The Orville: new on Fox

@ 2:12

Smokin' Rockets!
I was just about to post this.
Ya beat me to it.

I guess I'm in.

Hope she does not get type cast. Agents of Shield and this she the Ex wife.

Hmmm Can I get an Ex wife like her!!!

Sure good that he loosened that door for her. Unfortunately, it was the wall she took out. With the armored door still in it. She'll be fun.

Shadar

I always love Adrianne Palicki. It'll be interesting to see how she does comedy. She looks like a natural for irony or playing the straight.

I remember the first time I saw her act... she was the first Kara on Smallville, way back in 2004. Episode called Covenant focused on her and Clark. It started with her walking out of the woods, nude, and stepping in front of an approaching car. Just before it hits her, she slams her fists down on the front of a car, crushing it so badly that the back end flew up and the car's inertia sent it flying over her head to land down the road in flames. (It was one of the better special effect stunts on Smallville.)

And then she walked to the Kents and introduced herself to Clark, still in the nude.

Here's a clip of that scene from Youtube -- not a great video, but watchable.




Shadar

Looks like fun!

shadar wrote: I always love Adrianne Palicki. It'll be interesting to see how she does comedy. She looks like a natural for irony or playing the straight.

I remember the first time I saw her act... she was the first Kara on Smallville, way back in 2004. Episode called Covenant focused on her and Clark. It started with her walking out of the woods, nude, and stepping in front of an approaching car. Just before it hits her, she slams her fists down on the front of a car, crushing it so badly that the back end flew up and the car's inertia sent it flying over her head to land down the road in flames. (It was one of the better special effect stunts on Smallville.)

And then she walked to the Kents and introduced herself to Clark, still in the nude.

Here's a clip of that scene from Youtube -- not a great video, but watchable.

Shadar

I know her as Sam's first girlfriend on Supernatural. The Smallville clip is definitely better.

She's done comedy before, I seem to remember her doing ok (Electra Luxx). But she's been a comedy voice with McFarland before on Family Guy, as well as Titan Maximum and Robot Chicken. Coffee Town is a comedy, but I don't know how comedic her role was as I've never seen it.

John Wick wasn't a comedy, but she did have some black comedic moments while she was kicking ass. Not to mention there was a lot of comedy on SHIELD. I think she'll do really well.

From the official description:

"ALARA KITAN (Halston Sage, “Neighbors,” “Goosebumps”), a young, inexperienced security officer whose home planet’s high gravity gives her superior physical strength"

www.fox.com/the-orville

This reminds me a lot of Powerless.

Not obviously the same genre, but you know same kind of premise of taking a big action genre and making it a 30 minute sitcom. Powerless i thought that was a clever idea if they didn't quite nail the landing on, but it was a clever idea-they have figured out how to do a 30 minutes show with 2 or 3 minutes of superhero stuff with effects that may not actually be great but convey the idea.

This....Seth Macfarlane as a live action actor has a better animator-and even then its not that great. Hes often seems a guy coasting or trying to coast on how handsome he is when he is not that actually that handsome. This has some of the lazy energy of it-but that said pilots are tricky for comedys with a lot of diffrent aims.

And space opera works well for this kind of stuff-the kind of space ship flying through the cosmos stuff is pretty easy to do these days in semi competent effects, as well as laser fire and other stuff. i do like how the space ship looks and the fact that it has two windows in it (which is something that Star Trek always avoided as a dodge), but now is cheep enough just to do. I am kind of reminded of Firefly also a show that failed to a degree becuse in the early 2000s a lot of this stuff was to expensive to do.

So let see-i doubt this ever going to be a show with a lot of girlpower ellements-but i do in my head think if this works someday where going to get that show so lets see.

Seth Macfarlane seems to be polarizing to a lot of people, and if you don't think his stuff is funny, I doubt this will be the show that changes your mind. But it's a simple, nifty idea with a lot of potential, made by a guy who obviously deeply loves the source material. I'm certainly willing to watch it and see.

I kinda of liked the pilot.

its not great, but its good. It had legitimately great effects-the best i honestly think i ever sdr on television-yeah its all cgi, and some of it is cgi for quick sight gags but its real nice looking show. i was impressed ever minute. It is 100% star trek, but star trek never looked as good as this on TV-hell the recent movies have a run for there money here.

Which is what the show is. Its Star Trek Competent star trek. But its star trek that ever 20 seconds or so stops to deliver a joke. I would say its Family guy style as that show does the same thing-but the jokes feel a little nicer then tha-part of it wants to seem filthy- Scott Grimes really is playing the suzz ball but even he doesn-t overplay it -not necessairly funnier, but just punch a little higher for the most part-and there not all funny-but they re cute.

And that wen as he cast For Halson Saga as Kita the girl with super strength . Whiles she very much the does all the physical stuff fighting stuff-she doesn't play it as the tough sexy warrior, but kind of the slightly inexperienced but trying her best young cute character(and i like that yes its more cute then sexy). She never seems like she wants to do anything super strength related, but when asked does it. Its just part of the skill set, and thats kind of admirable. Her best momment is in the trailer that everyone showed off here-she destorys a bank vault and seth macfarlane makes a joke about lossening it for her, and its played as hes telling a bad joke-and she gives him a half dagger eyes, half pride that really does a lot to sell a character Shes not given a lot to do-but well she does it everyones does it

Palacki is given more to do as the ex Wife commander riker character-and shes fine. The show gave her a kind of intresting arc as someone who wants above all to be liked and respected as a commanding officer and that works-and some of her scenes where she plays that off are strong. Its mostly flat like the rest of the show, but fine.

everyone is kind of flat i think by design and some play it better then others Bothron is a lot of fun as the dry vulcan like character. The Doctor and the Obviously evil guy in the suit don't get a lot to do but hey its a pilot.

But that pilot thing hurt it in ways. The constant need to cut every 20 second for a joke, felt like it cut time. It maybe just a need to establish things but there wasn't a whole lot of a story, and what there didn't have a lot of depth-an evil ugly alien race attacked a sciece station-and all they where was an ugly makeup job on the screen-not a lot of depth or anything-just the angry shooty part of trek which is rarely the good parts.

The shows second main problem is-well Seth Macfarlane is just on the edge kay as the lead kirk character-but only okay. Part of the shows design is how flat everyone is-and he is leading that. We see him angry at padaliki and at times pride-but not much else. Its intresting. Most people when they parody Trek, try to parody Kirk and his brash i am the hero who over enounciates. Here he seems very much the Calm reasonable Picard, just a Picard getting over a bad divorce. Considering how much work hes done with Patrick Stewart that kind of makes sence.But like Picard in early seasons of Next Gen-he can be a little flat to.

Which maybe this- the pilot reminded me a fair amount like the first season of TNG-and that turned out to be a great show, as it was kind of trying to find its leg. Encounter at FarPoint i would argue when Q isn't on Screen is a bad episode of Trek also. But better came-and i hope the same is true here.

Disappointing, but worth following to see if they can turn it around.

Poor writing, little character development, most of the actors seemed flat in their roles as their roles seemed entirely one dimensional. Generic bad guys with no back story - there as nothing more than cannon fodder. Most of the jokes were meh, but a lot of that had to do with delivery.

The women on the show seemed to have the most promise - not because they were women but because they seemed to have the most nuance. The guys just seemed like generic frat boys save Seth who tried flitting between frat boy, boss, joker and insecure ex. It never seemed to fit.

The pilot left me with no idea where they are taking the show. For me, however, it takes a bit more story and better writing to hold my interest for an hour. I may love the promise of having a character with our favorite abilities on the show, but it will take more than that to keep me showing up for an hour. Supergirl dropped off my watch list as well because the potential of watching someone with our favorite abilities was drowned out in poor writing and too much social commentary.

I doubt, however, I'm in the demographic that the advertisers are going for so maybe it works on a business level.

Kita (security chief who can bash down bank-grade vault doors and bend steel in her bare hands) was fun. Cute too. Hope they do more with that.

Palack's character (First Officer) was Ok, but I usually enjoy her roles. She's can be sexy in a strong way. Also sounds like she's the real mover and shaker of the entire story line.

McFarlane is an asshole as usual. But I'm willing to suffer him for a bit given he only wrote the pilot. Hopefully show will improve with other writers.

I don't see it as parody or comedy, but I hope they have fun with it. Destroying a Krill ship with a redwood tree was fun. Not funny, but neat. I'm a tree person.

I agree with Starforge's comment that some of the female characters have promise, but all the male characters are either stupid or assholes. But that seems increasingly the norm in TV and movies.

It's a female future.

I have no issue with that.

Shadar

1. Do the producers know the common meaning of "krill?"

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krill

2. Should the Krill foot soldiers all have been wearing red shirts?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redshirt_(character)

--Brantley

brantley wrote: 1. Do the producers know the common meaning of "krill?"

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krill

2. Should the Krill foot soldiers all have been wearing red shirts?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redshirt_(character)

--Brantley

Krill are werid looking things, that none the less are very important part of the food chain-but not individually, there killed and eaten by the score...so you know not bad name.

And fun fact i learned:

A not to close friend, is one of the Green suited extras in a few episodes of the show so take what i say with a grain of salt. I am rooting for him to turn into the next Colm Meany

brantley wrote: 1. Do the producers know the common meaning of "krill?"

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krill

2. Should the Krill foot soldiers all have been wearing red shirts?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redshirt_(character)

--Brantley

Yeah, without the krill, our Pacific wild salmon (that I love to catch) would not have such gloriously pink flesh. Yum.

I think the Krill in Orville should have red skin and taste good.

With any luck, Kita will give us a few entertaining moments. As they establish early in the Pilot, she's far too young and inexperienced to be Security Chief. But her superstrength will in theory make up for that. Based on the Pilot, she must be a hundred times stronger than any human.

(Although blaming it on high gravity on her home planet is a tired meme, and not sufficient either. Anyone from a high gravity planet would be squat and heavy boned, yet she's slender and lightly built. Which says there is another explanation for her unusual genetics.)

Whatever the case, she should be interesting to we SWMers, assuming the writers cooperate.

Shadar

AuGoose wrote: Eh, you could make a case that her folk didn't evolve on a high-G world, but rather were deliberately adapted for life there by giving themselves superstrength. Her stunt with the vault door was more an exercise in mass than strength - she'd have to be very, Very, VERY dense to win that argument through force of impact rather than sustained pressure.

She might be quite touchy about her weight - as its probably several TONS.

That scene was fun, but stupid. Agree that her superpower would need to be supermass to do that. But this is TV. Nobody expects TV show physics to even work in a comic book universe.

Except maybe those of us here. Who know that you can get the speculative physics to kind of agree with your fictional universe in a way that doesn't insult the reader/viewer's intelligence.

But this is McFarlane's story, and he doesn't care who he insults.

Shadar

You guys have said already what was needed to be said and I agree with everything... but I wanted to add just one thing: did you notice the phasers (or whatever you want to call them) "battle" ... standing still in front of each other and never being hit (except -of course- the enemies and just Seth on a shoulder), and then the following scene "let's run in the middle of this water fountain, we should be faster & safer from the shots here" (?), non sense

Helstar wrote: You guys have said already what was needed to be said and I agree with everything... but I wanted to add just one thing: did you notice the phasers (or whatever you want to call them) "battle" ... standing still in front of each other and never being hit (except -of course- the enemies and just Seth on a shoulder), and then the following scene "let's run in the middle of this water fountain, we should be faster & safer from the shots here" (?), non sense

MacFarlane wrote the Pilot. Nothing more needs to be said about nonsense.

He does not write any more of the episodes (per Wiki). So there is a chance some of those details will improve, although this appears to be his show to run.

Given he acts in them all and he also directs two later episodes, we can only hope he's too busy to completely screw up the rest of the writing.

The show could turn out half decent if we get lucky. At least I'll hope for that unless I see otherwise.

Shadar

Helstar wrote: You guys have said already what was needed to be said and I agree with everything... but I wanted to add just one thing: did you notice the phasers (or whatever you want to call them) "battle" ... standing still in front of each other and never being hit (except -of course- the enemies and just Seth on a shoulder), and then the following scene "let's run in the middle of this water fountain, we should be faster & safer from the shots here" (?), non sense

one thing about the episode was it contained the Big capitol ship to capitol ship battle, and the big phaser battle we associate with Star Trek-but like star trek normally doesn't do either particularly well. Yeah that scene was a little dumb.

But that said so much of it was about establishin the iconography of whats going on-you know cut it a little slack Just the pilot. Ye

Helstar wrote: You guys have said already what was needed to be said and I agree with everything... but I wanted to add just one thing: did you notice the phasers (or whatever you want to call them) "battle" ... standing still in front of each other and never being hit (except -of course- the enemies and just Seth on a shoulder), and then the following scene "let's run in the middle of this water fountain, we should be faster & safer from the shots here" (?), non sense

I was cringing through those scenes. I really couldn't tell if they were doing it deliberately as a spoof or if someone really thought that those fights were a good idea. Like most, however, let's see if they can turn it around.

As to the space combat (mentioned in a later reply) I would say it was also cringe-worthy. The enemy ship had it's beams in the front and the Orville clearly had the mobility - why not just get behind it and stay there? Well, then we couldn't teleport a tree inside. Umm....ok.

Babylon 5 was (IMO) the last sci fi show to have decent space combat. You would think that after 30 years the technology and skill at generating such scenes would improve and they clearly haven't.

Starforge wrote:

Helstar wrote: You guys have said already what was needed to be said and I agree with everything... but I wanted to add just one thing: did you notice the phasers (or whatever you want to call them) "battle" ... standing still in front of each other and never being hit (except -of course- the enemies and just Seth on a shoulder), and then the following scene "let's run in the middle of this water fountain, we should be faster & safer from the shots here" (?), non sense

I was cringing through those scenes. I really couldn't tell if they were doing it deliberately as a spoof or if someone really thought that those fights were a good idea. Like most, however, let's see if they can turn it around.

As to the space combat (mentioned in a later reply) I would say it was also cringe-worthy. The enemy ship had it's beams in the front and the Orville clearly had the mobility - why not just get behind it and stay there? Well, then we couldn't teleport a tree inside. Umm....ok.

Babylon 5 was (IMO) the last sci fi show to have decent space combat. You would think that after 30 years the technology and skill at generating such scenes would improve and they clearly haven't.

I think when audiences put up with simplistic stuff, then they get more of it. My guess would be that an astounding number of current viewers would be bored out of their minds by a Babylon5 kind of show today. Which is a shame, because it was decent SF

I did chuckle at the opening HoloDeck scene in Orville, although they never chopped heads off in the original HoloDeck scenes. But after GOT, we're stuck with that.

Those HoloDeck scenes always raise the question in my mind of what we'd really do with a HoloDeck if that kind of virtual yet physical kind of simulation existed. My guess is that a lot of the sims wouldn't be politically correct. Many would be very personal.

But man, what a HoloDeck could do with our genre!

Shadar

B5 was great. The spin off, not so much.

One of your old stories from the 90's in a HoloDeck would be interesting.

I want to say I read a story once that was husband and wife in a holodeck. He had no clue WTH he was getting into.