The Orville - About a Girl - Review + POLL

After the banning of 'Partial Terms of Endearment,' the season 8 abortion themed finale of Family Guy, it was to be expected that MacFarlane's next attempt at exploring a controversial theme - as was in this past episode of The Orville - would be a relatively tame one.

'About a Girl' explored the issue of gender and cultural values. Though not as controversial as abortion, the issue was still a serious one that brought up some thought provoking questions, all without the crude humour that we expect from MacFarlane with a theme like this.

To us, as humans, putting a baby through a sex change is completely unethical, there is no argument about it, but would it be in our right to interfere in the matters of another race that sees otherwise?

In one of the more important scenes in 'About a Girl,' Captain Mercer says, it is easy to judge one's way of life because it is alien to our culture.

Mercer uses the example of having a baby with three legs and how we would remove it with no qualms, despite it being unethical to other alien cultures that have three legged species. Yes, the argument can be made that it is not the same as changing a baby's sex at birth, but again, that can only be said out of our own cultural beliefs.

While some may disagree with the ending in that it wasn't a happy, the humans win the trial type of climax, I think it was the ending that was needed and the one that made most sense. There are some things engrained in culture, and hardwired in our own mindsets as a result, that just can't be changed. For Moclan culture in the world of Orville, woman have never been seen as equal to men, why should it change in one trial?

An episode like 'About a Girl' takes guts to do, and it is a sticky issue that was handled very carefully and thought provokingly in this episode.

With regards to the humour, there was just enough to keep the episode from getting too serious - though most of it was very understated. Lt. Bortus being inspired by Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and him exaggerating the situation (the euthanization of Rudolph) provided some chuckles.

However, it was Palicki this episode who had the best lines from, ""hey doc, I'm not feeling well, I've had the tits all day," to her quoting Beyonce, were some of the best laugh out loud moments.

Many reviewers will continue to complain though about how this is not what they expected, or that the writers of The Orville don't know what they want the show to be, but what is wrong with having a drama with comedic elements? One that is not afraid to explore controversial issues, and with care and a lot of heart to boot?

I think this was a very important episode that makes us question who we are as humans, and I applaud Macfarlane and crew for giving viewers an episode like this early on in The Orville's premiere season.


9/10

What did you think of this unexpectedly serious episode, 'About a Girl?' Leave your thoughts below and vote in the poll!