Answering a signal on a supposedly dead world, Ed, Kelly, Bortus, Gordon and Talla find themselves put through some bizarre worlds on a weird journey.
Tropes:
- The Alcoholic: Dinal, while in disguise as Talla, tells Kelly that Talla's father is an alcoholic whose devotion to the Union uniform is the only reason why he hasn't completely turned to the bottle. The real Talla makes no mention of this, so it's uncertain if this is true or not.
- Bait-and-Switch: It looks as if the hallucinations are part of a Kaylon experiment to manipulate perceptions and cause dissension for conquest. It turns out to be just another of Dinal's illusions.
- Brand X: Subverted, possibly unintentionally. Atlantic Airways sounds like a generic airline name, but it's actually the national airline of the Faroe Islands. They use a different logo and fly differnet planesnote though.
- Call-Back: Dinal is from the temporally-displaced planet in "Mad Idolatry". From their perspective, it's been 50,000 years since they last encountered the Union.
- Continuity Nod: When the group enters the simulation of the Xelayan lake, Ed is the first one to point out that, if they were really on Xelaya, the gravity would've killed everyone but Talla. It makes sense that he'd point it out: the previous season, he'd almost been crushed to death by Xelaya's gravity.
- Eye Scream: When Gordon gets grabbed by "Randall", Talla (Dinal in disguise) throws part of a bench into the alien's eye.
- Foreshadowing:
- When Ed, Kelly, Bortus and Gordon all have their own out-of-body experience with a close-up of their eyes going blank for a second. Talla gets neither a close-up nor her own situation, piggybacking on Kelly's instead. Guess who turns out to be an imposter!
- While "Talla" is the one to point out that the lake is on Xelaya, Ed is the one who recognizes it as a simulation, as the real Xelaya would've killed everyone but Talla. The real Talla likely would've pointed that out first, seeing as how she's aware of the dangers Xelaya poses to anything not native to it.
- Ignored Expert: Isaac points out that, without knowing what happened to the first landing party, it would be inadvisable to send a second team down to the planet. His suggestion is met with hostility from Charly and irritation from Lamarr, so he just drops the matter when Lamarr repeats his order to assemble a second team.
- Immortality Immorality: Dinal sees nothing wrong with putting the crew through life-threating illusions just so she and her people can feel what impending death is like, and Mercer's attempts to explain it fall on deaf ears.
- Mind-Control Eyes: Each member of the away team gains milky white eyes as they think they're about to die, a side effect of Dinal and her people sharing their consciousness in that moment.
- Mind Screw: The away team can't make heads-or-tails of what is happening on the planet's surface. They're presented with situations that they know aren't real, but have the ability to hurt and kill them, and don't seem to have any thematic connection. Dinal eventually reveals that she was presenting them with life-or-death situations to try and understand what it means to be mortal.
- Non Sequitur Environment: The fake reality created by Dinal has the away team stumble from one environment into the next with little rhyme or reason. First they find themselves in a 21st century high school on Earth, then onboard a passenger jet, then a Moclan morgue, and then a lake on Xeleya. The final simulation avoids it since Ed refuses to walk through a door that simply appears in front of him, forcing Dinal to present him with a believable path back to the Orville with a fake reveal involving a Kaylon holographic projector.
- Oh, Crap!: Kelly has this look on her face upon realizing who Dinal is, when Dinal refers to her as "Our goddess, lord, and savior."
- The Singularity: Dinal's people have evolved beyond death itself and have the power to casually warp reality and create Pocket Dimensions.
- Spotting the Thread: Gordon quickly deduces something is wrong on the flight before everything goes to hell because he can tell that the plane is shifting altitude into turbulence, rather than moving out of it.
- Tron Lines: Dinal's clothing and head feature glowing lines.
- Wham Line:
- Charly telling LaMarr she's getting a call from Talla... only she's not calling from the planet, but from her shuttle still waiting to be picked up at the original rendezvous, having been waiting for hours.
- Dinal revealing who she is.Dinal: Oh, Kelly. Our goddess, lord and savior. Or, more accurately, a simple human woman with a less than simple relationship to our forebears.
- What Does This Button Do?: As they're exploring the Moclan morgue, a panel lights up with a flashing button and Talla inquisitively presses it, opening a casket. Though, seeing as how she was really Dinal controlling everything, she clearly knew what the button did.
- What Year Is This?: During the high school scenario, Gordon asks one of the high school students for the date. When he gives it as the 19th, Gordon tells him that he wants to know what the year is. The student asks him if he's high. He replies that this is what he's trying to find out.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?:
- Dinal muses that the drawback of her species achieving immortality is that they forget what life is truly like and wanted to "experience" the emotions brought about by confronting mortality via the crew.
- Ed confesses that he'd accept immortality if given the choice, as he always wants to know what comes next.
- Year Inside, Hour Outside: For Dinal's universe, as previously shown in "Mad Idolatry", which advances 700 years for every 11 days in the Orville crew's universe. It's been just 2 years for the crew, but on Dinal's planet, it's been 50,000 years. As a result, they now have the technology to warp reality and extend their lifespans indefinitely.
