. [n 3] The second had blue-grey skin with black irises and white sclerae. [n 4] The Krill homeworld, also called Krill , was covered in a shroud of darkness; and evolutionary adaptation to that environment had caused the Krill to be vulnerable to even mild exposure to the ultraviolet radiation in lights and sunlight. [3]

All observed Krill had the same slender physique. Lieutenant Unk briefly mentioned that Krill women can be "chubby," though the extent to which that is only prurient fantasy is unknown. [4]

Politics [ ]

As a whole, politics were shaped by a supremacist interpretation of Krill religion, although the Union suspected progressive movements existed "within the Krill power structure." [5]

Lak'vai pact [ ]

A lak'vai pact was a joint resolution between two parties with a statement of goodwill and an intention to conduct open treaty negotiations in the future. A lak'vai was not a ceasefire, but initialized peace talks. [6]

One notable example was the Lak'vai Pact of Tarazed 3 between the Krill and the Union, signed by Ambassador K.T.Z. and Captain Ed Mercer . [6]

In the wake of the pact, the Krill proved themselves open to requests for passage through areas of their space to unknown regions that had previously been off-limits. Negotiations for this were hosted by Admiral Paul Christie , who proved a deft negotiator, both securing access while agreeing to certain terms stipulated by the Krill. [7]

Dissolution and resumption of war [ ]

Later in 2422, the governments of Krill and the Planetary Union were in negotiations for a treaty. This was outgrowth of the lak'vai pact in order to create a more formal treaty of the union between the two peoples against the Kaylon threat. The negotiations on the Krill side were hosted by Supreme Chancellor Korin , who at the time was nearing the end of his term and up for re-election. His opponent was Teleya , a Krill woman whom had once secretly infiltrated the Orville and had intimate relations with Captain Ed Mercer.

Teleya preached a fiery rhetoric which advocated a return to the core practices of the Krill and worship of Avis, completely renouncing all ties with the Planetary Union. Against expectations, Teleya won the election as Supreme Chancellor. Though Korin attempted to call for a recount, she succeeded in affecting his immediate capture on charges of treason. She then personally executed him by stabbing, later cutting off his head and having it mounted in the planet's capitol. She then had the Planetary Union delegation, including Ed, captured as well, and ordered the capture of Orville, which was currently in orbit.

Teleya ordered the Planetary Union group held captive pending their execution as well. She, however, had Ed brought before her and he tried to appeal to her on the basis of the past. Though she seemed unpersuaded, she secretly allowed him to go free. He was then approached by members of a splinter group within Teleya's faction, who brought him before a girl named Anaya , who appeared to be half-human and half-Krill. They explained that she was Ed's daughter, born of the romance between him and Teleya. They felt that she could be a powerful symbol that could reset the balance and once again bring peace between Krill and the Union in light of the Kaylon threat. In order to do so, however, they explained that Ed would have to convince Teleya to go along with the decision, or else if she was simply deposed another autocrat would rise to take her place.

Ed returned to Teleya, revealing that he knew of Anaya's existence. He again tried to sue for peace, asking why she had even gone through with birthing the child if not for this. In response to this, she asked him if he knew what they did on their planet to those who had abortions. She then showed him how they would create a simulation of the unborn child as they would be if they were old enough to talk, then have this simulation personally ask the parents why they had chosen to "send them away." She then had Ed returned to the other prisoners and attempted to execute them, but only got as far as stabbing the Union President Alcuzan non-fatally before the group was rescued by a team from the Orville. The damage, however, was done, as the two great powers were again at open war with each other and thus vulnerable to the Kaylon threat. [8]

The Krill, under Teleya’s leadership, would later go on to form an alliance with the Moclans (who had recently been expelled from the Union), in opposition to both the Union, and the Kaylon. They would work together in the construction of a super weapon (acquired from Union dissidents) designed to wipe out all Kaylon. This would lead the latter to reluctantly ally with the Union, as they launched a combined assault on the planet research was being held on, which ended with Teleya being captured, the weapon detonating, and causing a chain reaction which annihilated both the Krill and Moclan fleet. With much of their military devastated, and their leadership effectively decapitated, the Krill’s political future was left uncertain. [9]

Religion [ ]

The Krill religion revolved around the worship of a supreme deity named Avis, whose stories and philosophy were recorded in the Anhkana , the Krill sacred text. Avis created the Krill independent of all other life and granted dominion over all things in the universe to them. All other life was soulless and thus unworthy of existence. [2] Even complex species were regarded as non-sentient, their actions compared by the Krill to the generated responses of an advanced computer. [3] Avis commanded the destruction of all other godless life. [2]

Krill gather for services , religious rituals, inside rooms or buildings known as chapels. Chapels may be found throughout the Krill home world and in their destroyers . Services were led by a high priest , flanked by two priests. [3]

A basic chapel consisted of a single room with an altar at its center-front; a copy of the Anhkana and a ceremonial bell rested on the top of the altar. Two rows of pews flanked the sides of the room, separated by a single center aisle. The walls of the chapel were adorned with Krill writing proclaiming belief in Avis. [n 5]

Services [ ]

At the start of services, the priest opened services by twice ringing the ceremonial bell and greeting the congregation: "A blessed evening. Temeem Emedeen ." [n 6] Congregants replied, "Temeem Emedeen." [3]

After the salutation, a blood sacrifice was presented for the glory of Avis. The priest uttered, "Let us now cleanse," and the sacrifice was presented. For example, during services on the Yakar , the severed head of a human from the Union colony planet Chara 3 was placed upon the altar. The priest produced a ritual dagger and explained the reason for the sacrifice's death. [3]

Finally, the priest destroyed the sacrifice. The priest said, "Hail, Avis! Hail, victory! Temeem Emedeen," and plunged the dagger into the sacrifice. The Priest proceeded to mash the sacrifice with the dagger while the congregation chanted “Temeem Emedeen." [3]

Cuisine [ ]

A delicacy of the Krill is Kahspid cider, which is made from native Kahspid plants.

Military [ ]

The Krill military was an extension of the society's religion, and participation in the military was known as joining "the divine fight" against other lifeforms. [n 1]

The Krill operated warships called destroyers for military operations. Destroyers were led by a captain in charge of all operations aboard the ship. The captain was assisted by a high priest who oversaw religious affairs. Some destroyers may self-cloak.

There were at least two tiers of Krill military rank: the captain in command of a destroyer and the soldiers who comprised the bulk of the Krill force. Soldiers were highly trained for hand-to-hand and weapon-based combat. Soldiers were in charge of minor operations, enforcing the commands of leaders aboard destroyers or leading ground teams on military strikes.

Armor and weaponry [ ]

Krill armor was durable yet flexible, having the same toughness as their rifles. [10] Armor covered nearly all of the body of a soldier, although it was not entirely for protection in combat; because Krill were extremely sensitive to light, the armor blocked out deadly ultraviolet radiation. When on the surface of well-lit worlds like Epsilon 2 , Krill soldiers wore helmets that guard the face at all times possible. The helmets opened and retracted automatically.

Soldiers carried several types of weapons, an assault weapon known as a plasma rifle , a single-handed plasma gun , and a sword for close-quarters combat. [n 7] Some Krill (notably Captain Haros ) carried daggers, which featured a trademark dagger-within-a-dagger design. [3]

Krill used electrified batons as an instrument of torture on prisoners, which had at least nine levels of intensity to hurt the victim. It is assumed that higher levels were extraordinarily painful and harmful as the Krill themselves were only able to survive up to level eight. [2]

Captured enemies were temporarily stored in the brig of a ship, [2] but long-term captives such as Orrin Channing were held in prisons. [6]

Relations [ ]

The Krill were hostile towards non-Krill species of space , raiding or attacking other civilizations such as the Planetary Union and the Chak'tal . The Krill-Chak'tal conflict erupted when the Krill attacked Chak'tal colonies, and the Chak'tal launched a punitive campaign in retaliation.

Planetary Union [ ]

From at least the 24th century until the early 25th , the Krill were adversaries of the Planetary Union , a longstanding hostility known as the Krill-Planetary Union conflict . The Union was careful to avoid an official declaration of war. As Admiral Ozawa elaborated, the Krill saw a declared war with the Union as "a holy crusade," which meant it would last decades. [3]

From 2418 through 2419 , the Krill converted Doctor Derek Ashton into a spy, and with his help nearly captured a sophisticated quantum-field technology known as a quantum accelerator , a device capable of rapidly aging anything within a "quantum bubble." They were stymied by the USS Orville in the Battle of Epsilon 2 . [11]

The Krill peppered Union colonies with military raids throughout 2419. The destroyer Yakar conquered the colony of Chara 3 and killed its settlers. [3] Later, a different, unnamed destroyer attacked the USS Druyan , but was defeated by the intervening Orville. [12] Around December, the Kakov attempted to raid the colony planet Kastra 4 but was destroyed by the Orville. Dozens of Union settlers were confirmed killed. [3]

Captain Ed Mercer and Helmsman Gordon Malloy captured the Yakar in late 2419 - killing most of its crew and taking its schoolteacher, Teleya, captive. [3] Teleya escaped prison in early 2420 and rejoined the Krill (although how she managed to accomplish that is unknown). [13] The military seeded Teleya into the Union as " Janel Tyler ," a dark matter cartographer .

In late 2420, Talla Keyali served aboard a ship that had their "butts kicked" by the Krill. [14]

Emergence of the Kaylon threat [ ]

A turning point in Krill-Union relations came when the Kaylon launched a campaign to eradicate all biological life in the galaxy in January 2421 . [15] The Kaylon sent a war armada to attack the Union's headquarters at Earth , but First Officer Kelly Grayson and Gordon were able to send an advance warning to the Krill. With a common threat, the Krill successfully aided the Union at the Battle of Earth in February. [16]

The Krill and Union signed a ceasefire agreement soon after the battle, followed by the Lak'vai Pact of Tarazed 3 signed in March. [6] This agreement, however, was nullified following the election of Teleya as Supreme Chancellor. [8]

Technology [ ]

Krill used dedicated broadcast frequencies for communications and distress signals that other civilizations identified as distinctive to the Krill. [2]

Education [ ]

Krill children were educated in space vessels such as destroyers, exposing the children to warfare on the ship and indoctrinating them into the Krill's military society. A classroom consisted of roughly a dozen pupils led by a single teacher.

Language [ ]

Other culture [ ].

Some Krill women chose a life of dedicated child-rearing. [17]

Unmarried Krill women had maiden names before they adopt a new name at marriage. One such maiden name is Kalavus , belonging to the mother of Ambassador K.T.Z. [6]

The Krill considered a region known as the Kalarr Expanse to be part of their territory, but never entered it. Their Anhkana warned of "Shadow Realms" within this space, said to be gateways to depths of the underworld where demons waited to possess the souls of those who strayed within their reach. In fact, the area was the home of the arachnids , a species which reproduced by rewriting the DNA of other sentient species. [7]

The Krill considered the Merchant Class to be the backbone of their civilization, having been stable for tens of thousands of years. The Grand Marketplace was their center of commerce and merchants from every corner of the planet could be found there. [8]

Notable Krill [ ]

Anaya (half-human hybrid)

Production [ ]

Years before The Orville was greenlit, creator Seth MacFarlane envisioned an alien species of religious extremists that viewed all other life as inferior. [18] His vision evolved into the "Krill:" a highly religious species and a metaphor of fundamentalist religions on 21st century Earth . As cinematographer Marvin Rush explained, "The Krill are very religious in a way for instance that ISIS or ISIL is. ... We're not saying this is the story of ISIS, we're not telling that story, but there's a corrupting effect that religion can have." [19]

Yet despite the fact that the Krill are the primary antagonists of the Planetary Union , MacFarlane was careful to show that the Krill are not wholly evil. During the premiere of Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes , MacFarlane elaborated: "We wanted to create an enemy that felt threatening on the surface, but with an underlying humanity that we have to patiently unearth over time." [20] At San Diego Comic Con in 2019, MacFarlane stated that he wanted to make sure that "no alien species is 100% evil" in the show.

Design, make-up, and costumes [ ]

Design of the Krill was heavily influenced by the classic film Nosferatu . More specifically: their sensitivity to light and their vampiric appearance. Howard Berger , make-up department head for Season 1 , recalled that "we did a series of design work on them - Seth [MacFarlane] said they're vampiric, they should be pale, black eyes and scary." [21] Yet MacFarlane originally envisioned simpler aliens with nose and forehead prosthetics and make-up. To convince the man that realistic, large-scale Krill costumes were possible, Berger dressed his wife and two men in his vision of the Krill in November, 2016 and presented them to MacFarlane. He was impressed and immediately approved Berger's idea. [22]

Artists designing the Krill chose to contrast the Krill people against Krill architecture by aiming for "polar opposites." The grey and blue-grey skin of the Krill moved the production team to design Krill architecture that is very dark; the gentle ridges on Krill bodies meant sharp angles on the walls; the soft skin of the Krill led to hard, metallic surfaces and harsh lighting. [23]

Krill costumes have three generic types: adult male, adult female, and child. Berger notes: "We came up with a male and female version and a child version because there's an episode [ Krill ] with children, and on that episode we ended up doing 111 Krill in eight days." [23] Only particularly important Krill characters received unique prosthetic masks, such as Chris , Haros, and Teleya.

Each costume is comprised of a prosthetic head, face, and chin piece, which are pre-painted to save time and then added to the actor. [24] Application of the prosthetic and blending them into the skin take roughly one hour per person. [24]

A concept sketch of a basic Krill soldier by the show's wardrobe designer, Joseph Porro.

Actors portraying Krill wore dentures in the pilot episode Old Wounds . Unfortunately, the collection of dentures was lost after filming. [25]
Howard Berger says that, once in costume, extras portraying Krill curiously tend to eat their meals together, isolated from the rest of the cast. [22]
The name has been confirmed not to be based on the Krell from Forbidden Planet . [26]
A krill is a type of crustacean found in all of the Earth's oceans, but it is unknown if this in any way inspired the name of this species.
This can be a hybrid of two alien races names from Marvel Universe, Kree and Skrulls.
In Krill society, sunlight is a symbol of death, while rain and darkness are symbols of good.

Gallery [ ]

External links [ ]

Sioux City Journal - One of the earliest public production discussions of the Krill.

Appearances [ ]

Episode 1x01: Old Wounds
Episode 1x02: Command Performance (mentioned only)
Episode 1x04: If the Stars Should Appear
Episode 1x05: Pria (mentioned only)
Episode 1x06: Krill
Episode 1x11: New Dimensions
Episode 1.5x01: New Beginnings, Pt. 1 (mentioned only)
Episode 1.5x03: The Word of Avis, Pt. 1 (flashback)
Episode 1.5x04: The Word of Avis, Pt. 2
Episode 2x01: Ja'loja (in human form only)
Episode 2x02: Primal Urges (mentioned only)
Episode 2x04: Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes
Episode 2x05: All the World is Birthday Cake (mentioned only)
Episode 2x08: Identity, Pt. 1 (mentioned only)
Episode 2x09: Identity, Pt. 2
Episode 2x10: Blood of Patriots
Episode 2x11: Lasting Impressions (mentioned only)
Episode 2x12: Sanctuary (mentioned only)
Episode 2x13: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow (mentioned only)
Episode 2.5x01: Launch Day, Pt. 1
Episode 2.5x02: Launch Day, Pt. 2
Episode 3x04: Gently Falling Rain
↑ 1.0 1.1 Teleya : "To become a soldier in the divine fight." Episode 2x04: Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes
↑ Ed Mercer as "Chris" calls them such to a Krill guard. Episode 1x06: Krill
↑ These Krill attacked during the Battle of Epsilon 2 . Episode 1x01: Old Wounds
↑ This is the most commonly encountered Krill phenotype, including in the Battle of Kastra 4 and the infiltration of the Yakar . Episode 1x06: Krill
↑ The writing of which has not yet been deciphered. See Krillain .
↑ The meaning of this phrase is unknown.
↑ The sword is not seen in any episode but depicted and described in the book The World of the Orville as a double-bladed sword for close combat.

References [ ]

↑ Episode 2.5x01: Launch Day, Pt. 1
↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 Episode 2x04: Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes
↑ 3.00 3.01 3.02 3.03 3.04 3.05 3.06 3.07 3.08 3.09 3.10 Episode 1x06: Krill
↑ Episode 2x02: Primal Urges
↑ Perry . Episode 2x10: Blood of Patriots
↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 Episode 2x10: Blood of Patriots
↑ 7.0 7.1 Episode 3x02: Shadow Realms
↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Episode 3x04: Gently Falling Rain
↑ Episode 3x09: Domino
↑ Bond, Jeff. The World of the Orville . Titan Books. 2018. Pg. 94.
↑ Episode 1x01: Old Wounds
↑ Episode 1x04: If the Stars Should Appear
↑ Episode 1.5x04: The Word of Avis, Pt. 2
↑ Episode 2x05: All the World is Birthday Cake
↑ Episode 2x08: Identity, Pt. 1
↑ Episode 2x09: Identity, Pt. 2
↑ Unk states that there are Krill "housewives." Episode 2x02: Primal Urges
↑ Pascale, Anthony. " Interview: David A. Goodman On ‘The Orville’ As Sci-Fi Gateway And How ‘Futurama’ Landed ‘Enterprise’ Job ". TrekMovie.com. Oct. 23, 2017.
↑ Bond, Jeff. The World of the Orville . Titan Books. 2018. Pg. 109.
↑ @SethMacFarlane. " We wanted to create an enemy that felt threatening on the surface, but with an underlying humanity that we have to patiently unearth over time. ". Twitter. Jan. 17, 2019.
↑ Bond, Jeff. The World of the Orville . Titan Books. 2018. Pg. 105.
↑ 22.0 22.1 " PLANETARY UNION NETWORK: EPISODE 20 ". Planetary Union Network. June 17, 2018.
↑ 23.0 23.1 Bond, Jeff. The World of the Orville . Titan Books. 2018. Pg. 110.
↑ 24.0 24.1 " The IMDb Show | Episode 103: Amber Stevens West, the FX of “The Orville,” and Shows Ending in 2018 ". The IMDb Show . Dec. 1, 2017.
↑ The Martini Shot Show. " Ep. 5 Howard Berger talks The Orville, breaking into the industry, and more! ". Youtube. March 2, 2018.
↑ 26.0 26.1 David A. Goodman, Executive Producer and Writer . Quantum Drive . May 10, 2022.
The Orville
3 Kelly Grayson

an image, when javascript is unavailable

Orville Peck’s ‘Stampede’ Tour: Here’s Where to Buy Tickets Online Before They Sell Out

By John Lonsdale

John Lonsdale

If you purchase an independently reviewed product or service through a link on our website, Rolling Stone may receive an affiliate commission.

Grab your hats and slip on your boots — country star Orville Peck ‘s Stampede Tour is right around the corner. Kicking off on May 28, Peck will embark on a 40-plus-date trek across North America, including stops in Asheville, North Carolina, the Hinterland Music Festival in Iowa, and wrapping with back-to-back Brooklyn Paramount shows with Nikki Lane and Vincent Neil Emerson in October.

“I took a break from last year to focus on myself and even though it was a difficult decision at the time, I’m so happy I did,” Peck previously told Rolling Stone when announcing the Stampede trek. “I feel healthier and happier than I’ve ever felt in my life and I cannot wait to get back on the road.”

After announcing the tour, Peck teamed up with country icon Willie Nelson for the track “Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other.” “It was his initial idea for us to do the song together and I will forever be grateful for his support,” Peck said. “As an artist who has sometimes felt excluded from the Country music industry, once Willie Nelson wants to work with you, there’s really nothing the country world can say after that.”

That’s not the only duet fans can expect from the star. Peck shared on Instagram that the first volume of his upcoming new album Stampede would also feature songs with Elton John, Noah Cyrus, Midland, Allison Russell, Nathaniel Rateliff, and Bu Cuaron, though fans will still have to wait for an official release date for now.

Until then, here’s where to score tickets to Peck’s upcoming tour dates online (even if they sell out).

Where to Buy Orville Peck Tickets Online

Fans can find Stampede Tour tickets on Peck’s official website . Tickets are sold across a variety of platforms — here’s how to make sure you secure a stub before shows sell out.

Buy Orville Peck Tickets on Ticketmaster

Tickets for the Stampede trek officially went on sale earlier this month, and general admission tickets are still available for most of the dates on Ticketmaster . Fans can find both standard tickets and verified resale tickets, depending on the show, on the website at a variety of price points. Keep in mind that resale passes sometimes cost higher than face value, so it’s a good idea to price check between sites before breaking out your wallet.

Buy Orville Peck Tickets on StubHub

If tickets sell out in your area, you can always try looking for resale stubs on sites like StubHub . The site currently has tickets available to purchase for Peck’s upcoming tour dates, with prices ranging from about $57 for the opening night in Asheville, to $146 each for the sold-out date in Sante Fe. We recommend checking Peck’s website to compare prices of tickets for each date and venue.

Buy Orville Peck Tickets on Vivid Seats

Still looking for affordable tickets to see Peck on the road? You might consider looking at Vivid Seats , which currently has Stampede tickets on sale. We have previously purchased tickets through Vivid Seats for concerts, and it’s easy to get verified resale tickets sent straight to your email or through the app. Bonus: Shoppers can use the exclusive promo code RS2024 to take $20 off their first ticket purchases over $200 at checkout. At the time of this writing, fans can score tickets for the opening night for around $56 a piece (thought that doesn’t include fees).

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Orville Peck (@orvillepeck)

Orville Peck Stampede Tour 2024 Schedule

With stops in Asheville, Atlanta, Cleveland, and more, here’s the complete tour schedule for Peck’s upcoming Stampede concert dates.

May 28 — Asheville, NC @ Rabbit Rabbit *^ May 30 — Raleigh, NC @ Red Hat Amphitheatre *^ May 31 — Charlotte, NC @ Skyla Credit Union Amphitheatre *^ June 1 — Atlanta, GA @ Cadence Bank Amphitheatre at Chastain Park *^ June 3 — Columbus, OH @ KEMBA Live! – Outdoor *^ June 4 — Rochester Hills, MI @ Meadow Brook Amphitheatre *^ June 5 — Grand Rapids, MI @ TBA *^ June 7 — Cleveland, OH @ Jacobs Pavilion *^ June 8 — Cincinnati, OH @ The Andrew J Brady Music Center *^ June 9 — Indianapolis, IN @ Rock the Ruins *^ June 11 — Minneapolis, MN @ The Armory *^ June 13 — Chicago, IL @ Byline Bank Aragon Ballroom *^ June 14 — Madison, WI @ The Sylvee *^ June 29 — Asbury Park, NJ @ The Stone Pony Summer Stage # June 30 — Washington, DC @ The Anthem +# July 1 — Lewiston, NY @ Artpark Outdoor Amphitheater +# July 3 — Toronto, ON @ Budweiser Stage +# July 4 — Ottawa, ON @ Ottawa Bluesfest July 8 — Vancouver, BC @ Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre # July 10 — Edmonton, AB @ Midway # July 11 — Edmonton, AB @ Midway # July 14 — Winnipeg, MB @ Winnipeg Folk Festival July 27 — Newport, RI @ Newport Folk Festival July 28 — Harrisburg, PA @ Riverfront Park ~% July 30 — St. Louis, MO @ The Factory ~% Aug. 1 — Kansas City, MO @ GrindersKC ~% Aug. 2 — Saint Charles, IA @ Hinterland Music Festival Aug. 3 — Omaha, NE @ The Admiral ~% Aug. 5 — Oklahoma City, OK @ The Jones Assembly ~% Aug. 6 — Santa Fe, NM @ Santa Fe Brewing Company ~% Aug. 8 — Denver, CO @ Fillmore Auditorium ~% Aug. 9 — Salt Lake City, UT @ The Union Event Center % Sept. 24 — Bend, OR @ Hayden Homes Amphitheater +! Sept. 25 — Woodinville, WA @ Chateau Ste. Michelle Winery +! Sept. 27 — San Francisco, CA @ Bill Graham Civic Auditorium +! Sept. 28 — Los Angeles, CA @ Hollywood Palladium +! Sept. 29 — Los Angeles, CA @ Hollywood Palladium +! Oct. 1 — San Diego, CA @ Cal Coast Credit Union Open Air Theatre at SDSU +! Oct. 2 — Phoenix, AZ @ Mesa Amphitheatre +! Oct. 16 — Boston, MA @ MGM Music Hall at Fenway +& Oct. 18 — Philadelphia, PA @ The Met presented by Highmark +& Oct. 19 — Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Paramount +& Oct. 20 — Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Paramount +&

* With Durand Jones ^ With Debbii Dawson + With The War And Treaty # With Goldie Boutilier ~ With Jaime Wyatt % With Gold Star + With Nikki Lane ! With Emily Nenni & With Vincent Neil Emerson

Here's Where to Watch the Bruins vs. Maple Leafs NHL Playoff Series Online

How to watch mark wahlberg's 'arthur the king' online.

Streaming Guide
By RS Editors

How to Watch 2024 NBA Playoffs: Livestream Without Cable

finals time
By Oscar Hartzog

How to Watch the Suns vs. Timberwolves NBA Playoff Series Without Cable

By Jake Warren

How to Watch Your Favorite ABC Shows Online (Even if You've Cut the Cord)

By Noel Santos

Verify it's you

Please log in.

Screen Rant

The orville season 3 includes star trek: tos homage.

The Orville season 3, aka New Horizons, will turn to its original science-fiction inspiration and feature an homage to Star Trek: The Original Series.

The Orville has always taken inspiration from Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek , but season 3 will reportedly feature an unmistakable homage to Star Trek: TOS. The Orville was created by and stars Seth MacFarlane, creator of Family Guy and longtime Star Trek fan. The sci-fi comedy series follows Ed Mercer (MacFarlane) and his crew on the USS Orville as they explore space in the 25th century. Adrianne Palicki, Penny Johnson Jerald, Scott Grimes, Peter Macon, Jessica Szohr, J Lee, Mark Jackson, and Anne Winters also star with MacFarlane.

While The Orville seasons 1 and 2 aired on Fox, the series will be moving to Hulu for its third and final season, which will premiere on June 2. Although the series was renewed in 2019, the wait for The Orville season 3, also known as The Orville: New Horizons , was unusually long because production was delayed twice due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The new season will introduce a new member to The Orville's crew (Winters) and see the Orville clash again with the Kaylons , a race of artificial lifeforms.

Related: Charlize Theron's Orville Episode Helped Turn Seth MacFarlane's Show Around

On top of the turbulent war with the Kaylons, The Orville season 3 is expected to pay homage to its source of inspiration. TV Line reports that episode 3 of the new season will feature a landing party excursion that could be cut straight from Star Trek: TOS. Still, season 3 won't be all nostalgic tributes. The same report also mentions that The Orville: New Horizons may take an unexpected emotional turn.

As The Orville progressed from season 1 to season 2, its tone changed drastically. Season 1 was not well-received by critics, but when season 2 adopted a more serious approach more in line with Roddenberry's style, The Orville managed to find its audience. Based on the report for the new season, The Orville : New Horizons will also stick to a straightforward approach with more natural humor, which should please both Star Trek and The Orville fans alike.

MacFarlane's love of the Star Trek franchise is well-known. The Orville creator has made numerous references to Star Trek in Family Guy, and once, the cast of The Next Generation guest-starred on the show. It fits then that MacFarlane would continue to allow Star Trek to influence The Orville 's writing and slip a reference to TOS into the new season. While TV Line' s report isn't specific regarding the landing party in episode 3, it seems inevitable that some unfortunate red-shirt personnel typical of Star Trek: TOS will be present.

Next: Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Isn't A TOS Throwback - It's The New TNG

Source: TV Line

1 hr 56 min

Trill Talk (guest-starring Celeste!‪)‬ Casual Trek - A Star Trek Recap and Ranking Podcast

We’ve got a guest star! Celeste of the Nerd & Tie Podcast and Celeste is Best joins the casual crew this episode to talk about the Trill. The species has always been a fascinating one and science fiction stand-in for conversations about gender and identity, so the three of us are going to delve into that in three different shows. Star Trek: The Nest Generation’s “The Host” is the introduction to the Trill who look a little strange compared to what we’re used to. There’s a romance, a death and Riker volunteers to get a slug put in him. We also spend time in the Enterprise salon with our hands in some green goo. In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s “Rejoined” Jazdia Dax meets her wife from a former life and the pair hit it off, even though they’re not supposed to in Trill lore. Kira’s a good comrade, Bashir’s a fifth wheel and we get a touching love story in this episode. Finally in Star Trek: Discovery’s “Forget Me Not”, new arrival Adira is having problems being a human host to a Trill symbiont, so we journey through memories and buck traditions while Saru’s having to learn how to get his crew of overachieving nerds to chill out a bit. This was a really fun episode to make, even though there are some audio issues we’ve hopefully ironed out and one of us didn’t do the right homework. 00:05:30 Trill 00:07:55 Celeste’s history with Star Trek 00:10:29 What Non-Star Trek Thing Have People Been Enjoying? 00:21:51 TNG: The Host 00:52:30 DS9: Rejoined 01:22:05 DISCO: Forget Me Not Pedant’s Corner: The governor was Leka Trion, not Leka Tyrion. Damn you, autocorrect! Eastenders had a brief flash-forward to build suspense for their Christmas 2023 episode Burnham’s Captain Catchphrase is, “Let’s Fly” Talking points include: Venom, Maggott, Mr Mind, 52, Doctor Who, apparently Americans don’t know when an American’s putting on an English accent, Transformers/Star Trek crossovers, yuri anime, I’m in Love with the Villainess, Reincarnated Princess and the Genius Young Lady, The Executioner and Her Way of Life, Gundam, Dark Shadows, Degrassi’s zombie and Terminator webseries which genuinely happened, Grange Hill, EastEnders, Arthurian Mythology, Fantastic Four, The Curse, Nathan Fielder in general, Lynch, Wandavision, The Bear, Miles watches Zardos so much he was probably watching it while we were recording, Meatloaf, The Enterprise has a salon?, Game of Thrones’ approach to siblings, what sad loser YouTube channels would have been doing in the 80’s, Avatar, homosexuality in the very early 90’s, Northstar, Pasíon de las Pasiones, slightly less psychic damage from Mariah Carey, the Tom Tom Club, Weird Al, Weird Science, Revenge of the Nerds, untrustworthy practitioners of close-up magic, New BSG, Helix, Dawson’s Creek is better in the original Klingon, Michael Scott is so devoted to profit, appropriating ‘not my cup of tea’, Quinton Reviews also giving us psychic damage, The Orville, Jessie Gender, X-Men, pointed sticks, Buster Keaton. Oh, and occasionally Star Trek. Casual Trek is by Charlie Etheridge-Nunn and Miles Reid-Lobatto Music by Alfred Etheridge-Nunn Casual Trek is a part of the Nerd & Tie Network https://ko-fi.com/casualtrek Celeste is Best YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/@NickIzumi?si=zn9n9co5XTbM3d-P The Nerd & Tie Podcast: http://www.nerdandtie.com/our-shows/the-nerd-tie-podcast/ Miles’ blog: http://www.mareidlobatto.wordpress.com Charlie’s blog: http://www.fakedtales.com The sound effect “Landline phone pick up angry” is by FilmCow

Episode Website
More Episodes
Charlie and Miles

IMAGES

The Orville Is the Perfect Star Trek Homage
The Orville: The Best Star Trek Homages
The Orville vs. Star Trek: Discovery Ratings: Both Open Competitively
'The Orville' renewed: Why it's the best 'Star Trek' on screens rn
The Orville Season 3 Includes Star Trek: TOS Homage
'The Orville' renewed: Why it's the best 'Star Trek' on screens rn

VIDEO

The Orville Experience
Is The Orville the New Star Trek?
Star Trek: Orville
Star Trek: Orville
Is There Hope for the Future of The Orville?
Star Trek : Orville

COMMENTS

The Orville
The Orville is an American science fiction comedy-drama television series created by Seth MacFarlane, who also stars as the protagonist Ed Mercer, an officer in the Planetary Union's line of exploratory space vessels in the 25th century. It was inspired primarily by the original Star Trek and its Next Generation successor, both of which it heavily parodies and pays homage to.
The Orville (TV Series 2017-2022)
The Orville: Created by Seth MacFarlane. With Seth MacFarlane, Adrianne Palicki, Penny Johnson Jerald, Scott Grimes. Set 400 years in the future, the crew of the U.S.S. Orville continue their mission of exploration, navigating both the mysteries of the universe, and the complexities of their own interpersonal relationships.
Every Star Trek Actor Who Has Appeared On The Orville
Related: Star Trek: DS9's James Bond Episode Saved Dr. Bashir As well-connected as MacFarlane is, it's no surprise that The Orville features a bevy of A-list guest stars from Liam Neeson and Charlize Theron to Bruce Willis and Rob Lowe, but the three seasons released thus far have also included an array of names from the world of Star Trek, some more recognizable than others.
5 Ways The Orville Is Actually Better Than Star Trek ( & 5 Ways Star
THE ORVILLE: HUMOR. The Orville walks a fine line between satire and homage, trying to make farcical parts of Star Trek that it clearly reveres, while simultaneously charting its own course. Its greatest strength lies in its ability to use humor to these ends, and make light of situations that would otherwise be dire.
Why 'The Orville' Is More Than a Star Trek Homage
The Orville may have started off as a Star Trek homage, but the character relationships have helped the show stand on its own. The realistic, relatable interpersonal relationships make 'The ...
Seth MacFarlane Interview: The Orville Versus Star Trek
The Orville's 2017 arrival coincided with Star Trek: Discovery, the first new Trek TV show in over a decade, and comparisons were inevitable. With The Orville's third season almost here, io9 asked ...
Seth MacFarlane Explains How 'Star Trek' Influenced 'The Orville'
From the time The Orville premiered in 2017, it has been clear that the series is informed by creator Seth MacFarlane's love of Star Trek.MacFarlane has been a fan since he was a kid, creating fan ...
'The Orville' Is Back. How Does It Fit Into a New Space TV Landscape
The Orville, in its premise, setting, visual language, and choice of subject matter, is a Star Trek show in all but name. Even some of its senior creative figures, like executive producers Brannon ...
The Orville: The Best Star Trek Homages
Features The Orville: The Best Star Trek Homages. Orville creator Seth MacFarlane has never shied away from the fact that his show is an homage to the classic Trek he grew up watching.
The Orville: Every Star Trek Easter Egg
Every Star Trek Easter Egg in The Orville's Premiere. By John Orquiola. Published Sep 12, 2017. Seth MacFarlane's new sci-fi series The Orville is an ode to Star Trek in lots of ways. We tally up how the series is an homage to all things Trek. Star Trek fans will find plenty of ways The Orville, the new FOX sci-fi comedy created by and starring ...
Seth MacFarlane Discusses "The Orville," "Star Trek," and the Struggle
The comparisons between "The Orville" and "Discovery," the new addition to the "Star Trek" franchise, were inevitable, especially because a number of "Star Trek" veterans—writers ...
The Orville has finally matured into serious science fiction
The Star Trek homage series The Orville is the Rodney Dangerfield of science fiction shows: it doesn't get much respect, especially from genre fans. Whether that's because of the tonally ...
The Orville season 3
The third season of the comedy-drama science fiction television series The Orville, also known as The Orville: ... particularly Star Trek. Remus Norona of Collider gave the first episode an A minus, stating that the season premiere is "bigger, bolder, and a whole lot darker." He noted that the first episode explored themes such as trauma ...
The Orville
The Orville is a live action parody of and homage to Star Trek, specifically Star Trek: The Next Generation. The show was created by and stars Seth MacFarlane and is co-produced by Brannon Braga, former Family Guy collaborator David A. Goodman, alongside another Star Trek veteran Andre Bormanis, who reprised his role as technical advisor. Braga himself states the series "is aiming to tell ...
The Orville is Star Trek: TNG's true spiritual successor
The Orville could have easily been a flop, but it's destined to become a classic in its own right, and one that embodies more of the Star Trek spirit than the officially sanctioned TNG successor ...
Seth MacFarlane gives update on The Orville season 4: "There will ...
The Orville has always been a labor of love for creator Seth MacFarlane.A loving homage to Star Trek that many fans think has beaten the iconic sci-fi series at its own game, The Orville has ...
The Orville
Set 400 years in the future, Seth MacFarlane's hit space adventure series follows the U.S.S. Orville, a mid-level exploratory spaceship. Its crew, both human and alien, face the wonders and ...
The Orville Season 4 Seemingly Confirmed By Seth MacFarlane After 2
Seth MacFarlane seemingly confirms The Orville season 4, two years after the show last premiered original episodes. A comedy-slanted take on Star Trek-style space adventures, MacFarlane's sci-fi show premiered on Fox back in 2017, moving over to Hulu exclusively for season 3 in 2022.In early 2024, MacFarlane sparked hopes of The Orville season 4 happening, saying that he's "working on ...
Well, Everyone Was Right About 'The Orville'
The Orville, now about to finish up its third season under new ownership at Hulu, is far from a parody of anything. It's much more of a homage or tribute to early Star Trek, which Macfarlane ...
The Orville (Series)
The Orville is a live action Science Fiction Dramedy television series created by, and starring, Seth MacFarlane as a homage to classic Star Trek.It premiered on Fox on 10 September 2017. It moved to Hulu for its third season in 2022, with all three seasons also available on Disney+ on August 2022. Outside the US, the series airs on Disney+'s Star hub in many countries.
Seth MacFarlane Hinted At The Orville's Return Again, But Now I'm
Star Trek is his main jam, but he also regularly reports on happenings in the world of Star Trek, WWE, Doctor Who, 90 Day Fiancé, Quantum Leap, and Big Brother.
Star Trek: The Strange New Worlds vs. The Orville vs. Discovery fight
The Orville is not technically a Star Trek show: The Fox series uses none of the Trek IP, and the producers have made a point of listing multiple sci-fi sources of inspiration. But Star Trek is ...
The Orville: Seth MacFarlane Stresses "There Will Be More"
When it comes to the future of The Orville, fans of the series have been left with more questions than answers.Series star Adrianne Palicki has previously indicated that she's done with the show ...
Watch The Orville Season 1
Get a glimpse at all the highlights of THE ORVILLE cast visit to Comic Con. Get a glimpse at all the highlights of THE ORVILLE cast visit to Comic Con. Related. Customers also watched. ... Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Season 1. Free trial or buy. Star Trek: The Next Generation - Redemption
Krill
The Krill were an aggressive, reptilian species from a planet of the same name, located in the same quadrant of the galaxy as the Planetary Union. Krill society was ruled by an extreme theocratic government[1] dominated by the worship of an omnipotent vengeful creator god named Avis who commanded the destruction of all non-Krill through "the divine fight," a state of perpetual conflict.[n 1 ...
10 Ways The Orville Is Better Than Modern Star Trek
7 The Orville Is More Optimistic Than Modern Star Trek. Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Picard both have first seasons mired in pessimism, with characters like Michael Burnham or Jean-Luc Picard who must navigate great adversity before eventually achieving a positive payoff. For fans of Star Trek's inherent optimism about the future of ...
Orville Peck's 'Stampede' Tour: Here's Where to Buy Tickets Online
Buy Orville Peck Tickets on Ticketmaster. Tickets for the Stampede trek officially went on sale earlier this month, and general admission tickets are still available for most of the dates on ...
The Orville Season 3 Includes Star Trek: TOS Homage
The Orville has always taken inspiration from Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek, but season 3 will reportedly feature an unmistakable homage to Star Trek: TOS. The Orville was created by and stars Seth MacFarlane, creator of Family Guy and longtime Star Trek fan. The sci-fi comedy series follows Ed Mercer (MacFarlane) and his crew on the USS Orville as they explore space in the 25th century.
‎Casual Trek
We've got a guest star! Celeste of the Nerd & Tie Podcast and Celeste is Best joins the casual crew this episode to talk about the Trill. The species has always been a fascinating one and science fiction stand-in for conversations about gender and identity, so the three of us are going to delve into that in three different shows.

The Orville

Episodes 36

Photos 8812

More like this

Did you know

User reviews 1.7K

Technical specs

Related news

More to explore

Recently viewed

Why 'The Orville' Is More Than a Star Trek Homage

The Orville 's Seth MacFarlane on Those Star Trek Comparisons

Related Content

Cookie banner

Follow The Ringer online:

Site search

‘The Orville’ Is Back for Season 3. But How Does It Fit Into a New Space TV Landscape?

Share this story

Share All sharing options for: ‘The Orville’ Is Back for Season 3. But How Does It Fit Into a New Space TV Landscape?

Vote for the best TV series finale in the latest Trial by Content !

Next Up In TV

Sign up for the The Ringer Newsletter

Arsenal Win the North London Derby, Man City a Point Behind at the Top

Eagles Sign Mekhi Becton, Draft Leftovers, and Sixers Therapy Session!

Part 1: The Brunson Game, a Kyrie-Harden Slugfest, and OKC’s Ceiling With Ryen Russillo

NFL Draft Superlatives: Most Likely to Get a Coach Fired, Steal a Starting Job, and Host ‘SNL’

Eagles Draft Review: Day Three Picks, Overall Grades, and What’s Next

The Lakers Finally Beat Denver, Orlando Goes Electric, and More From Saturday’s Playoff Slate

The Orville: The Best Star Trek Homages

Ensign Burke and Ensign Ro

Dinal and Q

The Orville Has Two Versions of The Borg

The War with the Kaylon and The Dominion War

An Emotional Experience for Isaac and Data

Mercer & Teleya and Chakotay & Seska

Alara Kitan and Tasha Yar

Double Dip Casting

Latest TV reviews

Seth MacFarlane Discusses “The Orville,” “Star Trek,” and the Struggle to Make Science Fiction Funny

With the two-part episode Identity, The Orville has matured into serious science fiction

Share this story

The walls of Apple’s garden are tumbling down

More from Entertainment

You should play Splatoon with your family

The Nintendo Switch 2 will now reportedly arrive in 2025 instead of 2024

The best Presidents Day deals you can already get

Vudu’s name is changing to ‘Fandango at Home’

The Orville

Concept [ ]

Production [ ]

Actors who have appeared in Star Trek and The Orville [ ]

External links [ ]

Suck it, Picard. The Orville is Star Trek: The Next Generation’s true spiritual successor

How The Orville channels The Next Generation

Editors' Recommendations

Seth MacFarlane gives update on The Orville season 4: "There will be more"

Log in or sign up for Rotten Tomatoes

Email not verified

Sign up for the Rotten Tomatoes newsletter to get weekly updates on:

Movies / TV

The Orville

Cast & Crew

More Like This

Series / The Orville

Tropes in this series:

Video Example(s):

Seth MacFarlane Hinted At The Orville's Return Again, But Now I'm Confused About The Franchise's Future

How Seth MacFarlane Confirmed More Of The Orville Is Happening

Why I'm Somewhat Confused By The Producer's Latest Comments

CINEMABLEND NEWSLETTER

Most Popular

Deep Space Whine

The Orville

Customers also watched

Cast and Crew

Biology [ ]

Politics [ ]

Lak'vai pact [ ]

Dissolution and resumption of war [ ]

Religion [ ]