MRW I finally watch Lower Decks and realize that "adult animation" doesn't mean "boring to children", and just means "violence, profanity, and sophomoric humor"

I think you might be in a minority on your dislike of Lower Decks.

Also, violence has always been part of Star Trek and if you don't like profanity, you are posting in the wrong fucking place.

I guess the secondary directive of the Federation is to gatekeep having fun?

Animation isn't for children by default. Only boring, unimaginative people talk that way about animated stories.

Star Trek has always had violence.

Star Trek has often had profanity. In another alien language sure, but we all knew which Klingon words were curses.

Does sophomoric humor graduate to senior humor when it's subtle enough that you didn't catch it as a child? Humor is SUPER subjective and VERY sensitive to the current zeitgeist, so comparing humor across a franchise that has been around this long seems a little absurd. Data pushed Crusher into the ocean for a laugh, that seems pretty sophomoric to me. Bones regularly joked about Spock's racial differences, that also seems pretty crude by today's standards.

Well now I have to check it out

Let me lead with this: I've also grown tired of the samieness of adult animation genre. Rick & Morty was alright for a while, but that ship was basically sailed for me by the time other shows started jumping on the trend. I appreciate what R&M/Adult Swim did in opening up the field for animation to be taken more seriously in the pitch room, we'll probably have an entire generation of decent media because of that, but we've kind of hit the trough of this first wave. That said, I liked Lower Decks a lot, because it kind of got rid of the high-stakes high-adventure selling point and zoomed in on the stakes and adventures that every day, non-galaxy class Starfleet crews can get into. It's DS9 but with the adult animation vibe instead of the daytime TV soap opera vibe. I love the introduction of the Cali class ships that are just sort of your regular, everyday, multi-role ships. I love that the Cali fleet and the Cerritos are largely just focused on the normal, unglamorous stuff that has to happen in the background while the really cool people and ships do cool stuff in space.

I also liked that the permission to be goofy and work with low stakes felt like it gave Star Trek the room it needs to breathe. It's hard to do serious new Trek that meaningfully expands the canon while also respecting what came before, which, I think, is why we tend to get a higher ratio of prequels. It's just easier and safer to stay within the bounds of the canon and tell Captain Pike's story (I fucking love SNW, not dissing it). Case and point for new Trek, you've got Discovery, which I haven't really enjoyed because it very much feels like it doesn't have room to breathe and/or was written by focus groups. Maybe it gets better later, but I watched the first two episodes and found it less enjoyable than auditing lectures. LD's characters and premise felt much more interesting by comparison, and I've really enjoyed the storytelling. It's not perfect Trek, but I think it's a show that largely knew itself and focused on trying to be the best version of what it was, and that's what's going to make it hard to beat.

No one misinterpreted your original post. It was sarcastic and dismissive, so people responded with that same energy.

As to the edit, I think it’s good that the new Trek shows each have such distinct personalities. They won’t all appeal to everyone, but the overall diversity is a strength. Part of what killed Star Trek in the 2000s was that TNG, Voyager, and Enterprise had all stuck to a very consistent approach. After close to twenty years, it was inevitably feeling a bit stale.

it's the first Trek comedy

that's it!

That's kinda how I feel about the majority of adult cartoons outside of shows like King of The Hill that feel more down to Earth in a way and less like a full-on highschool level comedy. I personally don't like adult animation usually as a rule because of shows like family guy, robot chicken, and such. There are definitely a very small few exceptions like KoTH or Futurama, but in general those types of shows just weren't made for people like me.

I've never seen a feed of this that doesn't have the profanity censored out. Is it just always sanitized or am I just not finding the adult version?

I watched the first four episodes or so and what I noticed the most was how it seemed like every character was either yelling or speaking at high volume the whole time. It was exhausting. I really like R&M and I know this is from one of the key creatives on that show so it was super disappointing.

I’m disappointed in this community. Someone voices an opinion that is contrary to the majority and, instead of lively discussion, I see dogpiling? To be fair, there is discussion, but in the past I saw any attempts at dogpiling being cut at the start. I see it flourishing here. I hope this isn’t a sign of things to come.

they stole the design and much more from Final Space

fuck that show