3 Details I Loved in The Orville

It’s no secret that I loved the premiere of The Orville. It’s the fun spaceship show that has been missing from the TV scifi landscape since… oh, I dunno, 1969?

A show with a unified aesthetic? Brilliant!

One of the most underrated aspects of The Orville is the universe-building done on screen but without overt comment. It makes the story feel more organic and realistic; the Planetary Union isn’t just a generic scifi setting, but feels like a real place.

Here are three examples of things I loved about The Orville that built the on-screen universe and helped make the premiere a success. The devil’s in the details, after all.

This is a still shot, a split-second before you see what you can’t unsee.

1. The aliens. Whether it’s the home-wrecking Retepsian or the Krill commander reminding us that a marriage is work, the show’s aliens are immediately accessible to the audience. The Krill are bad guys in black and green and they have horns, kinda. On the planet, the guy with the big head is doing science experiments because of course he is. The only explanations we need/get are why the 23 year old Xelayan is a senior officer and a set-up line informing us the hyper-masculine Moclans are single-sex. This is a universe where aliens are a normal part of everyday life.