Well, there goes the only character I cared about on this show. We'll see if I pick it up again next week.
I wanted to like this episode. Between the guest stars (Robert Picardo and John Billingsley on screen together?!) and fact that it's a character-centered episode about my favorite Orville crew member, it should be a shoe-in for my short list of Best 'The Orville' Episodes. But it's not—and the reason is nothing to do with any character's departure from the regular cast.
It's because this script is full of missed opportunities. With the amount of work that went into fleshing out our protagonist's backstory, it's surprising that so little (seemingly) went into fleshing out the episode's main antagonist. John Billingsley worked with what he was given, but it wasn't much to go on. Besides irony stemming from the contrast between this role and his stint as the doctor on Star Trek: Enterprise, his character was pretty one-dimensional here. That was disappointing, to say the least.
Robert Picardo got slightly more to work with, built on his previous appearance in season one. The scenes in which it was just him and Halston Sage were the highlights of the episode, and even though I didn't think the family drama felt particularly genuine, it still managed to make me feel something. (That's why this episode got a 5/10 from me instead of something lower.)
This didn't affect my rating (much), but: I really could have done without the drawn-out hedge-trimmer bit with Alara's sister Solana. Maybe it's because I'd just finished eating lunch when that scene came up, but the whole scene was extremely uncomfortable. Such a horrific prospect as cutting off fingers felt like a poor fit for the usual tone of this series.
Review by dgwVIP 10BlockedParent2019-01-11T19:43:20Z
Well, there goes the only character I cared about on this show. We'll see if I pick it up again next week.
I wanted to like this episode. Between the guest stars (Robert Picardo and John Billingsley on screen together?!) and fact that it's a character-centered episode about my favorite Orville crew member, it should be a shoe-in for my short list of Best 'The Orville' Episodes. But it's not—and the reason is nothing to do with any character's departure from the regular cast.
It's because this script is full of missed opportunities. With the amount of work that went into fleshing out our protagonist's backstory, it's surprising that so little (seemingly) went into fleshing out the episode's main antagonist. John Billingsley worked with what he was given, but it wasn't much to go on. Besides irony stemming from the contrast between this role and his stint as the doctor on Star Trek: Enterprise, his character was pretty one-dimensional here. That was disappointing, to say the least.
Robert Picardo got slightly more to work with, built on his previous appearance in season one. The scenes in which it was just him and Halston Sage were the highlights of the episode, and even though I didn't think the family drama felt particularly genuine, it still managed to make me feel something. (That's why this episode got a 5/10 from me instead of something lower.)
This didn't affect my rating (much), but: I really could have done without the drawn-out hedge-trimmer bit with Alara's sister Solana. Maybe it's because I'd just finished eating lunch when that scene came up, but the whole scene was extremely uncomfortable. Such a horrific prospect as cutting off fingers felt like a poor fit for the usual tone of this series.