This episode started by putting on its big boy Star Trek pants and then covered it all up with a creepy David Cronenberg's The Fly trenchcoat. I loved it!
Oh man, all this is such a lazy bad writing... so they're going into an unknown potentially dangerous place. And the alien race warns them specifically saying that is a very dangerous place indeed. They come there and who goes into the recon mission? The admiral, the captain of the whole ship, the first hand, the main doctor, the main engineer - so, all the "head" of the ship. So if something happens the whole ship has nobody to command. It's an official union explorer ship with hundreds of people on board and they have no exploration team who goes first at all. Okay, even if I can forgive them that stupidity for the sake of tv-show excuse to show the main characters more often. But what's next?
Do they go into this dangerous place in space suits with weapons? Of course no, they go just like that and admiral literally put his face into some weird looking bio-thingy. It's like Space 101 of what not to do. Of course he gets infected, of course he's a trojan horse. They don't even secure him anyhow, just walk and go, do whatever, infect others. Then we going to spread around the ship while having no weapons at all, because why would we, we're going to have them for a minute at the end of the episode otherwise no thrilling moments.
If you think you already seen all of that somewhere but in a much less stupid way - you are right, the episode of Firefly had exactly this, but much more logical.
That was disappointing…If I wanted to watch Alien I’d watch that. The episode was full of mistakes that even nu-Trek doesn’t commit anymore, such as but not limited to: going on a foreign ship without hazmat suits on, a medical officer reminding Kelly to not touch foreign substances (LOL, she is not a toddler she should know that and it’s probably protocol too), an admiral doing just that, every door open during a ship wide alien rampage, having personal weapons not working out because the plot demands it until when they need it because the alien has multiplied, having civilian crew, mere kids just wondering around the ship instead of being dropped at the nearest starbase before exploration.. It feels like this season is written by completely different people. I haven’t checked the credits but wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case.
UGH...so many old clichés in this! The old, "If there's any part of you/humanity left inside that alien lifeform you've just become..." I've always hated that line when it's uttered in the alien body takeover scenarios. This episode did a lot of explaining when it really didn't need to. Of course we know the Krill will interpret things through their "religion" or belief system and of course we humans will think them primitive in this way of thinking. Thus, the writers chose to explain all this every step of the way (DNA being altered = possession by evil)...UGH. I was sad that the new crew member, the xenophobic new one, didn't get infected by the aliens. I really don't think she adds anything to this season...I hope she gets left on a planet or sucked out of an air lock...Unfortunately, I think she's gonna end up hooking up with a crew member or two.
Not as deep as last episode but I wouldn't expect that every week anyway.
I liked this one nonetheless. It has Braga's handwriting all over it. And the little bits of information here and there help world building. There is something the Krill fear, they have their form of Boogeyman.
Was the addition with Doctor Finn and the Admiral necessarry for the story ? No, probably not. It would have worked out with anyone who was transformed. But we get more info on her and it might have implications moving forward.
The make-up on those creatures looked incredible. We haven't seen the last of those creatures, I'd say.
meh. Some ideas that failed to sprout into anything worthwhile. lazy writing and no fun. I'm going to give this one more ep before giving up on the show. I feel they have lost their mojo.
I don't know what is wrong with that episode, a lot of mistakes in it, no way a very advanced people will do all of those mistakes. Also, anyone noticed how bad was the CGI in this episode?!
The whole thing could have been avoided if they just went to the station wearing space suits. But apparently all you need to know that it's perfectly safe to go unprotected is the fact that there's a breathable atmosphere?
That's not an awesome episode. It's straight from the TNG, TOS, VOY playbook. Plus a spot of Alien (although I admit that I've never watched Alien). A traditional monster of the week story. Told solidly. Good enough for me.
Ugh. Where did the alien go at the end? They are fine with him just escaping into the air vents while threatening to not leave them alone? What happened to the ship that was approaching?
9/10, on a scale where 0=proper preparation and planning and 10=pet the alien. :joy:
The episode is not wasted because it sets up future storylines but, geez, this isn't the standard that they've established for themselves. I wouldn't even mind the mistakes if they had at least addressed it in the story - or, alternatively, if it had been a funny episode rather than a dramatic one. I guess the simulator is only meant for people to get their rocks off after all.
Hey let's go explore this sketchy evil looking alien ship in a completely foreign region of space we've never been to before. Should we wear space suits? Nonsense, it looks safe to me. Mercer has clearly seen Star Wars but I guess he never watched Alien?
The aliens were somewhat cool though.
Very convenient ending. Lucky none of the main characters got alienized.
How the hell did they get off the ship though? Did they all take a shuttle over to the other alien ship? Did the Orville dock with the alien ship?
Shuttle crew: recommend decontamination on arrival, just to be safe
Also shuttle crew: clustered around sample of possibly infectious bacterial spores, with their exosuits' helmets off
Good to know that the old Star Trek (il)logic of the '80s and '90s shows is alive and well on The Orville…
[7.2/10] “Shadow Realms” is a tale of two elements. One is the lingering interpersonal awkwardness melded with affection between Dr. Finn and Admiral Christie. It has the sort of recognizable, layered personal dynamic that marked the best of the shows The Orville is aping. The other is the attempt at doing genre-mixing horror movie in the midst of the show’s usual modus operandi when the crew starts being infected and taken over by some spider-like race. And it is...not very good.
Maybe it’s just that I’ve seen my share of horror movies at this point, so nothing here is particularly novel or fearsome. “Shadow Realms” does muster some good body horror, between Admiral Christie’s mid-transformation facial protrusions, to the quick changing of some poor redshirt who gets sprayed with the key microparticulate and transforms much faster in real time.
But otherwise, this episode isn’t especially scary, despite turning over most of the runtime to the horrorshow. The Orville loses power, which is supposed to give the ship a haunted house feel. The problem is that it just looks like the normal “Hampton Inn in space” sets with the light turned low, which isn’t particularly frightening. The monsters themselves aren’t that creepy 90% of the time either. It’s hard for the show to shake the sense of “It’s just a guy in a big rubber suit” vibe of the costuming, and the transitions between the practical versions of the monsters and the CGI versions is conspicuous and immersion-breaking.
That’s all a big problem, because the show moves at an incredibly stolid pace through all of this. A more measured rhythm for a horror story can work, because it creates empty spaces for the dread to leak into. But if you can’t pull off the dread, then the whole thing feels long and boring, which is where “Shadow Realms” lands. If these horror sequences and moments of suspense were any good, I think I’d be praising The Orville for giving the terrifying elements the time and space to unfurl. Such as it is, though, the monster attack sequences and attempts at a Jaws-style “less is more” approach soon become tedious.
I do appreciate the method of defeating them though. The idea that after transition, the alien insectoids haven’t fully developed an immune system yet, to where a common cold virus would kill them, has an intuitively satisfying explanation built in. It made me think of human babies, who (to oversimplify things, which is fine for Star Trek-adjacent stories) have to get their immunity from their mothers until they develop. It’s a clever enough answer to the problem of how to defeat them without just beating them up or otherwise harming the rest of the crew (who presumably have fully functional immune systems).
Plus, as a Trek nerd, there’s some appeal to the Nelvac aliens as a realization of the original conception of the Borg, who were supposed to be more insectoid, hence the idea of drones and queens and such. If I were to speculate, this feels like two Trek vet writers pulling from that unrealized original idea and trying to realize it in a spiritual cousin T.V. series instead. Who knows if these will become recurring big bads, but the show seems to be setting them up that way. I can’t say I’m terribly enthused at the prospect given these early results, but the idea that the Krill view them as possessing demons at least adds some extra juice to the development nod at play here.
But the meat of this one to me is the relationship between Dr. Finn and Admiral Christie that complicates the whole thing. Honestly, you could strip away the insect monster attack, and still have a damn good (arguably better) episode about two people who had something meaningful years ago reckoning with what it means to them in the here and now.
The conversations between the two of them where the Admiral is trying to rekindle things and Dr. Finn is more sanguine, even regretful, rather than wistful about their relationship are well-written. Dr. Finn confiding in Grayson about the May-December romance and the way Admiral Christie didn’t treat her like a partner, more like a bed-warmer makes for a writerly scene, but a strong one as well. You can see easily why there would be meaning and attachment there, but also strong reservations and regrets. That adds an emotional contingent when Dr. Finn gets through to the insectified Admiral Christie (and the ring is a nice setup and payoff for how she’s able to identify him). Hell, the whole thing even does a good job of gently nudging Dr. Fin and Isaac back together.
On the whole though, the episode is much more focused on its monster mash than on the human elements here, which takes a promising episode and turns into a B-grade imitation horror flick. Star Trek has done horror well in the past. (Hell, one of the writers of this episode oversaw one in Enterprise’s “Impulse”), but with cheap-looking effects and direction that can’t make the most of it, this one doesn't measure up.
Why in the hell would you go to a new area of space onto a new station like ship and not have on your protection suits :joy: that space exploration 101 . The Admiral clearly didn’t see the movie Alien in the archives, who sticks there face in a unknown object with no protection
And then you know he got exposed to something and you as a doctor is touching him with you bare hands :man_facepalming_tone3: you would almost forget these people are in the far future from now you’d think humans would smarting up and use there common sense more but i guess thats too much to ask.
Let me go secret the hallways with no weapon
So the power goes out and that means that the whole ship crew are just missing? No one is walking the halls?
So if you now know that the creature spits stuff on you to change you your next step should be the wear a suit for protection. Such lazy writing, this whole episode could have been solved with Suits for all applications lol
WHERE ARE THE DAMN WEAPON!!!! your telling you dont have weapons that dont use power as a source onboard
How did he turn on the force field and had enough time to jump inside of it.
How about you kill the these instead of knocking them out 47 times :man_facepalming_tone3:
Issac making on get away instead of protecting the crew is so stupid, whats the point of him being there then
58 mins in before we see ONE weapon
Good guys never learn, lets let them go so they can regroup and come back to have more casualties later on
A pretty good episode. But I did wonder, if the dampening field knocks out weapons, why do the flashlights work? I think they need to harden their weapons like they do their flashlights. Just sayin.
Aside: While I appreciate minimalism, whoever does the descriptions for the episode needs to take a vacation. They make me laugh. That typed, I do appreciate that the abstracts aren't step-by-step spoilers.
This was the Hellraiser episode. The effects during a... transitional period... were well-done and creepy. It brought to mind a certain Cronenberg film. However, as the episode progressed, it became a little generic and empty.
The closing did something interesting, which the series seems to have a knack on. The show often, but not always, takes on and works through situations in ways you don't normally encounter. There's an honesty to it. This is appreciated, even if I don't particularly like the conclusion.
All this typed, don't let that happen with Talia, please. I want a happy ending. Give me that 30s-50s ideal idea. I want Ed to be happy - he deserves it... and I appreciate the loving and mostly healthy friendship between he and Kelly - and would like to see that continue. You almost never see anything like that. It's wonderful.
Aside: The character of Charly Burke has got to go (the actress is fine). Every scene this character is in drags the show down. Nobody would want to be near her - and she's not reprimanded for the hateful discriminatory statements she's always spouting. Also, I haven't forgotten the terrible writing for Gordon, which wasn't followed-up on, didn't make sense and soured me on his character. One line killed the character (who was already goofy) (again, the actor is fine).
A lot better than the first crappy episode of the season but I just wish we could get some less lazyass low IQ Hollywood hacks writing stories.
Just because the atmosphere "appears" breathable you don't fucking go in there without protection and of course God forbid that they would put a infected person in isolation.
Visually stunning in the beginning and a lot of well integrated exposition. There was really smooth positioning in terms of relations for the new admiral. It was a real shame however that they really only brought him in as kind of a red shirt. I would have applauded them if that would have been the way to bring in a new permanent member for a new season.
The aliens were a bit to humanoid and familar. Especially after the talk about live possibly being so different from what we know that we do not even recognise it. Basically they were an adaption of Cronenbergs Fly.
The writing was really good for Orville's standards and the suspense was of the charts but overall the story was a bit too by the books and avoidable on top of it. Unfortunately very implausable to go in completely unprotected - after such a warning all the more ... (Let's not talk about "love conquers all"...)
But still cinematography was quite good and much more on a film level than television.
What a disappointing and weak episode. This was like watching a chapter of the book called 'Prometheus'. Absolutely awful writing!
Despite the terrible lack of the most basic standard procedures, like
- Going into uncharted, allegedly dangerous space with one ship and no backup, support, or escape routes
- Loading all the most essential crew, including the captain and an admiral, onto one shuttle, which is also the first shuttle, into a clearly Daedric (Elder Scrolls) space station
- Proceeding to split up in said unknown space station for no critical reason
- Crew members nonchalantly touching and getting their faces close to unknown substances and power sources
- The admiral, of all people, sticking his face in what clearly resembles an Alien (Ripley) face-eater egg (This one is slightly acceptable since he sits behind a desk all day and isn't well-practiced in maintaining standard procedure at every moment)
- Ed, the admiral's expedition partner, after hearing the admiral say something opened in his face, not immediately quarantining the admiral and scanning his biology for potential contaminants, but instead letting him freely wander around listening to sensitive discussions like nothing happened
- The captain, after the admiral was shown to have been infected by something, not immediately revoking his access codes or putting any information security measures in place due to such a high-level officer being compromised, but just winging it
- The crew, after the infected admiral has clearly gone rogue, not arming themselves in any way was OK, because the power was cut before anyone could be warned, so they were all in the dark (pun intended)
- The nurse putting 100% attention on the obvious bait in the middle of the hallway, not looking around at anything that might've caused it, until it's right behind him (I mean he's not security-trained, so maybe it's realistic)
- The kids not staying in one location to wait for help was realistic to what actual untrained kids (and many people in general) would do
- Everything else in terms of procedures made enough sense that I didn't mind the rest, except for the plothole that the approaching alien ship just... what, took the aliens and decided to just leave the lone, vulnerable ship to go free?
Despite all of this, I like the new theme and the direction Seth and the team is taking the series. It's moving away from "Family Guy IRL" towards more "Real Modern Star Trek" (because yes, the classics also had standard procedure problems with how they handled situations recklessly), but also keeping the good humour and jokes in little lines here and there, and there are actual story elements developing over the episodes that build their new Orvilley-style Trek universe.
I'm interpreting this as Seth growing his writing and directing skillet and perspectives beyond the limited cartoon-style humour and is learning and reaching for greater things while also keeping the best funny parts as comic relief. In my opinion, he's succeeding and doing at least a little better with every season.
But maybe I'm an idiot. What do you think?
Not badly executed, but far too by-the-numbers of a plot, mashing up V'Ger, Borg, and Alien, and doesn't do anything new or interesting with that setup. Has too many instances of bad science and bad logic, which I'd usually expect this show to take a quippy jab at. Far too drawn out, especially in the first half. It's nice that they have more freedom with their runtime in streaming, but that doesn't mean you can't still tighten things up when the story starts dragging.
I know it's just a show but it makes me laugh that the boarding party for an unknown alien vessel comprises of all the senior officers with no protection. And why did it take everyone so long to get armed!
It had a story to tell I know, trying to the 'Alien' suspense thing and definitely had some homages in there to it.
Plenty of other tropes along to way but this is still the best Trek I've seen in years ;)
The very end is sweet and it’s nice the show is back. The show isn’t as strong as previous seasons so far though. People turning into aliens sort of came out of left field.
Though it still better than a lot of Star Trek Discovery episodes.
This a very good show.
You're not supposed to take it too seriously.
This is not Star Trek.
I enjoyed this episode it was quite funny and it’s in align of what the shows original concept
Shout by Vers BachBlockedParentSpoilers2022-06-10T03:19:15Z
Okay, this is a very lazy episode, very strange. Love the new effects. The new suit of Isaac shines in every take. But, it's good, no definitely not good.