Tag Archives: Penny Johnson Jerald

TV Review – The Orville: A Happy Refrain

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TL;DR – A beautiful story about finding love in an unexpected place.  

Score – 4.5 out of 5 stars

The Orville: A Happy Refrain. Image Credit: Fox.

One of the things that The Orville has focused on in its run so far is the relationships between the crew, both plutonic, but yes also romantic. Indeed, the show’s premise was based around the fact that Ed (Seth MacFarlane) and Kelly (Adrianne Palicki) have to work together even though they used to be married. However, there has been one relationship that has been on a very slow burn since Season One and today we get more of it.

So to set the scene, we open as Claire (Penny Johnson Jerald) is working on a research paper and asks Isaac (Mark Jackson) to give it a once over. The two have grown close since their shuttle crash-landed and Isaac helped watch over her children. It is during this exchange that Claire finally works out that she wants to take this relationship to the next level, but is that something Isaac can even do. Oh and Bortus (Peter Macon) wants to grow a moustache and it is amazing. Now from here, we will be looking at the episode as a whole, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead.  

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TV Review – The Orville: Home

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TL;DR – In Home, The Orville finally finds that balance between the absurd and the sincere and creates one of their best episodes so far.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

The Orville: Home. Image Credit: Fox

Review –

So far this season The Orville have continued on in its mission to highlight the juxtaposition between the absurd and the sincere. Now, this is something that you can completely do, but the show in both Season One and so far this season just couldn’t quite find that right balance. Well with Home I think they really are starting to head in that right direction and it doesn’t hurt when you throw in some great guest cast and beautiful art design help along the way.

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TV Review – The Orville: Primal Urges

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TL;DR – With Primal Urges we see how The Orville is not afraid to tackle really important issues, but that it has yet to quite get that balance right  

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

The Orville: Primal Urges. Image Credit: Fox.

Review –

One of the issues facing the world today is porn addiction, free porn is literally at most people’s fingertips if you have an internet connection and it can be devastating to a relationship. The Orville looks at Porn Addiction in the context of a relationship that has completely soured but there is still a child involved, which is a situation that is very familiar in the world today.

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TV Review – The Orville: Ja’loja

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TL;DR – This first episode was all about us getting back into the groove with The Orville and its juxtaposition of absurdity and sincerity, but not all of it works.  

Score – 3.5 out of 5 stars

The Orville: Ja'loja. Image Credit: Fox

Review –

I finally got the chance to see Season One of The Orville early this year when it finally got a release down under, and I was struck by how funny and also how many serious issues it tackled. It was not just a Star Trek parody with the first officer and captain being exs, okay it is totally that, but it is also a beautiful sincere look at the work, with some fantastic characters and alien races. Now that Season Two is about to start, I am really interested to see how the show evolves going forward, and can it keep this interesting juxtaposition going.

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TV Review – The Orville: Season One

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TL;DR – While at first look this might have been just a Star Trek homage or at worst a blatant rip-off. Instead, it finds its feet and becomes a charming exploration of the future and the mess and opportunities that could come.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

 

The Orville. Image Credit: 20th Century Fox & Fuzzy Door Productions.

 

Review –

I have been wanting to catch The Orville for quite a while but there was no streaming or TV that picked it up here in Australia, so I was expecting this was something that I might only get to see when it dropped on Blu-Ray. But with SBS announcing they had picked it up and would be showing Season Two I jumped on a watched the whole first season in one night, which meant that clown appeared at a very confronting time late at night. But binged the first season I have, and now it is time to jump in and see if it was worth the wait. Now before we dive in, a quick reminder that as we will be looking at the season as a whole, there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead.

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Article – Why I Love Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

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TL;DR – From the setting to the characters to the story and themes, Deep Space Nine stands as one of the high points of science fiction

DS9 banner

Article –

This week we have the season finale of Star Trek: Discovery (see review) and it has been such a strong first outing for the new series. Because of this, I have been thinking back over the history of the entire Star Trek franchise and when I do that I can’t help but focus on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (DS9). Now DS9 was always the odd one out of the Star Trek spin-offs for some. It aired at the same time as both The Next Generation and Voyager, so it never stood apart. It dealt with issues that the other shows either avoided or ignored altogether, and some felt started to walk away from the vision Gene Roddenberry established. Indeed, it was the first series where he didn’t have a direct control over the creation and direction of, though from all accounts he did approve of its creation. So what I want to do today is talk about the reasons that I love DS9, the setting, the characters, the themes, and the stories. But just before we move on DS9 has been off air for almost 20 years, but all that being said, I will be talking about the series as a whole so there will be [SPOILERS] going forward, however, I will also provide links to the Memory Alpha Wiki when introducing characters and races so you can explore it more if you are new to the show.

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