Line #10 Recap/TheOrvilleS2E10BloodOfPatriots


1	As Ed and the Union try negotiating a lasting peace with the Krill due to the Kaylon threat, an old academy friend of Gordon's turns up alive, putting the already tense peace in danger of breaking.
2	----
3	!!Tropes:
4	* GloveSnap: After delaying the boarding Krill members for as long as possible, going as far as to come up with every boarding check she could thing of (and even making a few up), Security Officer Talla Keyali is asked to stall the Krill for five more minutes. She proceeds to put on a latex glove and gives it a good snap after which all three Krill members gasp in unison.
5	* AbandonShip: Gordon jumps out of the shuttle in a space suit when Orrin activates the bomb.
6	* AlienBlood: Envall blood is yellow. It also reacts explosively with nitrogen, which is common on most habitable worlds.
7	* AllAccordingToPlan: Gordon shoots Talla as he and Orrin sneak off the ''Orville''. She gets back up, revealing that it was all a part of a ruse to lull Orrin into a sense of security. She does grouse, however, that Gordon could have put his blaster to a lower setting.
8	* BeingTorturedMakesYouEvil: Orrin spending twenty years in a Krill prison after they killed his family has driven him to get revenge no matter the cost.
9	* BetterToDieThanBeKilled: Orrin would rather blow himself up than accept Gordon's offer to save his life, because the Union likely would have approved his extradition once they learned he really was responsible for blowing up several Krill destroyers, which would have been a death sentence far more terrible than going out on his own terms.
10	* BittersweetEnding: The treaty is signed between the Krill and the Union, but to get it done, Gordon had to lose his old friend who saved his life 20 years ago and spent most of that time as a Krill prisoner, a fate that's implied Gordon also ended up avoiding as a result.
11	* BizarreAlienBiology: The Envall have blood which reacts explosively with nitrogen, an element that is pretty common in the atmosphere of any species that breathe. Their atmosphere is able to negate the effect, so they came to an agreement with the Union to stay away from Union worlds with significant atmospheric nitrogen. Apart from that detail, it's implied they and the Union are on good terms.
12	* CallBack: When the Krill point out that Orrin is responsible for the death of 1200 Krill, Ed calmly recalls the Krill being perfectly fine with wiping out a peaceful Union colony of hundreds of thousands not too long ago. The Krill deliberately fail to acknowledge that.
13	* TheCameo:
14	** Creator/RobinAtkinDownes (a.k.a. [[VideoGame/EmpireAtWar Grand Admiral Thrawn]]) as Captain Jackazh.
15	** John Fleck (aka [[Series/StarTrekEnterprise Silik]]) as the Krill ambassador.
16	* ContinuityNod: The episode opens with Yaphit getting a medal for his actions in [[Recap/TheOrvilleS2E8E9Identity the previous episode]], before the main plot of the episode starts up.
17	* DeadPersonImpersonation: Orrin's daughter Leyna died in the Krill attack 20 years ago along with his wife. The young woman he's traveling with is really a HumanAlien whose blood can be weaponized.
18	* EnemyMine: Averted. Just because they face a common enemy doesn't mean the Krill are ready to accept the Union as equals. They still have their near-fanatic sense of superiority and know full well how the Union needs them.
19	* {{Foreshadowing}}:
20	** The Krill captain mentions Orrin holding an ultimate weapon on the shuttle he stole. Turns out the ultimate weapon isn't an object, but a person, namely an Envall.
21	** Leyna does not want to be scanned when Dr. Finn approaches her after Orrin crashes the shuttle, and for good reason too.
22	** The movie that Gordon and Leyna are watching near the middle of the show, ''Film/PlanetOfTheApes1968'', foreshadows Leyna as the weapon, as Charleton Heston's character in the movie exclaims the famous line "YOU BLEW IT UP!".
23	** Even the title of the episode itself is a clever foreshadowing. The "Blood of Patriots" refers to the explosive blood of Layna, a patriot, albeit an extremist patriot.
24	* GunStruggle: When Orrin reveals his true plan to Gordon, a fight ensues over Gordon's blaster, which Gordon wins.
25	* HiddenInPlainSight: Orrin's "daughter" Leyna is in fact his weapon, since in reality she's an Envall, whose blood can be converted into a powerful explosive fairly easily. She was able to avoid a medical scan (which would have outed her as not human) by pretending to be traumatized by Krill scientists, until her story was blown by Talla noticing needle marks on her arm.
26	* INeedAFreakingDrink: Gordon downs a shot of scotch before admitting to Talla that Orrin wants to steal a shuttle.
27	* IOweYouMyLife: Gordon outright says this to Orrin. The latter then uses this in an attempt to persuade Gordon to join him. However, when Orrin admits that he wants Gordon to take part in a SuicideAttack, Gordon points out that it sorta undoes the whole "saving my life" thing.
28	* IrrevocableOrder: Orrin's bomb. Once activated, the countdown can't be stopped.
29	* LiteraryAllusionTitle: The episode's title refers to a well-known quote by UsefulNotes/ThomasJefferson, "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
30	* MakeItLookLikeAStruggle: Gordon sells his supposed attempt to help Orrin by stunning Talla.
31	* MandatoryLine: Interestingly, coming off [[Recap/TheOrvilleS2E8E9Identity "Identity,"]] Isaac only gets a couple of lines here.
32	* MuggingTheMonster: Played with. Leyna holds a knife to Talla's throat. Talla responds by asking if she's ever met a Xelayan before, and then [[SuperStrength tosses her into the nearest wall one-handed.]] Talla looks ''completely'' unimpressed... before Claire arrives, spots the Envall blood, and points out that this woman is incredibly dangerous in her own right.
33	* NoodleIncident: We never learn what specifically the Krill did to earn Leyna's enmity, only that she has "her own reasons" for hating them.
34	* OhCrap: Finn, when she sees Leyna's yellow blood and realizes that they have seconds to prevent an explosion that could cripple or destroy the ''Orville''.
35	* {{Realpolitik}}: The Union and the Krill don't have an extradition treaty, but the admiralty considers handing Orrin over to the Krill should he turn out to be guilty of destroying their ships if it will help the peace process.
36	* RedemptionRejection: Gordon tries to save Orrin's life when his plot is foiled, but Orrin is too far gone and opts to blow himself up rather than admit defeat.
37	* ShellShockedVeteran: After losing his wife and daughter and spending years in a Krill POWCamp, it's no surprise that Orrin isn't at all sanguine about the idea of a peace treaty.
38	* ShoutOut:
39	** The basic plot of the episode is like "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS4E12TheWounded The Wounded]]" from ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', in which Miles O'Brien is reunited with his former captain, who has gone rogue against the Cardassians.
40	** Orrin himself also has similarities to Tahna Los from the ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' episode "Past Prologue" -- a prisoner who escapes on a small ship that our heroes rescue and who turns out to be friends with a main character, whom he then tries to manipulate into blowing something up only for said friend to stop him.
41	** The concept of Leyna's explosive blood also harkens back to the ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' episode "Basics, Part 1", where a Kazon, a recurring gang-like enemy, activates an explosive compound in his blood in order to disable the ship to allow its capture.
42	*** There was also a ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'' episode where religious fanatics use explosives in their blood to hijack the ship and attack another religious faction.
43	* SuddenlyVoiced: Leyna pretends to be mute, but when she realizes her cover is about to be blown, her personality changes completely and she threatens Talla with a knife.
44	* SuicideAttack: Orrin tries to do this with Gordon's help, since without the Krill shuttle he doesn't have a delivery system for his makeshift bombs.
45	* SunkCostFallacy: Orrin thinks the treaty is an insult to everyone who died in the war, making their deaths "meaningless", even though it could lead to fewer deaths in the future.
46	* ThatManIsDead: In the end, Ed tells Gordon he's sorry about Orrin's death. Gordon simply replies that the Orrin he knew died a long time ago in a Krill prison.
47	* WarIsHell: It's mentioned more than once that war is hell and that peace isn't an easy thing for those who have been victims of the war between the humans and the Krill.
48	* WhamShot: Leyna gets a nosebleed after being thrown into the wall, and the blood is yellow.
49	* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: Last we see and hear of Leyna, she's been sealed in her quarters by a forcefield. The episode never explains what they did with her, though it is likely they handed her over to the Krill: she is not under Union protection, and she is the surviving person responsible for the destruction of the Krill ships.
50	* TheWorfEffect: [[AvertedTrope Averted]] twice by Talla. When Gordon shoots her it looks like a straight example, but it was AllAccordingToPlan. Later, when Leyna has a knife at her throat, Talla calmly smashes her against a wall. She even throws in some [[DeadpanSnarker snark]].

Context Recap / TheOrvilleS2E10BloodOfPatriots