Bruce Willis has a secret movie in the Star Trek parody The Orville

Seth MacFarlane is now (and maybe always will be) best known as the man behind his massive animated hit shows “Family Guy” and “American Dad.” MacFarlane's work now rivals the likes of The Simpsons and South Park in terms of longevity and staying power in pop culture. But MacFarlane is more than that, as evidenced by his live-action love letter to “Star Trek,” aka “The Orville.”

The series, which has a total of three seasons as of this writing, premiered on Fox in 2017. Later, “The Orville” moved to Hulu for its third seasonwhich undoubtedly changed the show for the better, but that's a whole other issue. In its second season, when it was still on Fox, it actually featured a cameo from none other than action maestro Bruce Willis. That said, viewers would be forgiven for not noticing him.

Willis lent his talents to an episode titled “Deflectors”, which was the seventh episode of Season 2, which aired on Valentine's Day 2019. It seems fitting given what happens in said episode. This sees a famous engineer from Moclus come aboard the Orville to improve the ship's deflectors. Hence the title. He tells Talla (Jessica Szohr) that he is attracted to her. However, Moclus' attraction to women is regretted, resulting in a prison sentence.

As part of the episode B storyline, Kelly (Adrianne Palicki) had broken up with Cassie (Chris Johnson). An old friend of Cassie's named Grogan, who is essentially a large flower of an alien race known as the Everyman, sneaks aboard the Orville to try to convince Kelly to give him another chance. This alien flower is voiced by none other than Die Hard and Armageddon star Bruce Willis himself.

The clip above gives a glimpse of what Willis had to offer on “The Orville.” On the one hand, it sounds very much like the actor so many of us have come to know and love. On the other hand, because he's so laid-back and clearly having fun, it's a little hard to pin it down at first without letting him know what it is. That's part of what makes it such a fun episode, but it's also what makes it a fun recent addition to the actor's impressive career.

Willis is largely known for his action roles thanks to his breakout role in Die Hard. However, great things have happened in his career when he has stepped out of that zone. “The Sixth Sense”, one of the biggest hits of his careeris a great example. So even though the role is brief, MacFarlane giving Willis a chance to flex his comedic muscles as an alien flower is quite a change of pace.

Over the past few years, Willis has become more associated with direct-to-video clips, which, to put it mildly, were often less than stellar. A lot of it had to do with the fact that the actor wanted to put as much out there and work as hard as he could while he could. in 2022 it was announced that Willis was giving up acting after being diagnosed with aphasia. In which case, this short, odd role somehow feels a little more special in retrospect.

“The Orville” is now streaming on Hulu, or you can grab the show on DVD from Amazon.