What does God need with a starship?
(This review contains
spoilers!)
The
Orville managed to succeed last week with its smart blending of a
pro-transgender and self-identity storyline with some excellent world and
character building. This week thankfully continues the hot streak, as the crew
take on an even greater challenge.
They’ve come across an impossibly
large ship in the middle of nowhere, and upon investigating, discover a whole
world being run inside. The residents have no idea they’re even on a starship,
and it’s all being run by a corrupt politician posing as a man of god.
And now it’s time for me to introduce
the official CanadianYeti Drinking Game of the Fall 2017 TV season! Every time
you come across a show making an allegory to the current political situation in
America, take a shot! You’ll be hungover till Halloween!
(Disclaimer: Please don’t actually do
that. Drink responsibly, kids.)
All joking aside, it’s a really solid
concept that is handled pretty well. I liked how the team split up in the early
moments of the episode, allowing for plenty of separate stories exploring the
different parts of the ship. The crew was actually put in danger for the first
time this week after Alara was shot and Kelly was captured, leading to an
episode where the stakes actually felt pretty high for once.
The humour was also pretty on-point
this week as well. The cold open with Bortus’s mate was pretty funny, as was
Mercer’s reaction to eating the food the villagers made for him and the way he
was able to get past that one guard. Unfortunately they still rely on
low-hanging fruit jokes way more than they should, but considering the
showrunner we’re stuck with I guess I should be grateful that it’s nowhere near
as bad as it could be. Still, the running joke of Isaac being confused as to
what a dick is gets old before it even becomes a running joke.
The episode ends with a Liam Neeson
cameo. No, I’m not joking. They actually got Liam Neeson to cameo on this show
as the long since gone captain of the mysterious ship. He doesn’t stay long and
doesn’t do much more than just explain the ship’s purpose, but it’s a surprise nonetheless.
Much like that cameo, this episode was
another delightful surprise. While The
Orville still has plenty of room for improvement as far as the overarching
plot and the relying on low-hanging fruit jokes go, the homages to Star Trek make fans of stuff like The Next Generation feel right at home
with episodes like this and the previous ones. It’s well written, creative, and
a whole lot of fun.
FINAL SCORE
7/10
Good
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