First previewed here at borg back in March 2019, the first comic book story from the universe of television’s The Orville read in every way like a script that didn’t get produced–an episode that fits nicely into the timeline of the show but didn’t get filmed. As fans await the third season of the series, The Orville: New Horizons, coming to Hulu March 10, 2022, Dark Horse Comics is publishing a two-issue story this fall, The Orville: Artifacts. Written by executive producer David A. Goodman with artwork by David Cabeza and colors by Michael Atiyeh, The Orville: Artifacts keeps the series alive with its unique brand of humor and science fiction design style. Readers will find Ed, Kelly, Gordon, and the rest of the crew looking just like the actors that play them, as they ready themselves for The Orville’s next TV mission. Take a look inside the first issue below.
With a tentative release date in October 2021, Snake Eyes–G.I. Joe Origins is a reboot of the Hasbro G.I. Joe movie series (including 2009’s G.I. Joe: The Rise of COBRA and 2013’s G.I. Joe: Retaliation), intended to be part of a shared universe of features based on Hasbro properties including a host of familiar characters and toys, all coming to the big screen: G.I. Joe: Ever Vigilant, Visionaries: Knights of the Magical Light, M.A.S.K.: Mobile Armored Strike Kommand, ROM: Spaceknight, and Micronauts. Snake Eyes–G.I. Joe: Origins will star Henry Golding (The Gentlemen) as Snake Eyes, Andrew Koji (Fast & Furious 6) as Storm Shadow, Samara Weaving (Ready Or Not) as Scarlett, Úrsula Corberó (The Broken Crown) as Baroness, and Iko Uwais (Wu Assassins) as Hard Master. While we’re waiting for the next movie, a new one-shot story from IDW Publishing called G.I. Joe: Castle Fall continues with characters drawn to conjure the casting of G.I. Joe: Retaliation.
First previewed here at borg back in March, the first comic book story from the universe of television’s The Orville reads in every way like a script that didn’t get produced–an episode that fits nicely into the timeline of the show but didn’t get filmed. Dark Horse Comics is publishing four issues this summer, two two-part stories written by executive producer David A. Goodman with artwork by David Cabeza and colors by Michael Atiyeh. Fans of the show who haven’t already picked them up will want to find the two issues already in comic shops and add the next two to their lists. The feel of the characters is spot-on, every side glance among Ed, Kelly, and Gordon looks like actors Seth MacFarlane, Adrianne Palicki, and Scott Grimes–unusual when sci-fi adaptations these days often don’t feature the drawn characters looking like the actors behind them.
Both stories for Dark Horse’s first foray into The Orville take place between the first two seasons. The first two-issue story, “New Beginnings,” presents some things not necessary for the TV show, but still interesting to see play out, including the rapid growth of Bortus and Klyden’s child Topa, and how that relates to Kelly encountering her new love interest, Cassius, after walking away from Ed at the end of Season One. As fans know, Cassius took on a bigger role in the second season of the show.
Meanwhile Ed and Gordon take off in a shuttle to attend a conference. Gordon is bored with mundane ship tasks, specifically investigating a Magnitar. And Ed can’t get Kelly out of his thoughts. As they learn, sometimes it’s better to be bored. They end up crash landing on a primitive planet, providing readers the adventure and exploration the show really excels at. All the while writer Goodman carefully picks up that banter between Ed and Gordon that provides the backbone of the humor for the show. All told, “New Beginnings” is a great start that will hopefully mean many more years of tie-in comics.
Take a look at a preview of the story, plus a sneak peek at the cover art to Issues #3 and #4, courtesy of Dark Horse Comics:
Look for a more cinematic, episodic second season of The Orvillecoming your way, beginning tonight on Fox. All the crew members are back, Seth MacFarlane as Captain Ed Mercer, Adrianne Palicki as Commander Grayson, Penny Johnson Jerald as Doctor Claire Finn, Scott Grimes as Lieutenant Gordon Malloy, Peter Macon as Lieutenant Commander Bortus, Halston Sage as Lieutenant Alara Kitan, J. Lee as Lieutenant Commander John LaMarr, and Mark Jackson as Isaac.
These series was nominated for and won several awards for its first season, including Best Original Score for Television from the International Film Music Critics Association for the music by Bruce Broughton, John Debney, Joel McNeely, and Andrew Cottee, and a Saturn Award for Best Science Fiction Television Series.
You’re going to want to set your DVR to record the before and after shows tonight and throughout the season to avoid missing episodes getting bumped by football coverage.
Here is the latest preview for season two of The Orville:
The Orville is exactly what you have been waiting for. Not a flat sci-fi parody as the advance press characterized it, it’s more of a take on workplace situational shows like The Office and Office Space, recreating those daily grind obstacles that all of us face, only in a future, outerspace workplace. The result is a visually gorgeous show that takes itself seriously more than it tries to mock anything that came before it. Unlike Galaxy Quest, a fun and beloved parody it has been compared to, The Orville takes off into a new direction altogether. The Orville expands on elements from across all sci-fi, like space battle sequences and planet flyovers using Star Wars-inspired camera angles (including real model ships, not just CGI), completely new and unique aliens (the only thing close to these can be found in Doctor Who), and a fantastic, triumphant musical score from Bruce Broughton that is every bit what you’d expect from the composer of music for Silverado, Tombstone, Lost in Space, Gunsmoke, Dallas, Logan’s Run, and Buck Rogers.
Seth MacFarlane (Ted, Family Guy, Star Trek Enterprise) plays Ed Mercer, the newly appointed captain of the USS Orville. Ed is a once-ambitious officer in a future space force called the Union, who has taken some backward steps resulting from a marriage gone wrong to his new second-in-command, Commander Kelly Grayson, played by Adrianne Palicki (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., G.I. Joe: Retaliation, Supernatural, John Wick). Although the characters’ past together is grim, the writers quickly address the closeness they once had in a bit of comedy banter over a quantum device that speeds up time and in a classic MacGyver moment involving a seed and a hot glue gun. The chemistry they will need for the rest of the series is present from the start. The rest of the cast is a mix of straight man and comic relief, and the writers don’t hesitate to drift them into pure drama when the story calls for it. Scott Grimes (Band of Brothers, Crimson Tide, Star Trek: The Next Generation) plays Helmsman Malloy, a pilot and old friend of Ed who flies by the seat of his pants. Peter Macon (The Shield, Supernatural) is Lt. Commander Bortus, a Moclan (with an incredible prosthetic head) who takes his job seriously and represents the best of the Union, along with Penny Johnson Jerald (Castle, Deep Space Nine) as the ship’s doctor. Mark Jackson is Isaac, an artificial lifeform from Kaylon (who is a character that seems to emerge straight from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy), J. Lee (Family Guy) is navigator LaMarr, who seems to fear the change a new captain might bring, and Halston Sage (How to Rock, Crisis, Goosebumps) is security officer Kitan, a Xeleyan who is young and the physically strongest member of the team.
Enough cannot be said about the alien creations. Bortus and Kitan are perfectly realized. Isaac looks like a classic retro-inspired android. A swimming, floral, three-eyed chief botanist (created by Academy Award-winning visual effects supervisor Robert Legato) is gorgeous and organic, and best of all, not bipedal, as is the gelatinous Yaphit (voiced by Norm McDonald). The villains of episode one, the Krill, are as perfect as sci-fi aliens get (they actually take off and land on planets–a strange but welcome novelty for a sci-fi series), and the seething and charismatic Krill captain (played by Joel Swetow) stumbles into the crew politics in one very funny scene. Even passing background aliens are incredibly detailed compared to aliens of many other sci-fi series.
The new sci-fi comedy Orville is coming soon from Emmy Award-winning executive producer and actor Seth MacFarlane (Ted, Family Guy) and director Jon Favreau (Iron Man, Elf) premieres Sunday, September 10. It’s a parody, but has so many creators from Star Trek (like directors Jonathan Frakes, Brannon Braga, and Robert Duncan McNeill) it looks like the real McCoy. It’s the next science fiction series on our watch list.
This afternoon, Fox showcased the creators and stars at a panel at San Diego Comic-Con, including the reveal of a second trailer for the series. It features more aliens, and more humor. Panelists MacFarlane, Adrianne Palicki, Scott Grimes, Penny Johnson Jerald, Peter Macon, Halston Sage, J Lee, Mark Jackson, and Chad Coleman, and producers David A. Goodman and Brannon Braga were introduced to the crowd in Room 6A of the San Diego Convention Center. The big surprise was the news Charlize Theron will make an appearance in the first season.
Seth McFarlane returns to outer space, playing Captain Ed Mercer, newly tapped commander of The Orville, an exploratory vessel 400 years in our future. Its crew, a mix of alien and human–and better yet, non-humanoid–races, encounters all those trials of space life found only in the lower decks of past sci-fi series. Adrianne Palicki (G.I. Joe: Retribution, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) is the X.O., Captain Mercer’s ex-wife Kelly Grayson, Scott Grimes (Family Guy, Band of Brothers, Star Trek: The Next Generation) is Ed’s best friend Gordon Molloy, Penny Johnson Jerald (Deep Space Nine, Castle) is Dr. Claire Finn, Peter Macon (Supernatural, The Shield) is Bortus, newcomer Mark Jackson is Isaac, J. Lee (Family Guy) is John Lamarr, Halston Sage (Goosebumps) is Alara Kitan, and Norm Macdonald (Saturday Night Live) is the voice of Yaphit.
Check out the official Comic-Con trailer for The Orville:
It’s a parody, but the next science fiction series on your watch list looks just like the real deal.
While the next Star Trek series Star Trek Discovery remains somewhere in the shadows, a new, fully-realized sci-fi universe is heading our way this year on Fox with the new series The Orville. From director Jon Favreau and creator/star Seth McFarlane comes an incredibly well-designed future world full of ships, aliens, cool costumes, and… humor? In the vein of the Star Trek-spoof Galaxy Quest–but with a more finely-tuned science fiction look and feel–the next ship to hit television screens will be the USS Orville.
Seth McFarlane returns to outer space, playing Captain Ed Mercer, newly tapped commander of The Orville, an exploratory vessel 400 years in our future. Its crew, a mix of alien and human–and better yet, non-humanoid–races, encounters all those trials of space life found only in the lower decks of past sci-fi series. Adrianne Palicki (G.I. Joe: Retribution, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) is the X.O., Captain Mercer’s ex-wife Kelly Grayson, Scott Grimes (Family Guy, Band of Brothers, Star Trek: The Next Generation) is Ed’s best friend Gordon Molloy, Penny Johnson Jerald (Deep Space Nine, Castle) is Dr. Claire Finn, Peter Macon (Supernatural, The Shield) is Bortus, newcomer Mark Jackson is Isaac, J. Lee (Family Guy) is John Lamarr, Halston Sage (Goosebumps) is Alara Kitan, and Norm Macdonald (Saturday Night Live) is the voice of Yaphit.
Plus, the series has tapped the real deal for its music, composer Bruce Broughton, who worked on classic TV scores for years–everything from Barnaby Jones to Hawaii Five-O, to Gunsmoke, Amazing Stories, and Buck Rogers in the 24th Century, and memorable movie scores to Silverado, So I Married an Axe Murder, Tombstone, and the Lost in Space remake. Get ready for a surprise–this looks a lot better than we would have guessed–the first trailer for The Orville:
Half animated film come to life, half martial arts movie, in G.I. Joe: Retaliation look for one of the best action sequences ever to hit the big screen. Darker and more grounded in the realities of today’s terrorism themed movies as opposed to the days of action war pictures centered on the Cold War, the sequel to G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra is only slightly less fun than the first live-action look at the action figure-turned-animated show and comic book-turned-action figure again franchise. Whereas Rise of Cobra was steeped in toy references and faithful action figure costume re-creations, Retaliation has a plot that could have been pulled from the 1980s animated series.
After a disaster caused by a conspiracy between Zartan and the evil shadow organization called Cobra wipes out literally every active G.I. Joe but three, it’s up to new top ranking officer Roadblock, played by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson to lead the charge to unravel the conspiracy and save the world. He’s joined in a superbly created, fast-thinking survival maneuver by Flint (D.J. Cotrona) and Lady Jaye (Adrianne Palicki), who must then find their way out of a deep water well. Despite being developed characters from G.I. Joe incarnations past, Flint comes off a bit like Hawkeye in The Avengers and Lady Jaye as the token female Joe in an era you’d think would be long past relying on jokes about women in the service. Still, they both make the best of it and the trio, along with Duke (Channing Tatum), the squad leader of the Joes in Rise of Cobra, they share some good chemistry and laugh out loud moments in the film. If there is any fault in Retaliation it is why the producers thought the plot required eliminating such a pantheon of other great Joe characters who were featured in Rise of Cobra, like Scarlett (Rachel Nichols), Baroness (Sierra Miller), Ripcord (Marlon Wayans), Heavy Duty (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), or General Hawk (Dennis Quaid). It’s also a bit disappointing Bruce Willis’s General Joe Colton didn’t have a few more scenes. Willis, transitioning from action role to the wise general role, steals every scene and a partnership with Dwayne Johnson in another film, G.I. Joe or not, would be a fun thing to see.
