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News Seth MacFarlane’s The Orville

GOOD NEWS EVERYONE!

The Orville continues to do well in the ratings department!

The important Live+3 ratings came out for the first episode (basically counting everyone who either watched or recorded the show to watch later) and they were even better than the already good Live ratings.

The Orville logged a 3.5 adults 18-49 rating in L+3, up 30% from its Live+Same Day delivery. The Live+3 total viewership for the opening episode of Seth MacFarlane’s space adventure series was 11.3 million, up from 8.6 million.
(http://deadline.com/2017/09/the-orville-fox-premiere-ratings-live3-1202170849/)

11.3 million viewers is really good, and the Orville is turning out to be one is Fox's strongest premieres in years.

Ratings for the 2nd episode are down a bit, but still strong: "A wonky start time for episode 2 of “The Orville” caused its ratings to adjust down from Sunday’s early numbers to the finals. The show finishes at a 2.2 rating in adults 18-49, down half a point from its premiere but still pretty solid."

http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/daily-ratings/sunday-final-ratings-sept-17-2017/
 
Well, advance word on the Thursday episode is that it's problematic. Supposed to veer toward heavy "message" stuff and supposedly does it in a heavy-handed, tone-deaf way.

So, if the ratings drop - and they will drop some, at the very least - expect idiot comments on the Internet about how the episode got lower ratings because it wasn't very good. Because the ratings system is based on telepathically monitoring the audience changing channels five minutes into the show.
 
Does the modern rating system take into account DVR, On Demand, Hulu and all the other ways people are now watching tv shows?
 
KirkusOveractus said:
The corridors of the ship have the color pallette of TNG, but the width of TOS. I remember Roddenberry saying around the time of the planning of sets and designs for TNG that he didn't want it to look like TOS, since that was like the hallway of a Holiday Inn.

Turns out people say that about the TNG sets!
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That's because he traded open space for plush carpeting. :)

He also wanted to save money by redressing the existing Trek movie sets, which were already extremely claustrophobic and cramped compared to TOS. The set designers actually opened them up a bit when they changed the radial corridors from the slanted outer walls to straight-vertical ones. But yes, they were still tighter quarters than TOS.
 
The only TNG connection I can make with Orville is the lighting and the uniforms. Other than that, The Orville is much more casual and I love that aspect of it over all else.
 
Sophie74656 said:
That's what I'm wondering. Personally I don't have cable and only watch things on Hulu and Netflix. I'm sure I'm not the only one.
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I had DISH til about a year ago. I needed to save money, plus I really wasn't using it so much as to be worth the ever increasing price.
I have Hulu & AmazonPrime now. Not sure how I'll watch Discovery yet, unless I wait for the blu-rays.

I managed to watch ST-DS9, VOY and ENT on Hulu last year while I was off work, so the $12 a month is well worth it.
 
Ar-Pharazon said:
I had DISH til about a year ago. I needed to save money, plus I really wasn't using it so much as to be worth the ever increasing price.
I have Hulu & AmazonPrime now. Not sure how I'll watch Discovery yet, unless I wait for the blu-rays.

I managed to watch ST-DS9, VOY and ENT on Hulu last year while I was off work, so the $12 a month is well worth it.
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Pretty much the same here. My boyfriend and I got a place together recently and don't really watch much current tv. He already had Hulu and I already had Netflix so we just got internet and no cable.
 
One thing I take from the show is that Macfarlane isn't trying to play a captain Kirk or Picard character but play himself if he was a captain on a Star Trek show. I think he did the same thing in "A million ways to die in the West." He plays what it would be like if he was stuck living in those times.

Jason
 
Sophie74656 said:
Pretty much the same here. My boyfriend and I got a place together recently and don't really watch much current tv. He already had Hulu and I already had Netflix so we just got internet and no cable.
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I don't know if it's possible but you should try and get Youtube on your tv. They have stuff their you can watch for free as well such as Farscape and Space Above and Beyond the last time I checked.

Jason
 
Jayson1 said:
One thing I take from the show is that Macfarlane isn't trying to play a captain Kirk or Picard character but play himself if he was a captain on a Star Trek show. I think he did the same thing in "A million ways to die in the West." He plays what it would be like if he was stuck living in those times.

Jason
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That was a funny movie - I liked it a lot. Theron and Neeson were both quite good in it, I thought. Ironically, for the same reason that many people feel MacFarlane's language is highly anachronistic in Orville, I felt the same way about his delivery in AMWTDITW.

At least, for Orville, the future hasn't happened yet, and there could arguably be some contemporary idioms and slang language that continue on into the future. For example, slang terms like "pop a cap in your ass" may seem modern-gangster, but it originated from the Civil War, with the "cap" referring to the fulminated mercury cap used by 19th century rifles, yet the phrase is still commonly used today, over 150 years later. Mercer could also be a 20th/21st century cultural enthusiast, in much the same way that Tom Paris was fascinated by 20th century hotrods. In this case, exemplified by the presence of Kermit the Frog on his desk. Conversely, however, I found many of his 21st century language patterns to be somewhat jarring and out-of-place in a late 19th century setting. I know his goal was certainly not one of making an historically grounded period-comedy, but it still seemed off to me.

IMO, the best example of period-correct Victorian/post-Victorian language usage I've ever experienced in a show or movie was in Deadwood. That show was absolutely brilliant in its muddy mixture of the formal and the profane. David Milch can write!
 
Ar-Pharazon said:
How do they know I'm watching it on Hulu, and what about repeat viewings?
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Well, Hulu would know how many time you watched it, so I assume that info is reported to the network. But those views would only show in the Nielsen ratings if you were a Nielsen family.
 
SPOILERS
For the second episode. DO NOT read further if you do not want to be spoiled.


I'll except the show, generally, for what it is, but I was expecting more grounding of his universe.

Just in the second episode alone I found so many problems:

* Why doesn't a race that uses holograms to disguise ships, have the technology to detect other ships using it?

* Are there no names on these aliens ships? No transponder signals identifying the vessels? It's amazing the Orville got in in that kind of disguise.

* Why is Alara in a position to command a ship? Sorry, but in the Trek universe which Seth seems to love so much, it takes years and years to get promoted just once passed ensign and simply putting on a uniform doesn't mean the Federation trusts you to be the third in command.
Picard: First in command, second ship, rank of Captain with decades of service.
Riker: Second in command, forth ship of service, rank of Commander with over a decade experience.
Data: third in command, second ship of service, rank of Lt. Commander with over twenty years in service.

Alara doesn't have the work experience or training. To me that's kind of like telling acting ensign Wesley he's in command of the Enterprise.

* Goddamn the Union doesn't give a fuck. They aren't even trying a negotiation, despite that admiral's words -- just declaring them lost in the line of duty and replicable.

* Drinking on duty.

* So, if the doctor has command after Alara, who is the doctor in a real emergency with wounded and/or casualties?

* Transporter signals can arc? Don't go J.J. on me, Seth.
 
tharpdevenport said:
SPOILERS
For the second episode. DO NOT read further if you do not want to be spoiled.


I'll except the show, generally, for what it is, but I was expecting more grounding of his universe.

Just in the second episode alone I found so many problems:

* Why doesn't a race that uses holograms to disguise ships, have the technology to detect other ships using it?

* Are there no names on these aliens ships? No transponder signals identifying the vessels? It's amazing the Orville got in in that kind of disguise.

* Why is Alara in a position to command a ship? Sorry, but in the Trek universe which Seth seems to love so much, it takes years and years to get promoted just once passed ensign and simply putting on a uniform doesn't mean the Federation trusts you to be the third in command.
Picard: First in command, second ship, rank of Captain with decades of service.
Riker: Second in command, forth ship of service, rank of Commander with over a decade experience.
Data: third in command, second ship of service, rank of Lt. Commander with over twenty years in service.

Alara doesn't have the work experience or training. To me that's kind of like telling acting ensign Wesley he's in command of the Enterprise.

* Goddamn the Union doesn't give a fuck. They aren't even trying a negotiation, despite that admiral's words -- just declaring them lost in the line of duty and replicable.

* Drinking on duty.

* So, if the doctor has command after Alara, who is the doctor in a real emergency with wounded and/or casualties?

* Transporter signals can arc? Don't go J.J. on me, Seth.
Click to expand...
You can't use Trek rules to condemn a different show. The Orville is NOT Trek, the same rules don't apply. As said in the first episode, Alara got fast tracked through the ranks because few of the small number of people who join the military. She was the next person in the chain of command.
 
tharpdevenport said:
* Why is Alara in a position to command a ship? Sorry, but in the Trek universe which Seth seems to love so much, it takes years and years to get promoted just once passed ensign and simply putting on a uniform doesn't mean the Federation trusts you to be the third in command.
Click to expand...

She's not third in line, Bortus is.

TNG did the same thing when a rookie Geordie was left in command in The Arsenal of Freedom after everyone ahead of him was indisposed.
 
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