"I'm going to make him watch all the Star Trek, all three series." - Danielle Poole, 2003~4
If you count The Animated Series, that means this timeline did not get Deep Space Nine or Voyager (or Enterprise). I can imagine this has something to do with the falling out Ronald D. Moore had with Star Trek's Executive Producer at the time Rick Berman, who gave him hell on DS9 and led him to leave Voyager very early on. I wonder how many TNG movies there are in this timeline. This episode is set about around when the last TNG movie, Nemesis, was released in our timeline.
Edit: Someone else pointed out that FAM's timeline might have gotten Star Trek Phase II. Which would mean no Next Generation either. And because The Motion Picture was created from the ashes of the cancellation of Phase II, probably no Star Trek films at all! Imagine a few years of 60s Trek, a couple years of 60s cartoon Trek, then maybe a few more years of 70s Trek, all influenced by a young Roddenberry. And then the franchise peters out and gets shelved alongside shows like Battlestar Galactica and Space 1999 because people are much more interested in actual space travel than imagined space travel.
"To the Undiscovered Country - The future."
I lost track of how much talent is in this episode. I kept getting distracted by Bruce Boxleitner reprising his role as the President of Earth. What a lore-rich and beautiful episode this is. I think there is something for everybody. From the classic humor in the simulator, to getting deeper into Krill lore, to seeing multiple space battles.
To the above quote, this is The Orville's version of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. Right down to the Abrahamic leader figure. And this time the subversion is that peace goes to shit and all anyone can do is simply prevent going to open war on multiple fronts. The wildcard, that I'm mad I didn't see coming, is that Ed got Teleya pregnant and she now has a Krill-Human daughter that could upset galactic politics and cause an uprising on Krill. Ed is now sitting on an H-bomb, and he might have to press the trigger.
Overall this episode has such a warmth to it, even on Planet Ibiza. All the vistas we get to see, all the held shots and silent moments. Seth said that every episode would feel like a movie, and so far that holds true. This is best one so far, and also one of the best of the entire series.
I cannot stress how meaningful it is to me that the camera is allowed to be in a fixed position for several seconds at a time! After finishing Obi-wan, I am so tired of free-roaming cameras and additional shaking being purposefully added in post when the scene is just someone talking.
I'm just going to keep saying it until it stops being true. Right now, there are exactly two scifi shows airing that are telling stories of this caliber. Neither of them are called Star Trek, but both of them are being worked on by Star Trek alumni. I'm at least grateful that science fiction that prioritizes smart storytelling is still an option. Gene would be proud of both of them. And I'd like to think he prefers this one. :)
So good to have decent hard science fiction back on the air. Technology on the show has progressed to the point where I can start to see and feel parallels with The Expanse and Mass Effect (minus the aliens... ...so far). The visuals have also really gone up another level. The wide shots of them towing the asteroid are incredible!
I also missed the Soviet political intrigue. Now that The Americans is finished, it's a good way to keep myself from making the mistake of rewatching all of that again. Not because it's bad, but because I won't be able to stop. My backlog of stuff I haven't watched would put a curse on me.
Strong start, no time wasted. A much better start than teen angst and love triangles in the space hotel. This show really has become the heir apparent to classic Star Trek. Instead of a humanity that drives itself to the brink of extinction and has aliens hold their hands as they learn to travel the stars, humanity saves humanity. A humanity that prevents itself from becoming complacent and keeps feeding the hunger to go further. And we get to watch how, instead of making a perfect utopia, it simply makes the world better one little bit at a time. This is the show that will make future generations look upward and get inspired to be their best selves. And hopefully some of that positive change will affect this version of humanity.
(I always smile when I see the Okudas in the credits. They are good stewards of this show the way they were good stewards of Star Trek. Their respect for the story helps set For All Mankind shoulders above the rest.)
Getting Part Three vibes again. A sense of "That's it?" when the episode closes coupled with the realization that pieces have been moved into position and the plot has been set up for some bigger thing that's about to happen.
I was confused and then delighted by Ezra's whole attitude. He's doing a kind of "Jesus in the wilderness" thing and seems to have a very different connection to the Force than he did when we last saw him. The way he moved when he fought looked like something was moving him. Lightsabers? Ain't nobody got time for that.
As short as this episode was, we got see a lot of different class pair-ups at the end. Baylan vs Ahsoka was power vs power; This time their dual ended in a stalemate. Sabine vs Shin was cunning vs fury; This time Shin didn't underestimate Sabine, but Sabine still held her ground. Ezra vs Shin was wisdom vs fury; The first time Ezra had to fight in a long time, and it showed. "The spirit is willing, but the flesh is bruised and spongy." And Ahsoka vs Shin was balance vs fury; The thing that shook Shin the most was that Ahsoka wasn't angry at her. Shin comes from a time after the fall of the Jedi Order and I don't think she's ever had to face someone properly trained in the Jedi arts before.
The time spent with everyone else was pithy and just served to put them in their place for the finale. The scene on Coruscant was almost useless (of course Hera would be excused and protected for abusing her powers as a General), but Filoni does know how to force a grin out of me with a very unexpected C-3PO cameo. Apparently 3PO was having a spinal malfunction that day. I did appreciate the Gideon past-tense name drop which cements exactly when Ahsoka takes place against the third season of The Mandalorian (release order = chronological order).
Again, solid content, but nothing special... not yet at least. There's no question that Filoni is just putting runners on the bases to tee things up for a grand slam (baseball metaphor). It's what he always does. By now, even the lay viewer should understand that. Maybe it won't be exactly what I personally dream it could be, but good money says it'll be worthwhile. If you're still not sold on this series, or harboring discontent just because Disney's name is attached to Star Wars now, take advice from the wise, old star whales and fuck off to somewhere else.
This is not the way... this is the destination. This is new-generation Star Wars at its finest.
David Filoni is living his best life.
Can you imagine if Filoni had been in charge of Obi-Wan? Maybe they would have bothered to de-age Hayden that time.
I cannot wait to see the reactions to this one (Kyle Katarn is going to have a conniption fit), and I cannot wait to laugh at all the low ratings and negative comments. Wonder what straws they're going to grasp at this time...
Edit: Personal attacks it is. :expressionless:
Suddenly, out of the blue this comes out and it feels like the show never left. They are still firing on all cylinders. This gives me tremendous hope for the second season.
This is now one of my favorite superhero origin stories. Why can't Wonder Woman or Ms Marvel be this interesting to watch? They did more with an hour than all those 2+ hour-long summer blockbusters seem to be able to do. No wasted time, no plot padding, it never slows down and everything matters to Eve's upbringing and headstrong stumbling into the world of super heroes. One thing specifically, her brief friendship with a normal "weirdo" avoided the worn out trope of bringing said friend back for some emotional beat in the finale. She made a friend because neither of them had friends, she confided an even stranger secret in that friend, and that friend felt threatened and disappeared from her life as a result. No emotional make up after events bring them back together, no tattling to the authorities and threatening her ability to act in the future, it was just over. Big budget superhero franchises need to be taking copious notes while watching this show.
Soundly the best episode of the season, and one of the best of the series.
This is what this season has been building to, and it's satisfying seeing threads finally connecting in a way that doesn't feel contrived. IG-12 (I'm calling it Grogu-1, and you can't stop me) finally coming back around, Moff Gideon finally emerging from the shadows, the Beskar Troopers and Gideon revealing himself to be Mandalorian after all. And setting up the future of this series and other series. The father (?) of General Hux being part of the secret cabal of remanent Imperials, mentioning Grand Admiral Thrawn still being unaccounted for but promised to return, locating the Great Forge and finding a secret Imperial base right next to it. And this is just part 1 of 2 for the season finale. Please let the last episode also be 50 minutes long.
How I LOVED the opening sequence. Pretty much Rick Deckard roaming the streets of Los Angeles sniffing out a lead. I enjoy all the love Coruscant is getting now. It should have factored into the Sequels because it is such a rich storytelling landscape. In this season alone we've gotten to see Prequel-era Coruscant and Sequel-era Coruscant. And again in animated form in The Bad Batch. I'll take it all.
There is so much to this episode, but the only other thing I can think about right now is Paz Vizsla. What a fucking tank. I knew the moment Bo cut the hole in the blast door that he wasn't going to make it because it would have been hard for him to even fit through it. How badass you have to be to have an energy staff through your gut and still be trying to choke out someone wearing full armor with your bare hands. We lost a real one. His son Ragnar is the last remaining Vizsla that we know about.
Complain all you want, getting a fun, action-filled adventure of good versus evil with plenty of nods to the fans and unexpected cameos is Star Wars at its finest.
Christopher Lloyd AND Jack Black in Star Wars? I didn't realize it was my birthday already.
What a beautiful planet. I expect it to get absolutely fucked up by Gideon/Thrawn before this is over.
Justice for Ahmed Best, achieved. Welcome back, Sir.
Just wow. The subtle change in Crosshair's voice when Mayday was buried in the snow, you could hear genuine compassion and concern in him for the first time. Dee Bradley Baker is a vocal wizard.
This show is Mad Men set in a Black Mirror universe.
I guess it's getting low rating from people that need the conceit revealed within the first couple of episodes. I like that we're being led along and not allowed to see the whole board. There's a chance that it could end in disappointment, but I'm willing to give it a chance. I can enjoy the Rocket-age aesthetic in the mean time.
10 minutes into the episode
"Oh, I guess this is just going to be a standard, easy-to-digest bottle episode that shows Topa becoming more interested in joining the Planetary Union with a B-plot about her awkwardly crushing on Gordon."
45 minutes into the episode
"Fuuuuuck meeeee..."
More blatant retreading of past episodes and, again, despite that, a brilliant continuation of those plot threads. For an episode that was willing to depict child torture, it sure did end on a high note. And it threw quite a few curve balls in the process.
I ignored the throwaway line during the Haveena dinner, and the unusual meetup in the Lounge, because I absolutely did not expect to see a real spark between Bortus and Kelly. I equally did not expect to see Klyden come back and make a complete about-face from his previous position. There are going to be a lot of viewers that won't take Klyden back, but I am genuinely relieved that the family is whole again. So... (pregnant pause) ...what does that mean for Kelly? The dinner they all had on the ship felt straight-forward, but still gave me a twinge of impending trouble.
I don't quite get Gordon's involvement with Topa yet. I mean, I understand the general sentiment, but not how he suddenly took a frontline position about it. Did I tune out at the wrong time, or was the Engineering scene really meant to be all the backstory? Are they going to continue this in another episode? We don't even know the repercussions of his outburst in front of the Admirals.
Finally, DOLLY PARTON! Her appearance embiggened my heart. And her music was perfect. The celebrity cameos never dissapoint, even if it's just for a few moments. Though it is interesting that she referred to herself as a program, she knew she wasn't the real person. That would be a serious problem in a different altruistic universe.
This is it! These last two episodes are not a two-parter, but they are no doubt going to segue from one to the other as the finale of the season. If an underdog deserves to get renewed, it's The Orville. Seth is no stranger to having his shows canceled (sometimes over and over again). So even if it isn't renewed right away, I trust him of all people to find a way to make it come back somehow.
Dammit, I just wanted to watch some science fiction. I didn't want to have to clean myself up off the floor with a mop... for 75 minutes!
(I now have more to say...)
Everyone else is going on about the child actor who plays Topa and Palicki playing Grayson. They made this episode, without a doubt.
But I want to draw more attention to Peter Macon's Bortus. The character's best episode and Macon's best acting ever in my opinion. Klyden finally shows up in season 3 only to fuck off in the very same episode! Hilarious. He wasn't badly acted, but he was more of a caricature than anything else. I get it, the episode needed him to be that way. But Bortus shows so many layers and emotional combinations. Multiple times throughout the episode I stopped sitting and watching and found myself standing and watching, and once holding my hand over my mouth and fighting back my own tears as a father. It hit so hard and so soundly, no once feeling forced or cringy or convenient to the plot. He was behaving like a real dad who had real desires and fears for his child. It's in this acting and getting to see these scenes play out on their own time that the show is partially forgiven for shamelessly running so gosh darn long!
Though I did get to the point where I was asking myself how many MORE addendums was this episode going to get? But, in the end, I'm glad that it went out the way it did. With a lot levity and positivity instead of that safe, diplomatic conclusion the Union brass felt tied to - which would have echoed the failure from the first season during the trial on Moclas. I'm also glad that Mercer and Grayson got chewed out for it. It would have felt fake if there was no repercussions. But because the fleet is at war, The Union can't afford to jail any command officers, and Moclas can't afford to lash out the way they'd like to either. That's definitely the only reason that Admiral was satisfied with her mere pound of flesh from each of them. And also why she was willing to admit that she was unofficially happy everything worked out in their favor.
Secondly, I want to draw attention to the actual footage from "About a Girl" from the first season used in the simulator. I don't know how they pulled this off, but the perfect editing required to make the new footage of Topa and Grayson blend in with something that was shot five years ago and not even look slightly uncanny is probably owed to the COVID downtime. Seth MacFarlane said that since they couldn't do any shooting or practical work, they kept refining the post-production of the episodes they were already working on while they waited for the all clear to go back to work. This has to be one of those episodes because I was looking for blurry lines and cuts in the footage or other strange artifacts that HAD to exist and it just looks like it was all shot at the same time in the same physical space. Bravo to the editing team, this is clearly your best work.
The previous episodes do have much better pacing (even Electric Sheep), no argument there. But this episode is of the storytelling caliber that Tom Hanks uses when he needs a few more Oscars to decorate his tenth mansion. The Orville set a new bar for themselves and for all modern science fiction with this story. Both in-universe and out-of-universe, this was a comeback victory several years in the making. It still blows me away that The Orville is both generously pulling from its own past to create new and continued stories while also being mature and reserved enough to not overdo it or wear out the gimmick. They (again) covered a topic of white-hot contention at one of the worst moments in American history to do so, and they did it with respect for themselves and for their viewers. And without a doubt the beaming approval of a particular Great Bird. Maybe Umbrella Academy (they kind of already are) or Doom Patrol could pull it off. I honestly don't know what else is on TV right now that could even reach such heights without a massive overhaul to their writing team.
(Obligatory remark about people who are repulsed (Klyden'd, if you will) by the topic of this episode needing to grow up and realize that they've only got so much time on this Earth to enjoy life and how they're currently, objectively failing to do so. And also morbidly curious as to why they're watching this show knowing full well what it is and then acting surprised that such topics are broached. And reminding them that if they hate this episode it's probably only going to get worse from their point of view - especially if this show is renewed for a fourth season.)
Master Torbin is Shaggy using 90% of his strength.
This show keeps getting better as it goes on. Almost no dialog, yet this episode teaches such an important lesson.
The narrative told in these seven minutes is better and more meaningful than a lot of feature length movies.
You think you're not really watching Bluey, then you get this intro and it throws you so much you have to stop what you're doing and back it up to make sure it even happened.
If the characters winked at the screen any harder, their eyeballs would bleed. It's a worthy message, but with such ham-fisted writing that it makes Whittaker's run seem nuanced and understated.
Otherwise, this is exactly what you would expect from modern Who.
This show continues to be weird as hell in the best way possible. Not AotS, but this will most likely end up being a favorite of 2024 for its originality. This kind of left-field storytelling is something only Anime can really aspire to.
Gabriel didn't have to shut Lila down THAT hard. If he directed that kind of anger at Ladybug and Cat Noir, this show would've ended after one episode.
This feels like an unfinished script they dug up from 2010.
I could listen to Billy Crystal vamp for 30 minutes about anything. His voice acting is incredible. He is almost up there with Robin Williams.
The fight between Mark and Anissa has a very strong General Zod controlling Superman by threatening Lois Lane vibe.
Once again, the animators taking Every. Single. Live-action. Producer. To. School.
Real blackout darkness without making the show difficult to watch. Every light source and shadow in this episode was premeditated. Even when characters were completely hidden by shadows, I could still see what was going on on a nine-year-old LCD. The entire episode took place on an island experiencing total overcast and yet everything still looked beautiful and colorful.
If a genie suddenly told me I had three wishes, my first wish might actually be that every human values and respects the ability to competently frame and light a scene!
As for the actual story... Asajj Ventress, Kraken Whisperer.
The way Ventress was so casually (re)introduced, and the way she relates to the Batchers was a real left-field play and I really liked it. And they finally said "Midi-chlorians" after being so cheeky for so long with M-count this, M-count that. Just say the word. It's not cursed or anything.
Another thing I really liked is how Crosshair gave Ventress his hand. Good Crosshair, you're LEARNING!
Omega's journey is about to get very heavy, and we are now at the half-way point for the final season. This whole series has been one bar higher than the animated Star Wars that came before, and this season has been so focused and devoid of any distractions. I'm so conflicted that this is the end, but I'm so pleased that this isn't the end for Filoni's animated Star Wars.
(I'm still holding my breath for a complete remaster of the original Clone Wars series using the current version of their animation engine.)
If this show had been 10~12 episodes long, it would have been genuinely great. For reasons unknown, they spread everything so thin that they had to recap and literally rerun every single event three or four times over to the point where I was just wanted it to end. To add insult to injury, the big event that was teased throughout the series never actually happens. This isn't the worst Anime ever, but this is such a spectacularly-unforced error that should be taught as a cautionary tale in animation schools around the world.
I don't think anyone was asking for gator wrasslin' down on the bayou in Star Wars, but here we are.
We thought the old dude was bad. Naw, he's just a reckless old dude that puts other people's lives in danger because he has a hunch - like Gandalf or Dumbledore.
This one gets the first 10 of the season. Not because it's one of the best episodes overall, but because the plot is so perfectly honed and has almost no fat on it.
From the start to the finish, this episode is one, long run and gun. First it's the Imperial company against Rex's crew, then it turns into a squadron against the Batchers, then it turns into the Operative against Crosshair. Which leads to a very serious fight to the death that lingers on Crosshair beneath the water just long enough to make me genuinely worried that he was about to be Battlestar'd right then and there. You can see the fear of death on his face when he gets rescued. More trauma to add to the pile.
And the standoff at the end is a painting that Kubrick could be proud of. Even though it seems unusual that an Imperial Commando would just let them all go, they were clones that long stopped being mind-controlled by the inhibiter chip and are now just following orders - another clone's orders. Brothers recognizing brothers.
No wasted time, no wasted words. Everything that was done and was said is peak Filoni and peak Star Wars. This whole season has been almost completely free of filler thus far, but this episode in particular - the second half of a two-parter - is a shining example of why The Clone Wars and everything that spun off of it has tremendously raised the bar for what I expect from Star Wars and animation in general.
Love how the entire fight with Blue Streak is one big Lightcycle reference.
One of the best episodes of the series. BJ can be scary when he wants to.