I asked this question sometime ago on The Orville’s subreddit, and surprisingly got mixed responses. I assume most here however, are going to prefer Star Trek, specifically TNG that its aping from. For the record I do prefer TNG as well, but rewatching The Orville, after you get past its kinda sucky first season, I really enjoyed the show and feel it’s a very good successor to TNG just with added humor and levity which I think is a good thing. And there are elements I find better in The Orville. And now that Lower Decks is back (a show I’m now a fan of after dismissing it for so long), I felt the need to return to The Orville and see if I still liked it. I’m really hoping it at least gets a fourth season. Anyway, what do you guys think?
I personally don’t understand the need to hold it as “vs” perspective. You can have both. The Orville definitely wanted to be TNG 2, and if that’s what you’re looking for, then by all means, have both.
TNG 2 with Family Guy humor.
I feel like the Family Guy humour vibe tapered off pretty strongly after season 1 and by season 3 the show had definitely found itself in pretty squarely Star Trek like territory, which is par for the course for Star Trek really.
It’s not really family guy humour either. It’s Seth McFarlane though.
Yeah the humor in season 1 turned me off and I wasn’t sure if I liked the show at first, it tapers off in season 2 and mostly evaporates in season 3, so those seasons were far better.
Wait a sec… there’s 3 seasons?! Christmas came early this year!!
Yup, on Hulu. I personally liked the 3rd season and am disappointed there might not be any more.
The third season is the best one. Feels like a TNG season in a good way
It was never as mean spirited as Family Guy. That type of edge-lord humour doesn’t play anymore. Even Rick and Morty has to temper it with some emotional moments.
No need to be vs I agree, but people pit them against each other anyway so thought I’d ask. I like both to the extent I just include The Orville in my Star Trek lineup
I think that they both good in their own ways.
The Orville has nicer ships, for example. Besides the middle segment of the quantum drive giving me a twitch for being misaligned compared to the other engines, it’s cool and sleek in a way Federation ships aren’t.
In terms of progressiveness, I’d say The Orville does better. Personally, I blame the Star Trek brand being as big as it is for that.
It’s big enough that the networks would never allow any new show to push boundaries the same way that the original series did. The Orville isn’t established enough as a brand for them to have that problem just yet.
But in terms of tonal consistency, I prefer Trek for that. The Orville has a habit of suddenly having a joke in there that gives you a bit of a weird tonal whiplash. Trek also does that, but it’s much fewer and far between. They could be having a serious plot, which will be briefly derailed by the Captain/XO bringing up that they’re divorced, and arguing/joking about that for a time.
In terms of character design, though, The Orville does a bit better with variety, and feels a bit more diverse than Trek’s mostly-human Starfleet crews. Although most of theirs could pass for humanoid, it’s still a nice touch that makes the world feel more expansive. It was an inspired choice to make the head of one of the main crew a weapon.
But other than that, the world building does feel a little weaker than it is in Trek. Unfortunately, not surprising, since The Orville, whilst inspired by Trek, lacks the corresponding history, and I don’t think Seth McFarlane is the best world builder. A few of the details and various aliens seem to only pop up when they are plot-relevant, for example, and are mostly absent otherwise.
I agree with everything you just said
That’s like asking trek movies vs galaxy quest
The Orville isn’t anything like Galaxy Quest though
True. But similar to Galaxy Quest, The Orville is so lovingly done that it ascends past parody into being a worthy chapter in the overall cohort of shows/movies.
Edit: Interestingly, I would say “Lower Decks” does the same. It’s hilarious, but theres also just some great Trek moments in it.
I like Strange New Worlds, but Lower Decks is the best Star Trek show currently running in my opinion.
Tendi is the best new Trek character
Agreed!
Same here, but I think that’s because I have more nostalgia for the TNG era as I grew up with it.
LD and The Orville are both awesome
The other way I look at it: TNG was following the premiere ship in the galaxy, with plenty of places to explore, so it was always encountering “new frontiers”.
The Orville on the other hand was more a premise of “what happens when space travel is commoditized and you have more than enough ships and now need competent bodies to staff it?” For that it feels more “real” that you’re getting people who do it as a job, not a calling, which explains the random humor and diversions and a look at new discoveries through fresh eyes rather than “wow, more new as this is normal for us”.
Ironically though because of its higher budget, The Orville ran into more alien “strange new worlds” and species than TNG did.
Lol. I too have noticed that fewer planets in The Orville are “basically earth but in 19xx”, than in TOS.
There have been a few, off the top of my head I remember “what if current earth, but justice system is social media”, “what if current earth but horoscopes are state Religon”. Not that these are bad ideas.
And they all look like southern California
I’d say TNG mostly stopped exploring new frontiers halfway through season 1. Farpoint promised exploration, but soon the ship is ferrying diplomats and scientists and answering Federation distress calls. The worlds are new to the audience, but not the characters.
Why does one have to be better than the other? Both are good fun.
I’d say Star Trek is generally better but mostly due to the old shows. When it comes to the newer shows, The Orville is much better Star Trek then most of the shows that are legally allowed to use the name.
Agreed. TNG and DS9 are still the better shows, but I’d rank The Orville even above TOS and VOY and ENT.
“Aping” is kind of a pejorative way to describe what The Orville does. If they were “aping” TNG, they’d be imitating it in a very derivative manner. It’s more of an homage to TNG, but in a comedy format with original ideas and character dynamics.
The Orville’s first season is no worse than TNGs. There were some truly awful first season episodes of TNG. Code of Honor is a good example of an awful episode.
I don’t think better or worse comparisons are very meaningful. They’re both good shows. TNG has many of my favorite Trek stories and characters. I think it says a lot that it inspired so much of what The Orville does.
I mostly agree but the show did occasionally directly steal from TNG and other Treks. Then again it also did story ideas from TNG better as well, such as the episode Deflectors.
I was really disappointed with the most recent series of Orville. I feel they moved from social commentary to being preachy and smug.
The biggest example of this is the time travel episode in season 3. You have someone who has established a life and has kids and real character growth, who wants to be able to live the life they established after being abandoned for 20 years. On the other hand you have Seth McFarland saying that it’s bad. There isn’t any real discussion of what right is, it’s just McFarland saying that he’s right and then circumventing any resistance. It ends with McFarland being smug he did the right thing and having no self reflection on the damage he did.
To be clear, I’m all about social commentary in my sci-fi but I feel like anything interesting is diluted to make it a closer parallel to earth. The Moclans went from a unique all male species, to having a rare minority that allowed for discussion of trans rights, to in season 3 being 50-50 split and a tired gender war trope.
I think the Orville has gotten lazy and moved further and further away from having interesting plots to talk about big ideas and moved more towards character driven drama and lazy hamfisted commentary.
My wife got pissed at Mercer’s decision in the time travel episode, too. I just thought that he simply should have told him he’s glad he’s happy in that time and left, then changed the timeline like he did. Super dick move to tell him he was going to wipe their timeline and leave them in fear like that. I was also very surprised that he not only told Grimes afterward, but that Grimes was okay with it.
When Gordon first arrived in the past, he admitted he tried to adhere to the “temporal prime directive” for a time but found it impossible. The Gordon back in the future still believes in the reasons for this directive as he’s never spent years trying to live as a hermit and realising the directive isn’t compatible with human nature. Of course he accepted it as from his eyes the Gordon in the past betrayed his belief in the systems he signed up to protect.
I liked that time travel episode and its moral dilemma, even if basically aborting the children seems morally dubious. Why didn’t they offer to just take his family with him into the future? Other than that, I felt it was brilliant. Also I like “preachyness” if what’s being preached is the right message, and they mostly preached the right message IMO in The Orville.
I agree with their politics, I just feel that plot took a hit to allow them to soapbox more. Aliens lost what made them alien and became humans with make up.
My issue isn’t the message, to me it felt like the lecturing of DISCO with fart jokes.
At the same time, I think they tried to pick a plot point that was relevant today, while at the same time conveniently setting up a new bad guy since the Kaylon were “removed” as a threat. I also don’t see it as the most implausible situation, since both Orville (and star trek) can basically change your gender at will, it’s not the most absurd situation that a culture is so macho that they have been genetically altering all children at birth to make it 100% male
I feel the same about the last season. It seems to me they don’t make enough effort to think their ideas properly through anymore and just preach without applying logic, which is not satisfying to me. For those reasons I now prefer the Lower Decks. LD episodes seem much more creative to me and I like the diversity of character interactions and relationships.
That time travel episode was great, it explored the concept of the “temporal prime directive” and how hard it must be to adhere to it better than any Trek show ever has.
I don’t think they said the Moclans are 50/50 did they? Just that more women are born than the government would like to admit. Which is still a fairly good trans analogy when you consider how many trans people in the past probably never lived their truth as either the science to transition Wasn’t there, or they didn’t think society would accept it.
They’re both great!
I personally like Star Trek better because it’s the OG and has better world building.
I must be a weirdo because I actually preferred the Orville more in the first season when the focus was a bit more on the comedy, as that brought something new and hilarious to the table. In the later seasons, they shifted to what feels extremely similar to TNG, which made it less interesting for me, although I do still enjoy the story. The similarity isn’t just in the style or themes of the show, either… I remember seeing multiple episodes of the Orville with plot lines that directly correlated to specific TNG episodes.
The most important thing, though, is that we get more Sci-Fi on TV. The more the merrier!
I like them both. Sure new Star Trek isn’t close to what TNG was and Orville feels more like a true sequel to TNG. But I can understand why Star Trek had to change directions. Just compare the production value between the two shows. A modern Star Trek show that looks like Orville would never pull the numbers that would satisfy Paramount, since casual viewers probably wouldn’t even try the show. And to justify the higher production value they had to write more action based stories and a shorter season.
Good points, but I do think SNW taps a bit into the TNG vibe. It’s a very beautiful episodic show like The Orville is.
I like the Orville.
But Star Trek speaks to me. https://youtu.be/mMqGlSjAbwA?t=52
Wow. I swear I’ve seen every episode of TNG but this one I do not remember. I feel like I’m just repeating you, but it speaks to me as well. I wish I would have seen it earlier in life. It says how I feel better than I ever could.
Not Trek, but here’s another 90’s gem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCRgnMt7MiM
They’re both great and serve different purposes. The Orville is a more light hearted tribute to 90s TV sci-fi, albeit one that’s become more serious and built up it’s own universe and tone as it’s three series went on. Trek, as it exists today, is taking various Trek tropes and styles and trying to update them to modern times, be that via deconstruction in Lower Decks, nostalgic big-budget adventures in Picard, or introducing more modern character development and serialisation in Dis and SNW. Some times it succeeds, sometimes is doesn’t.
Really enjoyed it after the first season and also hope it finds a way to a fourth season.
IMO, it “counts” as Trek, so strong is its respect and homage to the essence of Trek. As Trek-Sci-Fi it also did some things well and made its own contributions to the “Trek forum of ideas”. It tackled the “prime directive”, progressive issues around gender, went all the way with robot-organic romance, did a very Trek style take on AI war and I rather liked its take on a hyper technologically advanced species (the one that runs through time faster than our universe).
Somewhat more uncomfortably, it stood as an affirmation of what those of us who have struggled with Kurtzman era Trek were actually looking for and remembering as the Trek we loved, and a reminder that that style of TV can still work well.
EDIT: grammar
IMO, it “counts” as Trek, so strong is its respect and homage to the essence of Trek. As Trek Sci-Fi it also did some things well and made its own contributions to the “Trek forum of ideas”. It tackled the “prime directive”, progressive issues around gender, went all the way with robot-organic romance, did a very Trek style take on AI war and I rather liked its take on a hyper technologically advanced species (the one that runs through time faster than our universe).
Very well said. There are elements of the Trek universe that The Orville IMO does better. The Prime Directive is one of them. And the show is much more bold on gender and queer rights issues, which Trek often ignored or at best just said “heres a LGBTQ character!” It almost feels like a distilled version of Star Trek.
Somewhat more uncomfortably, it stood as an affirmation of what those of us who have struggled with Kurtzman era Trek what we were actually looking for and remembering as the Trek we loved, and a reminder that style of TV can still work well.
Yeah I didn’t like Discovery at all and was disappointed in Picard, so The Orville filled that hole. Now that SNW and Lower Decks are out and are much better shows than DSC and PIC IMO, less so but I do still prefer The Orville even to them.
It’s nice that “new” Trek wants to portray things like equality for LGBT people as a given; hopefully we can reach that one day. And I think it’s good that LGBT people can “see themselves” on the screen without having their queerness be the focus of the drama. People just want to live their lives, and they want to see other queer people just living their lives.
On the other hand, showing the struggle and making it the focus of the drama, as Orville does, is the thing that helps people understand and confront the issues themselves. The whole story around Topa is very strong. Societal misogyny. Klyden’s entire journey (his own sex reassignment, hiding it from Bortus, their separation, his rejection of Topa when she transitioned back, the family’s eventual reunion). Bortus’ struggle to make the right choice as a loving husband and father. Bortus having the choice taken away from him. Topa lacking female role models.
These kinds of things are still very real issues that a lot of people don’t think about unless presented to them on this way. These kinds of stories help people imagine how they might need to support their own children, families, and friends.
It’s not really possible to compare Star Trek vs Orville because Trek is an entire franchise (even now there are 4.5 shows) and Orville is just one. But if I had to say of the current shows, which one does society need the most for social progress, I’d actually say Orville.
which one does society need the most for social progress, I’d actually say Orville.
Yep, exactly! And this is why I think it’s rather justified to be hard on new-Trek. At some point, it isn’t doing the “true” legacy and potential of the franchise justice.
Like, is young Kirk and Scotty really “good Trek”, and so on.
Yeah I didn’t like Discovery at all and was disappointed in Picard, so The Orville filled that hole. Now that SNW and Lower Decks are out and are much better shows than DSC and PIC IMO, less so but I do still prefer The Orville even to them.
Yea, in a way, that’s The Orville’s ultimate legacy … while Trek is being rebooted and prequeled and sequeled in the new-Trek era, The Orville is sitting there saying, hey, there’s still plenty of work to do in Trek’s original and essential “utopic adventure sci-fi morality play” space … it’s not as though we live in a utopia already, so how about we just keep on going with the original mission and not worry too much about milking the past and nostalgia for as much money as we can, TNG sure as hell didn’t do that.
And in the end, as I think about it now, The Orville is right, and probably stands as the best critique of new-Trek that we ever could have hoped for and which we most certainly do not deserve … just optimistic and progressive Trek … no critique necessary.
Damn, very well said. The rejection of a utopian setting in NuTrek, even in shows like SNW which pays lip service to it, is a major turn off for me because Trek was always good as utopian sci fi. And yeah DS9 challenged it, but it didn’t outright reject it either. The new shows totally dismiss it, whereas here’s The Orville dialing it up to 11.
And yeah DS9 challenged it
I always thought DS9 simply asked what happens at the fringes. Is Kira the terrorist justified? What else are you supposed to do with Cardassians and shapeshifters? Can one “live with it”?
Well it also tested the Federation by putting it on the breaking point with a galactic war. Which I approve of and think was very interesting, but it wasn’t saying things like replicators are made from recycled shit or that poverty still exists on Earth like NuTrek did.
I like them both :)
The Orville’s first season was a bit of a mess. It tried to be a comedy, but it also had some very serious moments. The second season was much better, as it focused more on the serious stories. However, the show still needs to improve its dialogue. Which I really like in Star Trek.
I debated with myself if I preferred the Star Trek humans vs The Orville humans, and in the end I do prefer the more serious dialogue of Star Trek
I kind of feel like that’s how Seth had to get it past Fox and onto TV to begin with. He’s not known for making sci-fi, he’s known for making comedies.
