While on my holiday trip last month and during the quite long flight, I was unable to find movies that I could watch (except for The Great Battle) as the rest of them I have seen already. So I decided to try watching TV series. Apparently there was option of several series and lucky for me, one of them was shown from first season. Since the premise was interesting, I gave this a try. Only four episodes were shown in the inflight entertainment, and I just completed the rest of them this week. Well we'll go ahead with the series.
Brief Story Line
Set in the 25th century, after having a bit of a slump in his career, Ed Mercer (Seth MacFarlane - Family Guy TV series, Ted etc) finally got his break when he was appointed as the captain of a mid-level exploratory space vessel named USS Orville. His senior crews included the pilot as well as his best friend Lieutenant Gordon Malloy (Scott Grimes - Robin Hood 2010 version, Party of Five TV series etc) and First Officer Commander Kelly Grayson (Adrianne Palicki - G.I. Joe: Retaliation, Friday Night Lights TV series etc) who was also Ed's ex-wife.
Aside from those, there were also the chief medical officer Doctor Claire Finn (Penny Johnson Jerald - 24, Castle TV series etc), the Second Officer Lieutenant Commander Bortus (Peter Macon) who came from Moclus planet, chief of security Lieutenant Alara Kitan (Halston Sage - Before I Fall etc) from planet Xelaya, the navigator Lieutenant John LaMarr (J. Lee) and last but not least a robot-like lifeform called Isaac (Mark Jackson).
Their journey would take them to do various assignments from delivering equipment to certain location, saving stranded ship, rescue certain alien race and many more with each episode having its own story.
End of Brief Story Line
After watching episodes 1, 2, 4 and 5 on the flight, I was really hooked by this series. It was such a refreshing take on a usually serious sci-fi series of space. I had been fans of Star Trek series and similar type of space exploration stories, but I don't think I have ever seen one that was so fun and had lots of humors. From what I understand, the creator & star of this show Seth MacFarlane was inspired by Star Trek and Twilight Zone. This would explain the familiar Star Trek: The Next Generation feel of the senior crew of Orville.
If you had seen that one, you would notice there were some quite obvious similarities such as Isaac's character a bit same with Data who was an android interested in learning human behaviors, or the ever serious Bortus who felt so much like Worf the Klingon and a wise female chief medical officer as well. The only apparent difference was obviously the captain. While The Next Generation had a commanding charismatic captain Picard (brilliantly played by Patrick Stewart), here we got an easy going, charming captain Ed Mercer. Though their ability to captain the ships were both excellent.
Each episode had its own story which also had similar theme with Star Trek including the learning of new civilization's culture and few times to solve mystery as well. Aside from having a more comedic approach, the series sometimes did have several really updated & serious topics. One of them (which was also 1 of my favorite) was episode 7 titled Majority Rules. There was even a sexuality topic too like in episode 3 titled About A Girl (I think it might also be the reason for the episode not available in the inflight entertainment). My most favorite episodes would have to be episode 6 which was quite intense and episode 9 that was hilarious.
The main attraction of this series for me was not only because of the various interesting stories but also due to the dynamics of the crews. Each crew got at least 1 episode that focused on them and there was always a scene or two where I got unexpected burst of laughter even during a supposedly serious moment. However, it did not make this series full of comedy since behind the jokes, there were also some serious stuff. The comedy element should not come as a surprise as Seth MacFarlane is famous for creating comedy series Family Guy and co-creator of American Dad! (both were successful sitcom). In addition the series also had some well known names as guest star or special guest star such as Charlize Theron, Liam Neeson, Victor Garber and few others.
I also felt the special effects were done pretty neatly especially the spaceships (and shuttles) visualization which were quite realistic. Though at certain times, the interior of USS Orville looked too much like inside of a studio. But it did not bother me a lot as I was having too much fun watching this series. The makeup effects was pretty decent while the music was generally OK.
Overall this is truly an entertaining and enjoyable TV show for me. A sci-fi series with some hints of comedy. The cast were wonderful portraying a group of crews who are interesting and having some quite updated topics in each episode. If you like Sci-fi but want to try something lighter than Star Trek series, then this would be the perfect choice. However, if you like your sci-fi series to be seriously done and heavy, this would not satisfy you. The choice is yours.
Mike's movie moments rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
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