As the crew investigates an ancient temple on an alien world, Kelly offers to help Topa start prepping to apply to Union Point Academy... only to run into interference from Klyden.
Tropes:
- An Aesop: Topa is depicted as transitioning from male to her true gender identity of female and is much happier afterwards. This mirrors how in present day Earth intersex babies are often altered as a baby to only appear to be either male or female. Later in life this can make these people feel like their body does not match with who they are and causes some to seek treatment to correct what was done in their infancy.
- Appeal to Force: When both Topa and Isaac refuse his demands to abort Topa's gender reassignment surgery, Klyden tries to remove Topa from sickbay by force. Fortunately, being a robot, Isaac is far stronger than Klyden and effortlessly but harmlessly restrains him, forcing him to leave in defeat.
- Big "SHUT UP!": When Bortus admits that Moclus is an imperfect society, Klyden objects and Bortus shouts back "Klyden, you will be silent!"
- Bittersweet Ending: Bortus and Klyden's marriage finally falls apart and Klyden disowns Topa. However, the crew rallies to help Topa live as her true self while Bortus reaffirms that he loves her as she is.
- Brick Joke: A very long one, but two seasons after Bortus was interrupted during karaoke night, we finally get to see him singing, and he does a pretty good job to boot.
- Continuity Nod:
- The episode opens with Ed writing a letter (whom he knows won't receive it, but he still hopes will read some day) to his half-Krill daughter, Anaya, who was established in the episode prior.
- Claire notes that crewmembers are more accepting of Isaac following his suicide attempt in the season premiere, though Charly is still a work in progress.
- Kelly shows Topa a hologram of the trial from "About a Girl".
- Klyden threatens to divorce Bortus "without even the dignity of the sword." It was established in "Primal Urges" that Moclan divorce usually involves one partner killing the other.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: On two separate occasions, Klyden attempts to attack someone, and both times he fails miserably. Kelly performs an admirable bit of self-defense to subdue him, and Isaac merely restrains him with such force that it causes him pain.
- Cut His Heart Out with a Spoon: After restraining Klyden with a hammerlock when he attacks her, Kelly tells him she'll pretend that didn't happen—and that if he ever assaults an officer of the Orville again, she'll rip his arm off and mount it on her wall.
- Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life: Topa states this as the reason he wants to join the Union fleet, that he feels like a bookmark for a real person. This ends up being the first big hint to Kelly that something is very wrong and Topa needs help.
- Disappeared Dad: Klyden divorces Bortus and abandons Topa, ignoring their futile pleas for him not to do so, leaving Bortus a single parent. Of course, Topa still has one father, one much more concerned for her well-being at that, not to mention a surrogate family in the crew.
- Disobeyed Orders, Not Punished: Admiral Howland is forced by the political situation to royally chew out Ed and Kelly for disobeying orders, and the loophole abuse just making them look incompetent. But there is no punishment because technically there was no violation of regulations, and once the official speech ends she says "please give my regards to the Moclan girl".
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: Topa's struggles with an ill-fitting gender identity are a clear metaphor for members of the trans community, while Klyden's continued insistence that they "fixed being malformed" harkens not only to surgical interference with intersex people, but forced conversion therapy.
- Easy Sex Change: Justified: the state of Union medical science makes gender reassignment surgery an outpatient procedure that Isaac is able to perform in an hour or two. The primary concerns about the surgery are not the performance of it, but rather the fact that only one parent is consenting and the Moclans could leave the Union over it.
- Exact Words: The Admiralty makes it clear that a fleet medical officer cannot perform Topa's gender reassignment procedure, lest the Moclans withdraw in protest and leave the Union to face the Kaylon and Krill without them. Ed and the others almost immediately spot the loophole that gives them, but aren't clear on how exactly they can exploit it (Dr. Finn offers to sacrifice her Union career by resigning) until Isaac volunteers to perform the procedure, since he's not a Union officer and can't be disciplined for disobeying Ed's orders.
- Exploited Immunity: Isaac triggers the trap to the burial chamber because his armor can easily deflect the arrows that spray out from the walls, and wouldn't cause irreparable harm even on the off-chance they did penetrate (which one does, barely).
- Later, he uses this as rationale for him performing Topa's reassignment surgery: as he is not a Union officer, he is not bound by regulations or orders and can thus perform the surgery without being punished for it.
- Go Look At The Distraction: Ed arranges a concert by Bortus so everyone on the Orville will attend and be away from Sickbay, where Topa will undergo the procedure. It fails to distract Klyden, who picks up on the ruse, but he can't stop Isaac from performing the procedure.
- Hidden First Act Parallel: Kelly's argument with the nude religious crewmember about his rights and beliefs, after the opening credits, parallels, more harshly, the argument about Topa's rights, and Klyden's beliefs.
- Holiday Episode: The episode was released on the last day of Pride Month.
- Hollywood Science: The science being archeology. The way the crew handles the excavation of the main burial chamber of the tomb they’re investigating in the cold open would drive a real archeologist to tears. Starting with the fact that a booby trap that is still in working order after at least 50,000 years or more would be of as much historical interest as any of the burial goods in the tomb (if not more), and finishing with knocking down the door to the burial chamber.
- Hypocrisy Nod: Invoked when Klyden snaps that Topa is too young to decide her gender and Kelly openly snaps "are you hearing yourself?" Klyden made that choice when Topa was born without her consent.
- I Have No Son!: By the end of the episode this is true for Klyden in both a literal sense — as Topa has had the operation performed on her as an infant reversed, and identifies as female — and a metaphorical one, as he is carrying out his promise to leave Bortus and disowns Topa, even telling her to her face that he wishes she was never born.
- I Reject Your Reality: Klyden tries to reassure Topa that the procedure was necessary and made them well, but it is clear to everyone, even Bortus, that Topa is not well.
- I'll Pretend I Didn't Hear That: A variation when Klyden attacks Kelly and she easily subdues him, sternly warning him that she'll drop the matter and let him leave this time, but will do worse if he decides not to take the offer.
- Internal Reveal: Topa discovers the truth about the forced gender reassignment, thanks to Kelly dropping some hints about where to look and Bortus providing the access key to the file.
- Irony: By having a Kaylon do a surgery to change a male to a female, rather than ruin the alliance with the Moclans, they're more determined to wipe the Kaylon out.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: Klyden tries to stop Isaac from performing the reassignment procedure on Topa, but when Isaac makes it clear he will do it and Klyden is unable to physically restrain him, he retreats.
- Loophole Abuse: The crew is told they cannot allow any Union officer to perform the surgery on Topa. Claire suggests she could resign her commission, but Ed points out that it would be a fairly transparent technicality that no one would buy. Isaac then notes that he was never commissioned; he is still technically an emissary of his people and thus not a Union officer, allowing him to perform the surgery. Since he's already an outcast among his own people and some of the Union, having the Moclans mad at him won't matter (in fact, it ends up making them even more committed to the war effort against the Kaylon). Admiral Howland lampshades after the fact that they were incredibly lucky to get away with this.
- Love Cannot Overcome: Bortus tries to talk Klyden into accepting Topa for who she is, but his prejudice and fear simply won't allow him to do so and he angrily abandons his family.
- Mandatory Line: LaMarr makes a power allocation request early in the episode, and then has no more lines.
- Naked People Are Funny: An ensign follows his race's edict to not wear any clothing on the first day of the month. Meaning he's on duty in the armory stark naked. Kelly convinces him to at least wear pants.
- Not Me This Time: Klyden understandably blames Kelly for giving Topa access to the file on her gender reassignment, which Kelly denies even though she left hints about the file itself. Bortus later reveals that he in fact covertly gave Topa the password, having noticed her attempt to access the file from the bridge and sent it to the terminal in their quarters.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Bortus is usually either stoic or angry, so to see him weep in front of Kelly shows just how much this ordeal is weighing on him.
- Pet the Dog: Though Admiral Howland is understandably furious that Ed and Kelly defied orders, she still asks them to pass along her best wishes to Topa — and uses Topa’s preferred pronouns.
- Plausible Deniability: Invoked by Claire when she offers to resign from the Union to do the surgery on Topa, which means the Union can claim they had nothing to do with this. Isaac takes it a step further, pointing out that he's never been a Union officer to start with, so if he performs the procedure the Union technically had nothing to do with it.
- It's implied that the Moclans, for all their posturing, understand how dangerous leaving the Union would be in the middle of the war, but couldn't let the Union humiliate them without responding. In that sense, Isaac's intervention gives them deniability as well.
- Proscenium Reveal: The episode opens with Topa captaining a Moclan ship fighting the Kaylon. Things go south and a Kaylon fighter tries to ram the ship, at which point the simulation freezes and declares the scenario a failure.
- Put on a Bus: After two seasons of increasing marital discord, Klyden finally leaves Bortus and abandons their child, departing from the Orville for good.
- Realpolitik: While legally, the crew can revert the procedure forced on Topa as a child, they're openly blocked by the Union. Because Topa is already a lightning rod for the Moclan culture, if the surgery goes through, the Moclans are prepared to leave the Union, leaving them severely weakened against both the Kaylon and the Krill. Thus, as much as she hates it, the Admiral must order Claire not to perform the surgery in order to hold the Union together. Isaac turns it on its head: since he's a Kaylon, the Moclan can put the blame on his people, who they're at war with anyway, thus condemning the procedure but maintaining the alliance.
- Ripped from the Headlines: The episode aired amidst continuing efforts by various far-right political groups in the United States to restrict gender-affirming medical care to transgender minors.
- Rule of Symbolism: The episode opens with Topa commanding a ship in battle but it turns out to be a simulation. Like Topa's identity, the situation is a cover on reality and the struggle is a solo one. In the end, after the reassignment surgery, Topa is brought onto the Orville's bridge and welcomed by the crew, showing she is who she's meant to be and surrounded by a strong support network.
- Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: The crew arrange to go ahead with Topa's procedure despite knowing the Union brass aren't going to buy their excuses. Their Loophole Abuse is just enough for the Union to let it slide with a harsh chewing-out.
- Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome: Topa has once again aged rapidly between seasons, now depicted as an adolescent. This also allows for Topa to now be played by a young woman after having previously been played by a male child actor. This is justified, considering she is an alien.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: As has been known to science for a few decades now, gender identity is biologically determined in each individual: even an involuntary gender reassignment and raising someone as a different gender won't affect it, it will just make them miserable. In other words, the Moclans may think they're able to flawlessly turn cisgender females into males, but as Topa proves in this episode, they really can't.
- Suspiciously Apropos Music: In typical Orville fashion.
- Bortus opens his concert with "Nature Boy", which imparts the famous lesson: "the greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return".
- Bortus closes the concert with "You'll Never Walk Alone", his message to Topa as she enters a new chapter of her life. Just to drive the point home, the song gets a Triumphant Reprise in the musical score in the coda.
- Talking Down the Suicidal: Topa questions Isaac about what it was like to have died and been dead in "Electric Sheep". Isaac immediately notifies Kelly, who realizes Topa's gender dysphoria is getting worse and intervenes.
- Temple of Doom: The species that built the tomb is noted to heavily booby trap their structures, most of which are disarmed by the survey team. Activating a panel to the primary burial chamber causes a score of deadly arrows to fire out, and it's built in such a way that it can't be disarmed from the outside. Isaac activates this trap intentionally so his organic compatriots won't be harmed.
- This Is Gonna Suck: Ed and Kelly have this reaction when they're informed that Admiral Howland came with the Newton after they've just ignored orders and wants to speak with them immediately.
- Wham Line:Bortus: I gave him the password.
