With eight episodes aired, season two of The Orville is off to a strong start. It continues to blend equal parts science fiction and social philosophy, though its proportion of outrageous gags has declined markedly in favor of subtler comedic elements. Despite a few lingering areas for improvement, Seth McFarlane’s love letter to Star Trek is really starting to gain momentum.
Warning: Some serious spoilers for The Orville Seasons 1 and 2 below!
After two relatively strong episodes focusing on Peter Macon’s outstanding alien character Bortus, Season 2 stumbled a bit with the surprise departure of security chief Alara Kitan (Halston Sage) in episode three. Though it seems unintentional, Sage’s departure is eerily reminiscent of Denise Crosby’s early exit from her role as chief of security in Star Trek: The Next Generation. That parallel is itself similar to John Lamarr (J. Lee) transitioning from navigator to chief engineer (in season one) almost exactly the same way Geordi did on Star Trek: The Next Generation. Fortunately, such one-to-one references are rare and usually not too meta, though occasionally they do veer too far in that direction — e.g. when a fanatical, warlike alien race embeds a mole on the Orville under the assumed identity of “Lieutenant Tyler”. That’s such an on-the-nose poke at Discovery you wonder if it could somehow have been a coincidence.
