To a certain set of culturally au courant kids in the late 1990s and early 2000s, the world was nothing if not a big joke. We weren’t original, of course; the postmodernists had cornered the market on irony decades before, and, unlike us, actually had something to say. But we were removed from the New Sincerity championed by David Foster Wallace, and even further removed from his saccharine offspring. We grew up in the age of the knowing smirk, of the hipster with his cultivated handlebar mustache. Perhaps this is why the Adult Swim cartoon Rick & Morty, whose third season is expected to launch this spring, feels significant. It can be seen as carving a new path for millennial expression that embraces both cynicism and schmaltz.

You wouldn’t know this from reading the reviews, which usually focus on the show’s zany plot lines and off-the-wall humor. Most episodes consist of Rick Sanchez, a preternaturally gifted scientist, dragging his timid 14-year-old grandson Morty (both voiced by co-creator Justin Roiland) along for madcap, sci fi–inflected adventures. One episode finds them lounging on the couch flipping through strange and hilarious channels on inter-dimensional cable. In another, they cause the destruction of the universe via a hastily synthesized love potion that turns those infected into giant insectoid monsters Rick dubs “Cronenbergs,” a reference to the grotesque creatures made famous by the films of the eponymous director.

In many ways, however, Rick & Morty is a traditional sitcom. Its animated half-hour format draws liberally from The Simpsons, which creators Roiland and Dan Harmon (Community) cite as a major influence. Centered on a middle-class, suburban American family, it hits all the usual beats: High school drama, the pitfalls of raising children, the stresses of employment (or lack thereof), sibling rivalry, and the intricacies of a troubled marriage. Rick may be a genius, but he’s also an unapologetic drunken asshole, unmoored from tact, who lays bare the family’s myriad problems with benumbed precision. Almost everything Rick barks at his family in between labored belches rings sad and true, and we laugh because what else is there to do?

Hovering over the show is the spectre of creeping doom. The silent terror in the darkness, the something lurking just beyond the razor’s edge where the light stops, is as much a part of the show’s identity as Rick’s godlike genius. Whether it’s a Lovecraftian monster of the deep, or the even more unnerving possibility of nothing at all, Roiland and Harmon have taken great care to thread cosmic horror into the very fabric of Rick & Morty.

Rick & Morty owes a lot to Lovecraft. The creators pay homage to the author’s most famous creation with a Cthulhu-like beast that soars through the opening title sequence. But if Lovecraft evokes existential dread through his brand of monster-flick nihilism, Rick & Morty counters it with a deep humanism. In the episode “Something Ricked This Way Comes,” for example, Rick encounters a man named Mr. Needful, who is later revealed to be the actual devil (voiced in a delightful turn by Alfred Molina). Needful opens a shop full of mysterious antiques that promise great benefits, but come at an unseen cost. There is a love potion that renders its user impotent, a facial cream that beautifies but blinds, a microscope that mentally handicaps. Through the power of science, Rick builds a gadget that identifies and removes Needful’s curses. He has neutralized a tired horror trope and asserted the utility of science over magic, truth over deceit.