The Orville New Horizons Season 3 Review
Added 2022-08-16 13:02:00 +0000 UTCIs The Orville the new Star Trek?
Comments
I don't begrudge Orville for what it tried to do at all. Star Trek has mishandled its own social message on many occasions. It's entirely down to my personal interpretation, and I am absolutely delighted that the show brings many people who watch it as much joy as watching Picard brings me.
Andrew Michael
2022-08-22 10:25:05 +0000 UTCThank you Leotha
Jessie Earl
2022-08-22 07:38:11 +0000 UTCAgreed, though I like Disco more (though not Picard haha) but I agree with a lot of what you said.
Jessie Earl
2022-08-22 07:37:31 +0000 UTCTotally get that
Jessie Earl
2022-08-22 07:37:10 +0000 UTCPoint taken, and very well stated.
Leotha Boyd
2022-08-17 17:51:48 +0000 UTCI try to read and only speak if I’m informed. I agree with all of Jessie’s remarks—her commentary as always is wonderful and informative, I just wanted to say that she had missed something I think has value given what we do know about the entertainment industry and social norms.
Conrad
2022-08-17 08:33:07 +0000 UTCSame deal with my point about actors and actresses: https://slate.com/culture/2015/05/leading-men-age-but-their-love-interest-don-t.html
Conrad
2022-08-17 08:32:42 +0000 UTCRespectfully, I never said I was white, I said I was gay and I said I feel represented by Bortas and Klyden and I do know my own experience. I was not speaking for all lgbt people and I agreed with Jessie that explicit rep is important. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/03/11/rising-share-of-americans-see-women-raising-children-on-their-own-cohabitation-as-bad-for-society/ We also have lots of polling data from well established polling organizations like Pew & Gallup that demonstrate that hostility to single mothers is a still a very real feature of American life, particularly the American right. Well also have plenty of polling & census data about women rarely being the older partner in a first marriage: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/01/03/globally-women-are-younger-than-their-male-partners-more-likely-to-age-alone/. The same is true of remarriage: https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/xpress/2014/12/9/7332691/men-remarry-younger-women.
Conrad
2022-08-17 08:15:39 +0000 UTCI do think that it's funny when a gay white men can comment on things that they know nothing about
Leotha Boyd
2022-08-16 23:54:43 +0000 UTCSo I think you’re a bit tohard on The Orville in terms of representation. As I’ve remarked before, as a gay man I actually do feel represented by Bortas & Klyden—it doesn’t feel like tokenism to me. But I also fully admit that this is an issue where different people can feel differently and it is very important for actual human LGBT representation too. I also am surprised you don’t comment about how wonderful the representation of Dr. Finn is. She is an not merely an OLDER woman (and an older black woman at that) who is a major character—far older than Dr. Crusher or Captain Janeway—but is still depicted as beautiful and competent and also willingly chose to be a single mother and has not regretted that. Given that single mothers—particularly black single mothers—are still demonized and the right is lambasting American women for waiting to have children her being an older mother is also powerful. Also it still is statistically rare to see an older woman romance a man who is even slightly younger than her in tv or film and yet the actor who plays Isaac is I think late 30s whereas the actress who plays Dr. Finn is late 50s and we repeatedly do see Isaac in human form. Is all of this revolutionary? No. But I legit think there is something valuable to it representationwise and unusual. Now all of this said, I would like for more explicit LGBT representation or at least for the metaphors to be more consistent e.g. while I think the moral force or “About a Girl” is righteous I think you are correct that because of the messiness of the metaphor that things are confused and that confusion does somewhat reverabate to later episodes. Ultimately I like The Orville much more than Discovery (which has its merits that you have quite rightly repeatedly pointed out) or Picard (which i heartily dislike—particular season 2 for the reasons you & Steve Shives has eloquently articulated) but I am glad Discovery exists and I agree with you we should want healthy competition so both shows get better.
Conrad
2022-08-16 22:55:56 +0000 UTCFor me? No. It's very Star Trek in tone, but whenever it tries to do the same kind of social commentary that Trek does, it just seems to miss the mark.
Andrew Michael
2022-08-16 13:12:48 +0000 UTC
