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THE ORVILLE - Show Discussion


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Woah, turns out I was wrong!  Dunno where I heard it was a 22-er from.

Reality is they ordered 13 episodes, but are only airing 12 this year (episodes 1-11 and 13), saving the already filmed episode 12 to be a Season 2 episode next year (it comes back in September)

 

That means this Thursday's new ep is the season finale! :heartbreak:

 

http://www.digitalspy.com/tv/ustv/news/a843131/seth-macfarlane-orville-season-1-cut-short/

 

http://www.thefutoncritic.com/showatch/orville/listings/

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It looks like a very expensive show to produce.  The CGI looks pretty darn good and of course MacFarlane is shelling out for a full orchestral score in every single episode, something even Game of Thrones doesn't always do!.  Makes sense to go with the shorter season.

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@Disco StuI quite liked the up/down vote episode. Anything that has a go at the social media mob is OK with me!

 

And I thought the scoring for the most recent episode (the one with the flat universe) was outstanding.

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8 minutes ago, Nick1066 said:

@Disco StuI quite liked the up/down vote episode. Anything that has a go at the social media mob is OK with me!

 

And I thought the scoring for the most recent episode (the one with the flat universe) was outstanding.

 

The idea of public shaming that ruins peoples lives over relatively trivial matters (the case of the woman who made that stupid joke about South Africa comes to mind) is concerning and well-worth speculative fiction exploring the implications of.  I just thought this particular script was a little clumsy about it, not sure what specifically to put my finger on.

 

Like I said I still enjoy the characters doing things together (and the visual look of the show is nice too) even if the narrative they were acting out left something to be desired.

 

3 minutes ago, Woj said:

I just love the show because it gives me the same warm fuzzy that watching classic TNG and DS9 does. 

 

Pretty much, yeah.  I love that it goes for that vibe, but it certainly doesn't have the intelligence and nuance of DS9, especially in its latter half.  But that's not some kind of dealbreaker for me.

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Hardly any shows start out great right off the bat, takes a little bit to figure out their strengths and weaknesses

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14 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

Pretty much, yeah.  I love that it goes for that vibe, but it certainly doesn't have the intelligence and nuance of DS9, especially in its latter half.  

 

I doubt Wojo was implying that. And The Orville is not a serious-minded science fiction series like DS9 was. It's comedy albeit with some solid Trekish chops. 

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I was not comparing shows, correct. I was comparing the feelings in me that the shows created. 

 

If I said The Orville gave me the same warm happy feeling as eating a cheeseburger, would I be comparing the show to a slab of milk encrusted ground beef? 

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18 minutes ago, Woj said:

I was not comparing shows, correct. I was comparing the feelings in me that the shows created. 

 

If I said The Orville gave me the same warm happy feeling as eating a cheeseburger, would I be comparing the show to a slab of milk encrusted ground beef? 

 

Cherries and papayas!

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The Orville 1x12 Mad Idolatry

 

Fantastic finale to a fantastic season!

 

I loved the sci-fi concept they delved into this week and I really loved the angle they took of having a character play a part in a civilization's development, and then feeling the weight of that when things didn't go well.

 

BUT, the only real problem with the episode is that it wrapped up MUCH too quickly!  We didn't get to go deep enough into this civilization and its differences from ours, particularly all the ins and outs of the Kelly idolatry....... but most disappointingly, not enough time was spent on the weight of the world it gave to Kelly.  They basically went right from that to the quasi-deus-ex-machina of Isaac being able to fix everything, and the wrap up after he came back was particularly lightning paced.

 

I think out of all the episodes would have made great two-parters, this is the one!  They could have done a whole hour just on exploring the world and coming back to find how they changed it, then a whole second hour on how Kelly feels about it and more planning on how to fix it and more time spend on isaac's time there and that aftermath.  Oh well.

 


Can't wait for season 2!

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There was a Voyager episode that was just like this episode, in which the Doctor spends lifetimes down on the time-dilated planet while Voyager is trapped, until they develop the tech to push the ship out of orbit. 

 

I was quite annoyed at the beginning of this episode because I think it was the third in a row that saw the Orville encountered an invisible space anomaly in the first five minutes. 

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Decent finale, even though I literally saw every plot point coming as soon as the natives at the beginning said "Kelly". The only thing I didn't guess was Isaac staying down on the surface, but the rest was fairly predictable to anyone who watches Trek...including the relationship being doomed, and why.  I did think for about 5 seconds that Palicki might have wanted out and they would just write Kelly out of the show by having her stay on the planet (which would be a heartbreaking resolution to the relationship issue) but nah. That would have taken BSG level courage in terms of storytelling.

 

I agree with Jay that is was all resolved WAY to quickly, given the weight of what was occurring. At one point I checked the time and it had like 5 minutes left, and had no idea how they'd resolve it satisfactorily. They sort of did, but it would have been much better as a two parter (like several episodes).

 

Maybe for season 2, if they're against doing a fully serialised show, they should consider mini-arcs of 2 or 3 episodes.  All in all I really enjoyed season one, surprisingly more than almost any other new show I've watched this year.  The show has a good hearted earnestness to it that's rare on TV. Really looking forward to season 2.

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Right, I totally forgot to mention the Ed / Kelly romance subplot.  Well, it wasn't done that well, I didn't think.  I still can't quite figure out if they have good chemistry or not, but I definitely they've they've each had better chemistry with other characters (Charlize Theron and Rob Lowe) than with each other.  If they had axed this subplot out of this episode, it would have given more time to flesh out the main story, too.  I hope season 2 doesn't dwell on their romance much.

 

I also noted that they stuck with LaMarr being chief engineer, in two different bridge scenes there were 2 different random extras in his old spot at the helm next to Malloy.  I wonder if season 2 will bring a new permanent bridge character, or if the unaired for now episode 12 featured more about his transition down there.

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8 hours ago, Jay said:

What do you think are the strongest and weakest aspects of the show, Pieter?

Hmm... You're making me think there.

 

Strong points, I reckon the generally good natured atmosphere, which is of course helped by the humour. Sometimes pretty clever points too.

On the other hand, not all the humour works, especially the crude and childish bits.

The characters are likeable though and respond in fairly human ways that you don't often see in shows like these.

 

Special effects are exactly at the level I'd expect them at; not any excessive "wow" factor, but that only helps them support the story instead of distract from it.

Plus having high quality orchestral music with a fun theme certainly helps too.

(Where is an OST when you need one?)

 

It is pretty much Star Trek, which I definitely like but is sometimes a bit slow and takes itself a bit too seriously.

But here some Stargate style "we really don't care" humour is thrown in for good measure, which adds to the fun factor for me.

 

Long story short: It's fun and entertaining, but not actually dumb despite some of the humour making it seem that way.

 

Does that sound about fair...?

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The first piece of licensed Orville merchandise arrives on January 16th!

 

81rGjYeVr3L.jpg


 

Four-time Emmy Award winner Seth MacFarlane creates a new sci-fi dramedy universe on the Fox Network with his new show, The Orville. MacFarlane plays Captain Ed Mercer, an officer in the Planetary Union in the 25th century who gathers a crew from the farthest reaches of the galaxy—his ex-wife included—to man the exploration vessel Orville and patrol the mysteries of deep space. Filled with alien species, exotic worlds, futuristic technology and awe-inspiring spaceships, this lavish companion to The Orville takes you behind the scenes through concept art, on-set photography and technical schematics to explore the show’s production design, costumes, makeup prosthetics and visual effects. This is the ultimate guide to this new space-faring epic adventure.

 

Jeff Bond is the author of Danse Macabre: 25 years of Danny Elfman and Tim Burton, and The Music of Star Trek. He was Executive Editor of Geek magazine and Senior Editor at CFQ, the revival of Cinefantastique magazine, from 2003 to 2006. He covers film music and other subjects for the Hollywood Reporter and has written hundreds of movie and television soundtrack liner notes booklets.

 

Hardcover: 160 pages
Publisher: Titan Books (January 16, 2018)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1785657615
ISBN-13: 978-1785657610
Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 0.7 x 11.1 inches

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1785657615

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On 13-12-2017 at 9:00 PM, Jay said:

The first piece of licensed Orville merchandise arrives on January 16th!

Interesting. Written by a person who does a lot of soundtrack stuff too?

Could that possibly mean good audible merchandise might follow...? :sarcasm:

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  • 4 weeks later...

Finally caught up with this during the week. Really enjoyed it. When it was announced, I expected a straight-up comedy. Didn't expect it to be as much like TNG as it is with loads of genuinely serious moments. Really looking forward to season 2. Although the first two seasons of TNG had some great episodes, most of it was pretty rubbish so I'd definitely say the season average of The Orville is higher than those first two seasons. 

 

It really does feel more like Star Trek than Discovery, and although Discovery has its moments, I think I look forward more to new Orville episodes. 

 

Given that Seth is a huge JW fan, I wonder did he approach JW to write the main theme?

 

 

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On 12/15/2017 at 4:32 PM, Pieter_Boelen said:

Interesting. Written by a person who does a lot of soundtrack stuff too?

Could that possibly mean good audible merchandise might follow...? :sarcasm:

 

 

I wanna say yes. I think there was a post over at FSM where LLL mentioned something about it. And I think Seth Mcfarlane mentioned something as well about doing a cd of the 1st episode.

 

20 hours ago, Damien F said:

 

 

Given that Seth is a huge JW fan, I wonder did he approach JW to write the main theme?

 

 

 

 

John Williams recommended John Powell write the theme.

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52 minutes ago, El Jefe said:

I wanna say yes. I think there was a post over at FSM where LLL mentioned something about it. And I think Seth Mcfarlane mentioned something as well about doing a cd of the 1st episode.

Bring it on!

But I hope they'll have music from the other episodes too.

Several composers contributed good stuff that deserves to be heard, right?

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  • 1 month later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Just watched the final episode. 

 

WORDS. CANNOT. EXPRESS. MY. LOVE. FOR. THE. ORVILLE. 

 

I haven't been this into a show for many years. I am basically giddy with excitement waiting for the next episodes every week.

 

I love it on the level of Stargate and Star Trek. Fantastic sci-fi, great stories, wonderful characters that are just damn fun to visit each week. I truly love everything about it.

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I don't even like the theme as much as many of the individual episode's scores.  The theme is fine, though.

 

The episode scores are easily my favorite things I've ever heard from Debney and McNeely

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  • 3 months later...

Since there still isn't an announcement about a soundtrack release yet (seriously, I'd expect one by now from such a music-loving producer!),

here are the only two tracks that I did find:

 

 

And this can serve as soundtrack cover:

The Orville.jpg

 

Still better than nothing! :D

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57 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

They could just publish the midi-file. It wouldn't sound anymore synthetic than the score "recording"...

Huh? Sounds real enough to me... :huh:

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33 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

There are pictures of the recording sessions.  Orville episodes had real orchestral recordings for their scores.  Just like all of MacFarlane’s shows.

 

That doesn't mean that all the instruments are real. For TV shows it's not unheard of to mix real recordings with instrument samples.

 

31 minutes ago, Nick1066 said:

 

I've been wondering...what are midi-files?

 

It's explained in the appendix of JRR Tolkien's Unfinished Tales.

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