'The Orville' Season 2 Storylines Teased

The return of The Orville on FOX is drawing closer, and the network has revealed some new hints at what fans should expect from the show's sophomore season.

These new details were revealed with FOX's midseason premiere dates announcement. Fans of The Orville likely already knew that the show would return to FOX on Sunday, December 30th after NFL football before returning to its usual Thursday night timeslot on January 3, 2019.

What fans didn't know was what to expect from the coming season. Here's a brief description from the FOX release:

"In Season Two, ED (MacFarlane) and KELLY's (Adrianne Palicki) relationship will take a new turn, while the ship's crew will meet never-before-seen aliens, face old adversaries the Krill, make first contact with a new civilization and revisit the planet Moclus."

Let's break this down a bit.

Ed Mercer and Kelly Grayson are the captain and first officer aboard the Orville. They're also recently divorced after Ed walked in on Kelly cheating with an alien. There was a lot of tension in their relationship at first, and then that tension grew into a "will they or won't' they" get back together scenario after they learned the alien Kelly slept with was literally irresistible. This all came to a head when Ed and Kelly decided to give it another shot, which ultimately led to them realizing they may be better off as co-workers for the time being.

Some fans of The Orville felt that this relationship storyline was going on a bit too long and they were happy to see it get some closure last season. For those fans, the idea that there could be renewed focus placed on the relationship is probably unwelcome news. It is worth noting that one episode of The Orville's first season was held back for season two, so perhaps this is just a leftover story that will put a bow on that previous closure rather than a sign that Ed and Kelly will be the center of season two.

The Krill are the antagonistic aliens from season one that fulfill the same role in The Orville that the Klingons did in the early days of Star Trek. The Krill were most in focus in the episode titled "Krill," in which Mercer and Gordon Malloy had their physical appearances altered to appear Krill so that they could infiltrate a Krill ship, learn more about the Krill culture, and steal a copy of the Krill holy book.

The Krill ship was a mission to bomb a Planetary Union colony and Mercer was forced to kill everyone on board except for the Krill children and their teacher. He allowed the children to return to their homeworld in the hopes that they would grow up to become something other than enemies of the Union, but their teacher warned that after Mercer killed all of their parents that would be unlikely.

Moclus is the homeworld of the all-male Moclan race. It has an extremely harsh climate and is inhospitable to most other races. The last time the Orville visited the planet was to decide the fate of Lt. Cmdr. Bortus and his mate Klyden's child, who was born female.

Are you excited for the new season of The Orville? Let us know in the comments!