Premieres for ‘The Orville’ and ‘The Deuce’
“The Orville” (8 p.m. Sunday, Fox, TV-14) is as odd as its title. It’s supposed to evoke the cando spirit of classic “Star Trek,” but a ship called the Orville does not stir the spirit like one named the Enterprise. The whole series has a similar hesitancy. It’s goofy yet occasionally inspiring, but it’s not enough of either to qualify as a comedy, parody or drama.
Creator and star Seth MacFarlane (“Family Guy”) puts special effects to good use to evoke a world 400 years in the future. Yet it remains a universe of arrested emotional development for grown-up men.
MacFarlane plays Capt. Ed Mercer. He’s first seen returning to New York only to find his wife, Kelly Grayson (Adrianne Palicki), in bed with a blue alien. After a yearlong bender, he’s assigned to captain the Orville.
A rather plodding pilot goes through the motions of introducing the diverse, intergalactic crew. It’s not giving too much away to reveal that Kelly joins the crew, much to Ed’s discomfort, and that the couple come to collaborate and eventually get out of a cosmic jam or two.
At its best, “The Orville” seems to be going through the motions of imitating a Spock- and Kirk-era “Star Trek.” It lacks the rapid-fire pop-culture jokiness of MacFarlane’s cartoons, but there are the occasional lines about penis envy and bathroom humor.
The whole enterprise (so to speak) seems rather decaffeinated.
ALL IN THE DETAILS
If “Orville” uses digital special effects to present a “Star Trek” re-enactment, the ambitious HBO series “The Deuce” (9 p.m. Sunday, HBO, TV-MA) employs spectacular set and production design to re-create Times Square of the early 1970s. The attention to seedy detail is simply stunning.
James Franco, who also serves as an executive producer, stars in this sprawling series as identical twin brothers Vincent and Frankie Martino, who become barkeeps and frontmen for a New York crime family as they become increasingly involved in the sex trade and the porn industry in its infancy.
Maggie Gyllenhaal (“Crazy Heart”) stars as tough and independent prostitute Candy, who is among the first to see the business and even cultural potential of filmed pornography.
“The Deuce” follows pimps, prostitutes, cops and johns in Times Square in an era when “the crossroads of the world” had become an open sewer to many respectable people and at the same time a petri dish for an emerging world of music, film, performance and culture.
Created by David Simon and George Pelecanos (“The Wire”), “The Deuce” takes a remarkably frank and unromantic view of the dangerous demimonde. Pimps control their “women” with mind games and violence; cops are on the take and on the make for the plentiful flesh walking the street; mobsters front bars and peep shows for clientele both gay and straight, providing a “service” that operates on the shady side of the law until changing attitudes bring the illicit into the daylight of social discussion and acceptance as well as big business exploitation.
“The Deuce” is not for everybody. It has a vast cast of characters to introduce and occasionally rubs its viewers noses in the gutter it has (re)created. But that all seems intentional. Some may recoil at its sordid
story, but it’s impossible to deny that this is a remarkable production, not easily forgotten.
WOMAN IN PERIL
Apparently, getting your groove back can be bad for your health. That’s the lesson of “A Lover Betrayed” (8 p.m., Lifetime Movies), a film that teaches us no feelgood deed goes unpunished.
Jamie Luner (“Melrose Place”) stars as Tess Ford, a mother whose marriage fell apart after the accidental death of her 11-year-old son. After her divorce and a long period of bereavement, she pulled herself together to become an author, expert and blogger who reaches out to other women who have gone through a similar tragedy.
As “Betrayed” begins, Tess is ready to move on with her emotional life and meets a handsome, seemingly perfect soldier at a book signing.
In a Hallmark Channel movie, this might be the end of the story. But Mr. Perfect (Brent Antonello, “Hit the Floor”) turns out to be a psycho stalker who puts Tess’ life in danger. Worse, nobody believes her. In fact, the police are led to believe that she is the stalker. After all, she’s the one with the “issues.” Look for this woman in peril to take up arms against a sea of troubles!
WEB SHORT ON SYFY
Syfy offers a 13-episode marathon of the web short series “Con Man” (10:05 p.m. today to 1:25 a.m. Sunday, TV-MA) about Wray Nerely (Alan Tudyk), a scifi celebrity has-been who tries to relive his 15 minutes of fame on the fan convention circuit.
TODAY’S HIGHLIGHTS
› College football action includes Auburn at Clemson (7 p.m., ESPN), Oklahoma at Ohio State (7:30 p.m., ABC), Georgia at Notre Dame (7:30 p.m., NBC), Stanford at USC (8:30 p.m., Fox).
› Charting a map of the emerging web on “Halt and Catch Fire” (9 p.m., AMC, TV-14).
› A lab mix comforts a troubled child on “Rescue Dog to Super Dog” (10 p.m., Animal Planet).
Contact Kevin McDonough at kevin. tvguy@gmail.com.