Discovery and "The Orville" Comparisons

[Prax]

Ok, then they were reduced to quips.
Comedic highlights, this week on ...the orville.

"That's what we used to call 'the glory hole'"
"No, that's what you used to call it"
Bortus: "Now entering the glory hole"
-This was really funny, then hampered by Captain Mcfarlane by talking(still occasionally ruining his own jokes). He should have just face palmed.

In the wreckage:
Boy is worried about mom, older brother says "don't worry, she's fine."
Isaac corrects him "That is highly unlikely"
Boy is worried about mom.
-this was funny.

The story itself was a serious one, and without comedic "antics."

 

[zar]

And who knows? Maybe Detmer will become the next O'Brian, after a season or two. Or maybe she'll just be another Lt. Kyle, who never really gets fleshed out because she's just a bit player. The show is not required to be an ensemble show about the bridge crew, just because some of the previous Trek shows took that approach. This is a different show, taking a different approach.

I actually do expect to see more from Detmer and Airiam at some point. Detmer because she's the only one on Discovery other than Saru who has history with Burnham. Airiam because they've been teasing about her for awhile now (apparently she's "a favorite of the writers"). But no, they're certainly not required to flesh them out.

He's saying that they're decoration. His analogy was something like "Imagine TNG where an android named Data was a background character on the bridge, and we never learned anything about him." like, there's this weird guy with pale skin and yellow eyes walking around who may or may not be an android, or alien, who knows.

They're introducing an intriguing new species/robot something via a background character. This is done for the "cantina effect."

In the older shows, the background extras would be human, sometimes vulcan. If they go to the trouble of showing an atypical race, they would also go to the trouble of adding them to the story. Or if they go to the trouble of adding a new alien race, they would have a story about them.

That's what I gather from the posts, but good news: this thread has taught me her name. It's "Airiam" and her species is "Augmented Alien."

Does anyone know the name of the Das Punk girl? I assume she died, along with frightened black Lobot.

That's not it, because he's including Detmer, Owosekun, and other regular humans. He's saying that simply because they are present in every episode, they must be treated as main characters and have episodes devoted to them, or else they must be absent from more episodes to focus on the real main characters. It's no wonder we can't make sense of his logic, because he contradicts it nearly every post. Case in point...

K here are the people in the credits of each series in order of appearance

Star Trek Discovery
Sonequa Martin-Green (Michael Burnham)
Doug Jones (Saru)
Shazad Latif (Ash Tyler)
Anthony Rapp (Paul Stamets)
Mary Wiseman (Sylvia Tilly)
Jason Isaacs (Gabriel Lorca)

Star Trek (grabbed season 2)
William Shatner (Kirk)
Leonard Nimoy (Spock)
DeForest Kelley (McCoy)

Star Trek The Next Generation (grabbed season 4)
Patrick Stewart (Jean-Luc Picard)
Jonathan Frakes (William Riker)
Levar Burton (Geordi La Forge)
Michael Dorn (Worf)
Gates McFadden (Beverly Crusher)
Marina Sirtis (Deanna Troi)
Brent Spiner (Data)
Wil Wheaton (Wesley Crusher)

Star Trek Deep Space Nine (grabbed season 5)
Avery Brooks (Sisko)
Rene Auberjonois (Odo)
Michael Dorn (Worf)
Terry Farrell (Dax)
Cirroc Lofton (Jake Sisko)
Colm Meaney (O'Brien)
Armin Shimerman (Quark)
Alexander Siddig (Bashir)
Nana Visitor (Kira)

Star Trek Voyager (grabbed season 4)
Kate Mulgrey (Kathryn Janeway)
Robert Beltran (Chakotay)
Roxann Dawson (B'Elanna Torres)
Robert Duncan McNeill (Tom Paris)
Ethan Phillips (Neelix)
Robert Picardo (The Doctor)
Tim Russ (Tuvok)
Jeri Ryan (Seven of Nine)
Garrett Wang (Harry Kim)

Star Trek Enterprise (grabbed season 2)
Scott Bakula (Jonathan Archer)
John Billingsley (Phlox)
Jolene Blalock (T'Pol)
Dominic Keating (Malcolm Reed)
Anthony Montgomery (Travis Mayweather)
Linda Park (Hoshi Sato)
Connor Trinneer (Charles Tucker III)

Obviously your method of using the intro credits to establish who is a main character falls flat with the original series but I think it does help establish that Star Trek Discovery has fewer characters to work with than any other series. Thanks

Others have at least 8 or 9 "main characters". We're stuck with these 6 even though there are at least 4 other regulars on the bridge.

^ I love how you just sweep TOS under the rug and casually edit its 3 to "at least 8" but happily accept DSC's list of only 6. TOS really did have only 3 characters that were focused on as much as DSC's 6. You can include Scotty, Sulu, and Uhura to reach 6 (though they had much smaller roles and several episodes where they didn't appear at all). There was only a few appearances of Nurse Chapel, and no Chekov in season 1. If you're going to stretch TOS this much, you should at least add Dr. Culber to DSC's list.

So let's be clear. TOS, ENT, and DSC all have 7 "main" characters. TNG had 8, then 7 post-Wesley. DS9 and VOY had 8, then 9 after Worf and Seven. And that's being generous to the other series, considering Culber is being featured more heavily than Nurse Chapel or Jake Sisko were, or even Sulu, Scotty and Uhura for that matter.

Fewer people means less variety. The 6 we're stuck with are shady, whiney, grumpy, or annoying. Not easy to relate to is it. I wouldn't have complained about not seeing more of the other 4 if I was satisfied with these 6.

If you hate the characters, then just say you hate the characters, man. Don't dress it up with this loopy nonsense argument about background actors and character counting.

 

[Mechanoid1]

that aside, Star Trek is a more serious franchise with more serious expectations.

I AGREE. If Star Trek Discovery was just called the Wilbur (a darker kind of sci-fi show) I wonder how many less negative votes/ratings there would be because of no comparisons between it as it's own show and Star Trek?

 

[GeekUSACarl]

I know I find implied future rape "silly", a child dying of disease "silly", and an entire race that fought a biological war "silly". The word everyone is looking for is Dramedy. And The Orville does it well.

From ages ten to forty-six, everyone in my household was far more engrossed with "Into the Fold" than anything Discovery has put out so far.



Than Discovery? You are absolutely right. But life isn't always so sullen, even in the worst of times. Than the original Star Trek? Yes. But the difference isn't anywhere near as huge as some folks keep trying to paint it. From "Shore Leave" to the "Trouble with Tribbles" to "A Piece of the Action" to "Spock's Brain", they were people who realized that drama isn't the end-all, be-all of the presentation. That they were telling stories about people doing things that are so far beyond the comprehension of regular people that sometimes you had to wink at them and let them know that this is entertainment.

Quoting some elements of the show that are serious or somewhat serious doesn't change what the lite and low brow humor brings to the show. Still a crew of silly people who contend with a mix of silly and serious situations. I'm not saying that as a criticism, I happen to like this about the show.

Personally, I haven't seen anything from Orville that makes me feel it's much comparable to Discovery other than the "it's in space" thing.

To me it's still more like MASH or Scrubs than it is a more dark and serious show like Discovery, again, not a criticism. It's why I like both shows.

 

[BillJ]

To me it's still more like MASH or Scrubs...

Yes. Dramedy.

 

[Prax]

That word gives me frowny faces inside.

 

[GeekUSACarl]

I AGREE. If Star Trek Discovery was just called the Wilbur (a darker kind of sci-fi show) I wonder how many less negative votes/ratings there would be because of no comparisons between it as it's own show and Star Trek?

And this is something they bring onto themselves.

Wanna tackle Trek? big expectations so you better deliver. As it should be.

 

[zar]

The most recent episode of Orville dropped comedy all together. The comedy elements in Orville are there in varying degrees depending on the episode. It really isn't a foundation of the show.

I wouldn't classify scrubs as a sitcom, nor Chuck. It's a comedic drama, or just more light hearted.

There's a lot of drama in sitcoms, at least some of the ones I grew up with, like Home Improvement, Fresh Prince, et al, but they are still sitcoms.

Thinking about it, Orville isn't even a drama, or comedy, it's "lite-fi."

This was also the first episode written by Brannon Braga. Is that a coincidence? It felt very much like a plain VOY episode, with some MacFarlane humor sprinkled onto the script as an afterthought.

Overall, it still comes off as a sit-com to me most of the time.

 

[BillJ]

Wanna tackle Trek? big expectations so you better deliver. As it should be.

Big expectations shouldn't mean dour with unlikable characters.

 

[Prax]

This was also the first episode written by Brannon Braga. Is that a coincidence? It felt very much like a plain VOY episode, with some MacFarlane humor sprinkled onto the script as an afterthought.

Overall, it still comes off as a sit-com to me most of the time.

Any points of comparisons you'd like to share? Is Chuck a sitcom?

 

[GeekUSACarl]

Yes. Dramedy.

I personally have a hard time considering either "dramedies" if we want we can call any show that has comedy, with any dramatic element a "dramedy" If we want we can call cheers and how I met your mother, and so on and so forth.

But simply calling it a dramedy doesn't speak to the extent of the drama, or the nature of it, or how good it is and certainly doesn't mean it's a "dramatic" show.

But at the end of the day it is a show about a silly crew who get into silly situations and make low brow jokes among some serious situations. It is a liter and sillier effort. Obviously, Discovery is different, it's a drama and an action sci fi show. IMO it has little in common with Orville aside from some aesthetics.

 

[GeekUSACarl]

Big expectations shouldn't mean dour with unlikable characters.

A drama isn't simply filled with likeable characters.

I like many of the characters, I do not like some. That isn't the same as not liking their presentation. I think the characters are well conceived and executed. I like, not liking Lorca. I love to hate that guy. To me that's some true drama and well executed.

I like Burnham and Tilly and Saru.

 

[BillJ]

I thought Braga did well his first time out with "Into the Fold". Every story doesn't have to reinvent the wheel to be done well and be entertaining.

 

[GeekUSACarl]

That word gives me frowny faces inside.

I've read it's been around since the 20's
I kinda don't like it though I understand the point. It certainly requires some context IMO.

 

[Prax]

Also, Discovery just did that time loop episode, that everyone has been comparing to Trek's only other time loop episode, "Cause & Effect" written by the same.

 

[BillJ]

Also, Discovery just did that time loop episode, that everyone has been comparing to Trek's only other time loop episode, "Cause & Effect" written by the same.

I didn't think about that. People calling The Orville unoriginal right after Discovery lifted an episode written by the same person.

 

[eschaton]

While I don't dispute that The Orville is more lighthearted/comedy driven than Trek, to act as if Trek didn't have lighthearted comedy elements is just riduiculous

TOS: The Trouble with Tribbles, a Piece of the Action, I, Mudd, and of course all of STIV
TNG: Most episodes involving Barclay, Lwaxana, or Q. A lot of the conversations involving Data.
DS9: Virtually every Ferengi episode, Our Man Bashir, Trials & Tribbleations, In The Cards, etc.
VOY: Only a few. Bride of Chaotica for sure. Maybe the (bad) Ferengi episode and some of the Q episodes.
ENT: Nada - the show took itself too seriously until it let its hair down a bit in the last season.

 

[BillJ]

ENT: Nada - the show took itself too seriously until it let its hair down a bit in the last season.

"A Night in Sickbay" from season two.

 

[eschaton]

"A Night in Sickbay" from season two.

I see that as more an exercise in character destruction than a comedy per se.

 

[zar]

I see that as more an exercise in character destruction than a comedy per se.

Whatever it was, it certainly wasn't serious.