About a Girl

Here in the comments I see many reasons why this episode was good, or even great, and only a few why it was bad. I was very good entertained by this episode, and I felt from the very beginning (well, that interracial dating joke had to be, hadn't it ?) the sense of Trek as it should be. The ending may be unexpected, but for a show like this, it was simply brave and completely in line of what had to be said to this topic.

And the topic was a very sensitive one. It has multiple layers under the surface, it's, amongst others, about parents making the right decisions for their children. There are a lot of people who suffered from gender change in their early childhood, simply because doctors didn't realize their gender. But that's only one aspect. Another is the question, if one-dimensional thinking, especially when "life-changing decisions" are pending, can be harmful (though indeed well meant).

Everyone should ask him/herself, if in the situation of the baby, how should it be - would it have been better for him/her to be changed or to be let untouched, risking a childhood of being an outcast ? One could talk about this for hours, finding endless other related topics and arguments, therefore I consider this episode as inspiring and thought-provoking, furthermore unpredictable and unconventional (yes too many people think of too many conventions that this show should fit into).

And I am thankful for not being lectured by the morals of this episode but entertained by its thoughtful approach.

And, btw, I was NOT confused about Klyden and the 75 year-rate of born females. I thought it is to be expected that a society would make up this low rate, while in fact it is much higher.

What is the series even about, their species literally has 1 gender, their sexual characteristics are absolutely identical, all that the operation does is get rid of the pathology, the closest analogue is cerebral palsy, incredibly stupid and unsuccessful attempt to make a plot point using an irrelevant premise, they literally want to condemn the creature to a disease using gender as a reason which is in no way related to the issue, this episode would not have worked if the characters faced with the problem tried to explain themselves instead of playing along with the script, the only episode that is hard to take seriously.

I'll keep this short and simple. I'm a HUGE Trekkie. Always have been. And THIS is one of the most Trek episodes of anything that isn't Trek. It feels like TNG's Measure of a Man which is arguably one of the best of Trek. This is an IMPORTANT piece of media in today's world.

Initially I started this series for the comedy, but I found myself impressed by the deeper substance that the show had to offer. This episode explores social, cultural, and ethical issues with an interesting take from both sides of the aisle. What impressed me even more than that however was the outcome. Even though we may know what's right, life isn't fair, and often we have to deal with harsh realities.

This was not a feel good episode but rather a thinking episode. This is made clear by the negative reviews all clearly being emotionally driven or blinded by political bias and completely missing the point.

If you're watching this for laughs, you're not going to enjoy this. It uses humor as a complement but not as something that carries the show whereas any plot line that comes out of shows like Archer is driven out of humor.

This episode cements Orville trying to be a serious take at what Star Trek envisioned. And it did just that. People crying about this and that are literal clowns. Watch this episode or any other episode from Star Trek TOS or DS9 with serious ethical dilemmas. Not all of them end happily, especially when they try to uphold what's best in the long run. This episode is similar in fashion; it addresses some social issue that we might face today (as TOS has done) but approaches it so that you can ask questions and debate about it in ways that isn't so preachy but rather out of core ethics. The sense that we have the ability to choose what is best for us and not have things set in stone and dictated for us.

Obviously the writing is not as deep as Star Trek but they embody the same atmosphere of it. One problem I had with the ep was that a lot of the ways they showed that men and women were equal were superficial and you couldn't apply the same points IRL when seriously talking about the same issues. However it's not scared to tackle and confront these issues.

If you really go back and watch Star Trek TOS, it had a lot of bad tropes/poor writing/bad acting/poor plot lines/deus ex machina's too. Get off your high horse. Not to mention the technobabble. 90% of problems could be described by "There seems to be something interfering with the power relays or warp plasma injectors" and you can "bypass" a seemingly impossible to solve issue by saying "I can adjust the frequency which should force the power couplings to burst!" in Geordi voice.

Just enjoy it for what it is. There aren't many shows like this today.