By Jonathan Klotz | Published
The Orville It may have originally been marketed as a Star Trek parody by the mastermind behind it Family manSeth MacFarlane, but by the time the third season finally aired in 2022, it had long since become one of the best science fiction shows of the decade. “Twice in a Lifetime,” the sixth episode of season three, proved that a series whose pilot features a discussion about urinating aliens is capable of emotional heights that most series never reach. To this day, fans debate the episode’s ending and whether our heroes actually made the right decision.
Twice in life
“Twice in a Lifetime” is an episode that revolves around Gordon (Scott Grimes) and serves as a sequel The Orville Standout Season 2: “Lasting Impressions.” At that time, Gordon created a holographic program based on information from a phone placed in a time capsule in Saratoga Springs, New York, in 2015. The woman, Laura Huggins (Leighton Meester), becomes the woman of Gordon’s dreams, and he falls in love with her digital pastime, but ultimately lets her go.
The second time, Gordon doesn’t fall in love with the digital version of Laura, but is transported back in time thanks to the Aronov device, which messes up the time stream again. Abandoned in 2015, Gordon sets out to find the real Laura Huggins, meets her, falls in love again, has children with her and is able to live his perfect life. The Orville, on a mission to rescue Gordon before he destroys the timeline, lands in 2025, where Ed (Seth MacFarlane) and Kelly (Adrianne Palicki) confront their navigator.
An act of betrayal
The Orville Things only really took off when the stories started to focus on the characters and less on playing around with sci-fi tropes, but here under the watchful eye of producer Brannon Braga, the man responsible for some of them Star Trek: The Next Generation best episodes, it’s the perfect mix of both. There is no true villain in Twice in a Lifetime, and the climax is an intense debate between Gordon, who argues for that perfect life, and Ed and Kelly, who insist that the timeline must be preserved.
Given how the Season 2 finale plays out, it’s ironic that Ed and Kelly take the stance they do, especially since Gordon explains he spent three years alone in the wilderness, avoiding all contact with humans to keep the timeline intact. In another series, Ed and Kelly could have finally won Gordon over with a superior, logical argument about the needs of the many. But The Orville is structured differently and the true resolution is a shocking, heartbreaking act of betrayal.
The Orville is refueled and ready to jump through time again. He goes back to 2015, before Gordon met Laura, and picks him up from the wilderness after just four months away. This version of Gordon is happy to be back. 2025 Gordon went back to his family, hugged them, told them he loved them, and enjoyed a few moments before they were all erased from the timeline when 2015 Gordon was brought back to the year 2422. There, Ed and Kelly explain the year 2015 to Gordon, what really happened, how he found Laura and how he lived his dream life in the past.
Nobody is right and nobody is wrong
There are a significant number of The Orville Fans who think Ed and Kelly are villains for robbing Gordon of his perfect life and then telling him about it so he can feel the loss all over again for the first time when they turn back to the real time. Considering her past adventures in the timeline have changed the future twice, it feels hypocritical and cruel to do something like this to Gordon.
Seth MacFarlane has continued to do interviews and appearances because, in his opinion, we never saw the life Laura would have had if Gordon hadn’t appeared in the past. Was her life better or did Gordon’s arrival change her future and take her down a completely different path? The worst thing about MacFarlane’s attitude is also what makes The Orville So good that he’s right, but it feels wrong, and that moral conundrum is what makes the series so fascinating, even years later.
There are more episodes of The Orvilleespecially both parts of “Identity” that someone likes best, but nothing hits as hard as “Twice in a Lifetime.” Gordon, the comical character who masks his insecurities with alcohol, was rarely in the spotlight, and when he was, Scott Grimes made sure he was the best in every single scene, giving us one of science’s greatest highlights. Five time travel episodes ever filmed.