The Orville S2 E1+2

Well, that was disappointing. I’ve been excited for the return of The Orville for months now, and the first two episodes did not meet my expectations.

The season premiere was all about the captain and his ex’s issues (she’s dating someone!) while Bortis needs to pee, and the doctor’s kid gets in with a bad crowd. Meanwhile the helmsman works up the courage to ask out the new scientist on the ship.

This was an entire episode of B and C plots stitched together, and nothing at all interesting actually happened. Boris pees (yay?) the helmsman chokes, and new science officer flirts with the captain instead, and the mess with the doctor’s kid gets resolved… that’s it.

Beyond the issues with the fact that this is a boring episode in which there’s nothing that couldn’t have been done on any other sitcom, the whole storyline with the doctor just ruined any sense of disbelief I could manage.

First off, this is a ship with only 300 crew, and somehow the CMO hasn’t met either of the bad kids parents? Hasn’t given a routine examination to the bad kid? Seriously? Also why is the android hanging around all the time? This is seriously the least competent crew in the galaxy.

Episode 2 focuses on Brotis’ holo-porn addiction, which is kinda interesting, but didn’t necessarily deserve the A plot, especially when TNG did this same story with Reg Barkley 2 decades ago… The B story was actually the more Trek-like bit of the show with a scientific/exploratory story that morphs into the attempted rescue of a lost civilization. In the end though, it lacked the emotional weight that it could have carried since so much attention was given to the more titillating(?) addiction story.

I've heard things improve later in the season... but I haven't gotten there yet. We'll see...