"The Orville," sci-fi comedy series from Seth MacFarlane.*

Discussion in 'Visual Arts' started by AKA, May 15, 2017.

  1. showtaper

    showtaper Concert Hoarding Bastard

    I'm not a big fan of either of them. Family Guy had its moments, but its charm (to me) is that it is a cartoon. Seth may be a nice guy, but he belongs behind the camera, not in front.........
     
  2. Vidiot

    Vidiot Now in 4K HDR!

    Location:
    Hollywood, USA
    Only with worse acting, a script about 10% as good, fewer laughs, and no heart. But yeah, very much a Galaxy Quest thing, except the regulars don't know they're actors.
     
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  3. showtaper

    showtaper Concert Hoarding Bastard

    Try "People of Earth" on TBS. A very nice mix of humor and science fiction with no big name actors to distract you from the story (or the fun). A great take alien abduction stories as a prelude to an invasion. Smart funny, stupid funny and occasionally dramatic. A nice mix.
     
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  4. Strat-Mangler

    Strat-Mangler Personal Survival Daily Record-Breaker

    Location:
    Toronto
    Although I haven't watched the show, doing comedy on a show like this for 1h is an unnecessary risk. If only plotwise, McFarlane knows this formula well and should stick to it.

    It'd also seriously cut the show's budget drastically, therefore possibly giving it more of a chance of surviving.
     
  5. skimminstones

    skimminstones Forum Resident

    Location:
    Kent, UK
    Watched it last night, unsure what it is really. Too cheesy to be serious, not enough laughs to be funny.

    It's in the same vain as his million ways to die in the West film. I'll probably still watch it as I like sci fi stuff and it's not that bad.
     
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  6. Pete Sorbi

    Pete Sorbi Well-Known Member

    hmm.....2.7/9 (adjusted....of course.....but not that much...) ratings (8.56 M) - if they can keep half of that ... I would say the 2nd (or spring?) season is imminent.....I can't imagine the post-post-game crowd accounts for much of that....probably a lot of long frustrated Picard aficionados......
     
  7. dprokopy

    dprokopy Senior Member

    Location:
    Near Seattle, WA
    Hmm, Patrick Stewart had a recurring voice role on "American Dad," and most of the other "TNG" cast appeared on "Family Guy." I wonder if Seth could talk any of them into guesting on this...
     
  8. Pete Sorbi

    Pete Sorbi Well-Known Member

    I wonder if there are certain things that could trigger a lawsuit.....like - a whole bunch of Next Generation cast members showing up in an episode might cross some line(?) - though perhaps one of them appearing as the alien of the week would be ok - (I really have no clue) - I noticed there were no transporters in the first episode...I wonder if that was one of the "off-limits" sort of things.....unless they change around the concept enough for it to be obviously different.....Seth said something about Fox having "good lawyers"..
     
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  9. Gems-A-Bems

    Gems-A-Bems Forum Resident

    Location:
    The Duke City
    This guy needs a new catchphrase
     
  10. dmiller458

    dmiller458 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Midland, Michigan
    All the jokes were completely predictable in the pilot. It seems like a great premise. But if the second episode isn't better, I won't be watching the third.
     
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  11. Gems-A-Bems

    Gems-A-Bems Forum Resident

    Location:
    The Duke City
    I thought it was great and I can't wait for the next episode. It's basically a more realistic version of TNG
     
  12. Luvtemps

    Luvtemps Forum Resident

    Location:
    P.G.County,Md.
    Oh man,I wanted to catch this thing,it looked funny a spoof of[Star Trek].
     
  13. Gems-A-Bems

    Gems-A-Bems Forum Resident

    Location:
    The Duke City
    I think its biggest problem is the perception that it is a spoof. It really isn't.

    It's more of a "what would happen if the people in Star Trek acted more like people of the 21st century"
     
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  14. 360-12

    360-12 Forum Resident

    I liked the jello-man bit. The rest was "meh" to use a well-worn phrase.
     
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  15. dmiller458

    dmiller458 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Midland, Michigan
    It's a workplace comedy. I think it might have worked better in the half hour format.
     
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  16. Gems-A-Bems

    Gems-A-Bems Forum Resident

    Location:
    The Duke City
    The thing is, it's not really a workplace comedy.
     
  17. Vidiot

    Vidiot Now in 4K HDR!

    Location:
    Hollywood, USA
    A Million Ways to Die in the West had one monster belly-laugh scene (also featured in the trailers), where the giant block of ice hits a storekeeper and MacFarlane yells, "THAT WENT SOUTH SO FAST!" I quote from that all the time -- it was an amazingly funny moment. The other 999,999 moments in the film were not nearly as funny.

    That would be interesting if just his voice said, "make it so," perhaps as a robot. Trust me, Paramount is not happy about this show.
     
  18. Gems-A-Bems

    Gems-A-Bems Forum Resident

    Location:
    The Duke City
    Another catchphrase that's worn out its welcome.
     
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  19. Deesky

    Deesky Forum Resident

    Not to mention Blunt Talk (a MacFarlane production).
     
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  20. BeatleJWOL

    BeatleJWOL Senior Member

    wow. let me guess. technically good, no soul? Can't say I agree but I can see how someone might think that.

    This. Seth being Seth, this whole thing was built up as being lulz in space.

    It's not. It's an attempt at a sci-fi series but it's so Star Trek it hurts. The only reason there's no transporter is because that'd be WAY too on-the-nose. I'm a sucker for that 24th century Trek aesthetic and Orville has that in spades.

    Still, the first seasons of all the Berman-era Trek spinoffs were, in hindsight, more dire than not, so there's a good chance Orville will follow suit.
     
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  21. Lonson

    Lonson I'm in the kitchen with the Tombstone Blues

    To be honest, I just don't like him, and I don't like his singing either. It's a purely personal reaction.
     
  22. misterdecibel

    misterdecibel Bulbous Also Tapered

    He's smarmy.
     
  23. HGN2001

    HGN2001 Mystery picture member

    We missed watching Ep. 1 last week because a hurricane was coming and local TV had preempted all network stuff, so I actually forgot all about it.

    Seeing a promo for Ep. 2 reminded me that we'd missed it, but Amazon has the first episode available for purchase for Zero dollars, so we just saw the opening. It had its moments and we'll go through Ep. 2 tonight whenever the NFL decides to leave the tube. They're starting these late afternoon games later and later just to hope to skew the ratings since the network Sunday night shows are no longer as big a draw. However, the NFL is losing audience like crazy anyway.
     
  24. pocofan

    pocofan Senior Member

    Location:
    Alabama
    Want to watch all of the Falcons-Packers game but it didn't even start until 7:30. I get up at 4:30 so I won't get too. Sunday night, a 7:30 start ??? Why ??? Really a great time for the fans NFL.
     
  25. Vidiot

    Vidiot Now in 4K HDR!

    Location:
    Hollywood, USA
    I would disagree solely in that I think by 400 years from now, we're going to look and talk and act so much differently than we do today, we're almost going to be unrecognizable. Part of the silly conceit of the show is that all the characters speak exactly like we do in 2017. To me, the way to handle this would be to say it's the year 2100 or 2075 or something, so it's only 50 years in the future. That, I could believe and I don't think our speech or appearance would've changed that much by then.

    To me, the show tries so hard to be a slavish clone of Star Trek, it fails for the simple reason that it's been done, we've already seen it hundreds of times before, and the previous attempts were generally a lot better.

    It is interesting that they omitted the transporter, and I think that was an interesting choice on the part of the writers and producers. There's still precedents for novels and films that used transporters before Star Trek, but no question that the 1966 show popularized it more than anything else did. The funny thing was that Roddenberry did it solely as a budget-cutting trick: they couldn't afford to "land" the Enterprise on planet surfaces every week, so it was a lot cheaper just to do a $1500 optical effect every time somebody beamed from one place to another.

    I don't hate MacFarlane at all, but I do get a sense he's trying so hard, he's looking kind of strange and desperate at this point. I think he's a guy with about $250 million in the bank who would desperately like to be taken seriously as an actor, despite his success as an animation director and writer. (And the hair frightens me, especially in HD.)
     
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