‘Star Trek: Lower Decks’ Set For August Premiere

Set phasers to laugh?
According to Star Trek: Lower Decks executive producer Mike McMahon, the animated Star Trek series will debut August 6th on CBS All Access. The program, not to be confused with Nickelodeon’s planned Star Trek cartoon, is aimed at an older audience and tells the tale of Ensigns Mariner (Tawney Newsome), Boimler (Jack Quaid), Rutherford (Eugene Cordero), and Tendi (Noël Wells). Assigned to the U.S.S Cerritos — a Starfleet vessel of the late 24th Century — the group must attend to their duties while the usual Star Trek goings-on occur up on the bridge. Can they face those challenges and still have an active social life? The ship’s command staff includes the voices of Dawnn Lewis, Jerry O’Connell, Fred Tatasciore and Gillian Vigman.
McMahon suggests viewers watch every episode of the previous Star Trek series — we presume that includes the 1970s Star Trek animated series — in anticipation of Lower Decks‘ launch. Expect references to go deep and fast in this program.
Despite its animated and comical nature, Lower Decks is part of CBS All Access plan to have new Star Trek content year round. Although the COVID-19 epidemic may prevent this from occuring for another year, the platform expects to run new seasons of the show, Star Trek: Discovery, Star Trek: Picard, Star Trek: Strange New World and a Section 31 series staring Michelle Yeoh in a sequence which allows them to offer a new episode of one of these shows every week.
It remains to be seen, of course, if Lower Decks will fit with the rest thanks to its comedy nature. Though Star Trek can be wildly funny — sometimes even intentionally — its thought of more for its dramatic chops. But the quality will be apparent when the new series debuts on August 6th.