TV Review: The Orville (2017). A scifi comedy that looks very familiar.

Image Courtesy of Fox

Tv Review: The Orville (2017) by Ben Jeffries (12/9/2017)
Season 1 Episode 1 - Old Wounds (Original Air Date: 10/9/2017)
44 minutes
Scifi, Comedy, Action, Drama,
Airing on Fox


To boldly go where others have gone before.

Ok, that might be slightly too reductive and simplistic a description of the show, but there was a point halfway through this pilot episode where I had to stop myself from googling “CBS sues Fox over Star Trek Parody” . From the sleek white space ships with glowing blue engines, to the uniforms denoting seniority (or maybe assignment) through differently coloured tunics, to the makeup design of alien characters, the sci-fi future of The Orville clearly takes extensive inspiration from Gene Roddenberry’s iconic franchise. Executive Producer and star Seth MacFarlane has said that the show is more inspired by the brighter, more optimistic view of earlier Trek as opposed to the darker tone newer versions have adopted.

In The Orville Seth MacFarlane plays Captain Ed Mercer, a man still recovering from a bitter divorce, when he gets his chance at a dream posting; Captain of a Federation starship. He grabs his best friend Gordon Malloy (Scott Grimes), one of the best pilots in the fleet despite his attitude problems, and heads for deep space. Unfortunately Mercer’s joy is short lived, as the Executive Officer he is assigned turns out to be his ex-wife Kelly Grayson (Adrianne Pallicki). Rounding out Mercers bridge crew are the serious and monotone Second Officer Bortus (Peter Macon), inexperienced but capable Security Chief Alara Kitan (Halston Sage), wise and knowing Dr Claire Finn (Penny Johnson Jerald), laid back Helmsman John Lamarr (J. Lee), and self superior android Isaac (Mark Jackson) as Science Officer .

Viewers who have previously been disappointed with MacFarlane’s on screen performances probably wont find anything to change their minds here. He manages to carry the episode, with his comedic delivery and timing working well, but his skills as a dramatic actor are less well developed. Casting Pallicki opposite him is a smart choice, as she shoulders the dramatic load without outshining him, while at the same time being able to keep up comedically. As the resident class clown Grimes manages to smooth a lot of the rough edges in the script, opening up the show for the rest of the main cast like Macon’s heavily made up and deeply serious Worf-alike Lieutenant Bortus, who plays a good straight man to Grimes.

Whether MacFarlane has the chops to actually anchor a show like this is just one of the many questions surrounding it’s future. While the episode opens with some better than average cgi effects which generally hold up over the episodes run time, it remains to be seen if the budget can maintain that level of quality for an entire season. Another big question is whether the show can attract a consistent audience. MacFarlane himself can be a divisive name, after more than 15 years at the Fox network with a host of animated shows, the name “MacFarlane” holds a certain level of attraction via familiarity for some audiences, but he can also be an instant deal breaker for some people due to the tone of those same shows. While The Orville has shades of the vulgar humour for which that shows like Family Guy draw criticism, a lot of it’s comedy is a spread of wry, passive aggressive, sarcasm and non-sequiturs. It’s amusing rather than hilarious, and without a higher laugh per minute ratio I don’t think a lot of the MacFarlane following will stay around for very long. At the same time, the genre elements seem more derivative than some of the hardcore science fiction fan base will enjoy. I’ve already seen one commenter online pulling apart the internal logic of the shows action climax as being poorly thought out. MacFarlane, a long time card carrying geek, actually had a small role on Star Trek: Enterprise as Ensign Rivers. With The Orville it seems he’s managed to convince Fox to let him engage in some wish fulfillment and make his very own comedic version of a Star Trek show. The marketing for the show tries to sell it as a witty combination of homage and parody in the vein of Galaxy Quest and while the pilot is much more homage than parody, failing to highlight or lampoon any of the genre tropes or cliches, the tone of the show does leave it open to that kind of writing further down the track.

Pilots are hard. They have to do a lot of heavy lifting when it comes to world-building and introducing characters, generating a connection between those characters and the audience, and establishing tone and sensibilities. The Orville outsources a lot of that hard work to it’s forbears, letting the cultural ubiquity of Star Trek stand in for thorough world building or explanation of setting while it focuses on trying to nail down the comedic tone, but seems like it can’t decide how seriously it wants to take itself from moment to moment.

While the pilot isn’t the strongest first presentation of a show I’ve ever seen, The Orville is an interesting experiment. It’s a high concept genre comedy on a major network with recognisable names involved. Unfortunately, in a world where hardcore sci-fi fans have a new Star Trek show premiering later this month, and shows like Rick and Morty are cult hits in the high concept comedy niche, MacFarlane and Fox might have waited too long, and underestimated the standards audiences expect, to be able to make a broad impact. If it can generate a following, either by finding a unique comedic tone, or something more to say than “remember Star Trek?”, then The Orville could hang around for a while, but it looks like being an uphill battle. I’m interested enough in the take the show has and I had enough fun with it that I’ll be back next week to see how things shape up, but I’m not quite willing to sign on for the full “five year mission” jut yet.

5/10

The Orville is Produced by: Fuzzy Door Productions, 20th Century Fox
Distributed by: Fox Networks
Created By: Seth MacFarlane
Written by: Seth MacFarlane
Directed by: Jon Favreau
Starring: Seth MacFarlane, Adrianne Palicki, Penny Johnson Jerald, Scott Grimes, Peter Macon, Halston Sage, J. Lee, Mark Jackson