'Star Trek: Lower Decks' Trailer Boldly Goes To The "Funnest Frontier"

Star Trek: Lower Decks boldly takes the sci-fi franchise where no series has gone before: into the animated comedy realm. The animated comedy series from Rick and Morty writer and Solar Opposites co-creator Mike McMahan is certainly a new frontier for the Star Trek franchise, which is mostly known for its serious live-action sci-fi fare. But Star Trek: Lower Decks aims to give a new perspective on the long-running franchise, taking you below the bridge to follow a group of ineffectual crew members. Watch the official Star Trek: Lower Decks trailer below.

Star Trek: Lower Decks is unlike any Star Trek series we've seen before: it's goofy, animated, and features a cast of characters who barely ever set foot on the bridge, where most of the action usually takes place in a typical show. Instead, we get to see the "scrappy underdogs" who work the lower decks of the U.S.S. Cerritos, an unimportant fleet ship. But that's where all the fun (and comedy) happens, as one character says, calling their work "the funnest frontier." It's like a whole series based on Sam Rockwell's character in Galaxy Quest.

"I'm never gonna write a serious Star Trek, so the way that we handled it is it's on a ship that isn't the capital ship," McMahan told us in a recent interview. "It's not about the bridge crew. It's about the lowest officers on that ship. But when we're breaking stories for the lower decks, every episode also has a proper Star Trek episode that's happening to the bridge crew, and our lower deckers aren't involved in it. However, you can't have a big sci-fi thing happening on a starship and not have it effect them because that's their whole world. So if you're watching Lower Decks, you're getting a full Star Trek episode from the perspective of people who are having their own social and emotional stories and their own sci-fi stories, but they just aren't on the bridge. They don't have the information the bridge is getting, and they don't have the responsibility."

Star Trek: Lower Decks stars the voices Tawny Newsome, Jack Quaid, Noël Well, Eugene Cordero, Dawnn Lewis, and Jerry O'Connell.

Here is the synopsis for Star Trek: Lower Decks:

"Star Trek: Lower Decks" premieres August 6, only on CBS All Access. Developed by Emmy Award winner Mike McMahan ("Rick and Morty," "Solar Opposites"), "Star Trek: Lower Decks", a new half-hour animated comedy series, focuses on the support crew serving on one of Starfleet's least important ships, the U.S.S. Cerritos, in 2380. Ensigns Mariner, Boimler, Rutherford and Tendi have to keep up with their duties and their social lives, often while the ship is being rocked by a multitude of sci-fi anomalies.

Star Trek: Lower Decks premieres on CBS All Access on August 6, 2020.