I’ve been sitting on the script for Orville’s first episode for a little over a month now. I didn’t review it for several reasons, first being that it could have been an early draft, and therefore not anywhere near the quality of the final project. I also didn’t want to accidentally ID the leaker by mentioning a detail that was only in that specific copy. My initial thoughts were not good. The main character was dull, the jokes were stale, and the premise was problematic at best. And certainly the facial the main female character gets in the very first scene – a sex act so demeaning even the most seasoned porn stars can’t make it seem like anything but uncomfortable – would be written out by production time. I also didn’t understand how such little material could fit forty-five minutes of airtime. This was a twenty-two minute comedy at most.

Now that I’ve seen the aired episode I can say definitively, and disappointedly, that the script I read was the one they shot, TV censor-friendly bukakke and all. The only real revelation is how they stretched this thing out to an hour: everyone. talks. really. slow.

Orville is everything every other review has made of it: a ponderous and vapid slog that wants to be taken seriously as is plies us with rejected Family Guy jokes. There are tipsy navigators, drinks spilled on bridge consoles, generic warrior aliens, and holodeck scenes every bit as dull as the ones you’d see on Voyager. It’s a Star Trek parody that wants to stand on it’s own two feet. It has top of the line CG and makeup effects and expansive exteriors mixed with internal sets that are as flatly lit as an office cubicle and more cardboard looking than anything made in the 80’s or even the 60’s. It demands sci-fi credibility while leaning on “it’s only a comedy” to avoid real criticism. Other than the opening sex scene, Orville plays it incredibly safe with very little to offend, rile, or even excite the viewer.

But the biggest problem with Orville is probably why it’s defenders, many of whom have proclaimed it “better than Discovery” before having seen either, will still lap it up: the main character is an aggrieved white guy. Captain Ed Mercer is as dull and witless as his name and not very good at his job. He’s every working-class schlub who’s ever been on TV since Ralph Kramden, only now he’s in charge of a space ship. Even though there’s nothing interesting about him we’re somehow supposed to feel his pain as we see him make weak decisions, get berated by his boss, disrespected by his crew, and cheated on by his wife. This last bit is the most important part of Ed’s sympathy-based characterization because it is this very ex-wife, Commander Kelly Grayson – the one that got splooged on by her alien lover in scene one – who is assigned as his first officer.

Two antagonistic exes forced to work with each other? Comedy gold, right? Maybe in more skilled hands, but here it just comes off as sad and depressing and indicative of why Seth MacFarlane is the worst person to be writing “optimistic” speculative fiction. Kelly is smart, ambitious, and all around awesome – everything her ex-husband isn’t. At the end of the episode it’s her solution that saves the day. She should be captain. The problem is she’s forever beholden to Ed because of her transgression. It doesn’t matter that Ed is a complete doofus that she should never have married in the first place. The ungrateful bitch cheated on him. In the twisted universe of a dudebro like MacFarlane, who used his time as Oscars host to reduce all the actresses to their body parts in song form, it’s a sin that can never be forgiven no matter how dysfunctional the relationship that caused it was. This dooms Kelly to a supportive and subordinate role, forever lifting up the incompetent man she wronged, and we’re all meant to believe she deserves it. In the end, when Kelly is apologetically discussing her reassignment, Ed makes it seem like he’s making this overture of forgiveness by asking her to stay when, in actuality, he needs her just to function.

To quote one of Seth’s own heroes: Is this your utopia? Your grand vision of the future?