The Orville

The Orville is a show with potential. I liked how it didn't try too hard to be funny. In fact, it reminded me more of a Star Trek episode than Family Guy. I suspect there will be many comparisons to Galaxy Quest.

My concern is the audience. To appreciate this show, I think you need to be both a science fiction and crude humor fan. I'm one of these people, but I'm not sure if there are enough of us to support the production. Hopefully, we'll be seeing a lot more of The Orville.

Star Trek discovery was also released, and I have to say, this show comes closer to what I expect in a Star Trek series.

As many critics have pointed out, this isn't a spoof of Star Trek. It's not exactly an homage either. The best way I can describe it is that MacFarlane wanted to make a Star Trek show that recalls that franchise's earlier days, back before it became an action blockbuster film series and before the TV shows started becoming dark and grim and edgy. MacFarlane is making his own version of the original Star Trek, and he is a new Captain Kirk. All the optimism and sincerity and lightheartedness of that show is here, and in many ways it's kind of wonderful. I'm honestly surprised something like this exists.

There's some off-color humor, but it's never (so far at least) particularly offensive, or at least its offensiveness pales in comparison to many of McFarlane's other works. Still, it's distinctly him, so it's not going to be appealing to everyone.

In any case, I've really enjoyed The Orville. It's not a perfect show. Some of the jokes do fall flat. But I love its spirit. I love that someone is actually trying to make a Star Trek show that isn't just filled with explosions, space battles and gritty action. You should check it out and make up your own mind. Maybe you'll hate it, but maybe not. It's fun and kind of sweet and I'm happy it's a thing, however weird and unexpected it might be.

Update: November 2017 The show keeps getting better from week to week and it seem has now found its groove. The Orville uses its adventure-of-the-week format to explore modern-day social issues and tackle current moral dilemmas in a sci-fi venue. The show is refreshingly progressive in its politics, and optimistic to its core. It is a Star Trek show for folks who want something a bit old-school. By not having a budget (or requirements) for wall-to-wall spectacle, the hour-long Fox show is forced to focus on character, chemistry, sci-fi plotting and moral debates that have partially defined Gene Roddenberry's property for generations. (though the special effects look superb and almost movie like)

Yes, to a certain extent it's fan fiction, but then so is so much of our current pop culture entertainment. But by being a network television show, it is forced to be the kind of Star Trek that fans claim the recent movies have neglected in favor of four-quadrant blockbuster thrills. The Orville is not a spoof, but rather a straight-faced Trek show with characters who are funny and which you can learn to love.

There have been a few times when I watched this show where I forgot I was watching The Orville. It has the true spirit of Star Trek written all over it. It's a bit more tongue in cheek, yes. But it has heart and portrays in-depth and heart felt stories. I watched the first episode of ST Discovery and still haven't gotten around watching the second, I'm just not that into it. Full of virtue signaling BS and it doesn't "feel" like Star Trek. I hang out for every new episode of The Orville, it is THAT good. Do your self a favor and watch this instead of Discovery if you want that real old feeling of Star Trek. A must!

No spoilers. I liked it. Like the original Star Trek it is character and story driven which I am sure will anger the people who think they are Science Fiction fans but don't know what science fiction is. People who have never read a book by Sturgeon or Simak and think Science Fiction is SciFi shoot'em ups with lasers.

I know there will be those who want to see "Family Guy In Space;" grow up. MacFarlane did. This is an independent, free standing piece of storytelling and MacFarlane is using storytelling elements instead of special effects or body function jokes. It is a show for grown-ups.

Ray Bradbury said Science Fiction is putting ordinary people into extraordinary situations and seeing how they respond. Sisko was the perfect embodiment of that concept and "The Orville" appears to follow that lead.

The first episode did a good job of establishing character roles and plot. They also did an excellent job of hinting as several subplots. All in all, it is like Star Trek in story but with a Next Generation maturity. Thank goodness MacFarlane does not have a Roger alien!

After having seen six episodes of both Star Trek: Discovery and The Orville, I am truly baffled and very positively surprised. Baffled at how, with a budget of millions, the people who made Discovery could not come up with a single interesting character or plot, but instead basically just made The Expanse with Klingons, taking every single thing that is unique, positive, and enjoyable about Star Trek and tossing it out the window. And positively surprised, because, out of the corner I would least have expected it - the filthy, cobwebbed one with the rancid yogurt, in which Seth MacFarlane used to reside for me - comes this gem of a show that takes everything fun, positive, and enjoyable from Trek and runs with it.

It is - as nearly everyone here has pointed out - the spiritual successor of TNG, although I would actually put it somewhere between TOS and TNG. It has a bit of the "cowboy" feeling people seem to like so much about TOS while including at least some of the elements that made TNG so brilliant - people actually trying to overcome petty human concerns by looking at the bigger picture and solving problems through compassion and dialogue rather than by inventing the next, bigger gun (yes, I know Trek did that too, but big guns are fine occasionally).

Now this is still by and large a comedy, so in order for that to function, you can't have straight TNG-like characters. But apart from occasionally overshooting the target a bit, the balance of comedy and seriousness is handled excellently - something I would not have thought possible for a Trek-like sci-fi show, let alone from MacFarlane.

You will recognize the plot elements, you'll recognize character traits. After hundreds of stories of drama and intrigue among the stars, what story hasn't Trek told? Again, the idea, as far as I can see, was not to create something entirely new (which, ironically, it is, though), but to take those elements that made Trek great and combine them with enough comedy to provide a breath of fresh air. And provide it does. In fact, the comedy allows the writers to approach topics in a way that would actually not have been possible for Trek playing it straight. Without spoiling, I will here point to the Episode "About a girl", which actually touches on subjects that weren't very prominent at the time TNG ran and is therefore quite unique in itself.

I'm not really going to touch on the scientific aspects of the show except to say that, even with scientific advisors, Trek has obviously always taken huge liberties with established science at times, while at others making the science and (at them time) new discoveries a central point of the story. Naturally, scientific accuracy is going to suffer a bit in a comedy. But let me just point to "Discovery" and say (farcially): subspace mushroom network.

I don't know how long they can make the concept work, but if they keep coming up with episodes like #3, #4 and #6, they deserve to have the kind of money thrown at them that "Discovery" now squanders on a tired old war story, forgettable characters, and making everything dark and shaky. But even with its limited budget, the visuals are more than adequate (maybe barring the Ikea furniture), proving once more that you only need so much resources to tell great stories.

Finally, one more thing. THE MUSIC. This show has hands down the best music of any official or unofficial Star Trek show (including the new movies, but of course always excepting Jerry Goldsmith). But considering you have Bruce Broughton doing the theme, and John Debney and Joel McNeely scoring episodes, that shouldn't be a big surprise.

Simply put, this show saves Star Trek for me and blows any contemporary Trek movie or show out of the water - with ease.