The Orville: Domino

July 28, 2022 12:01 AM - Season 3, Episode 9

The creation of a powerful weapon puts the crew — and the entire Union — in a political and ethical dilemma.

Also Bortus and Klyden back in peak form and hungry for walnuts.

posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit (9 comments total)

This episode goes hard. You think there's been a lot at the midway point?

The entire back half has zero breaks.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 12:01 AM on July 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

This is another episode with no B plot. I am good with it. Once the setup is established the ride is on. Charlie's arc is earned and Isaac's response, weirdly, feels right.

I am left wondering, is this the first straight-up badmiral episode or do the ethical questions about what to do leave that up in the air?
posted by Ignorantsavage at 3:23 AM on July 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

How is Orville more serious than Star Trek now?

I like. Very nice.
posted by Marticus at 3:30 AM on July 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

I wish the space/air fighting sequence could have been truncated or avoided. Charly's loss would have been more meaningful if it was not one among probably thousands on the Union (and, I guess I should say, Kaylon) ships that were destroyed in the fighting. So not only do the large scale and fast moving battles continue to do nothing for me personally, it also .. dilutes, I guess? .. the actual tragedy we should be feeling about Charly.

.. and it does seem like the space/air fighting could have been totally dispensed with, as well. Have Kaylon Prime on Earth at the time of the theft (formal ratification of the Kaylon surrender requires its presence), and of course it is taken as an observer when The Orville does recon at Draconis 427 (which is NOT surrounded by a swarm of Kaylon and Moclan ships). The same group can set down outside the facility in the cloaked shuttle, and while you still have all the shooting & hand to hand combat that was in the episode, you can just skip the tedious CGI battle sequences that are supposed to feel exciting and stakes-raising but really aren't.
posted by the antecedent of that pronoun at 1:28 PM on July 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

This was a really good episode. I agree the space battle sequences don’t do much. I really like the “the Orville is totally outmatched and runs away or does something clever” scenes, so I’m not anti-space battle. These big ones just seem boring, somehow. I think I’d like them more if there was more damage and less destruction, if that makes sense? Like I’m always comparing the rate of loss of what’s on the screen with how long the battle actually goes. Ships onscreen die fast on this show.
posted by BeeDo at 2:09 PM on July 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

This whole season has been fun and interesting, but all the episodes feel about 20% too long. A bit more editing would have been a great improvement.
posted by GhostintheMachine at 2:48 PM on July 30, 2022 [3 favorites]

When Charley said "I'm here, Amanda," I started sobbing, and every time I remember her saying it I start sobbing again. I have a lot going on right now so that might make it hit harder. But boy. This was one heck of an episode in an already stellar season.
posted by rednikki at 6:18 AM on August 1, 2022 [2 favorites]

Every episode this season has been 60-90 minutes long and most of them could have been great at 45 minutes. The bloat has made it really hard to watch for me.

That said, solid ongoing arcs for the universe and for the characters.

I'm glad Charley is gone though. She was defined by her racism and the show never really redeemed her for me.
posted by crossoverman at 5:35 AM on August 6, 2022 [2 favorites]

Charly literally sacrificed herself to destroy the weapon that would have wiped out the species she was racist about. If that's not redemption what could be? But that's just the literal plot; I agree the emotional hits of her story didn't work great.

What I was really hoping for was that Charly was pulling a trick and wasn't actually destroying the weapon but instead helping it go off. Not that I want to see the Kaylon wiped out but it sure would have been an interesting twist. Maybe the weapon only sort of worked and the Kaylon are somehow changed to be interesting and dangerous in a different way; warring factions following different leaders, or greatly damaged and reduced to guerilla resistance. But nope, nothing that weird happened.

This was an impressive show full of effects and intricate plotting and exciting galaxy-spanning consequences. All executed so well. But then it fell sorta flat, like a decent middlebrow movie instead of something really good. Maybe tighter editing would have done and less excitement over all the space battle effects shots. I like the suggestion above the whole episode could have been written without the space battles entirely, but then they clearly wanted to do the big effects shot. Their Star Wars trench run homage. I was entertained!
posted by Nelson at 6:47 AM on August 14, 2022