Rick and Morty review

Malcolm Durfee-O'Brien

“Rick and Morty” is a strange show. If you’ve done as little as watch a two-minute clip of it, you’d still be silently screaming at me for giving you no real insight, as that is about as obvious to anyone who has watched the show as the Sun in the sky. However, this bears repeating as it is the best single adjective to describe “Rick and Morty,” whether it be from the episode in which the titular Rick and Morty go to an intergalactic Spa where they get swallowed by a creature which coats them with oil from its stomach or because of the contrasting styles of humor, which vary from drawn out and intricately designed character arcs that eventually reveal themselves to be a joke to fart jokes or because of the strange yet believable dynamics of the show’s main family.
To begin, let’s start with this shows positive elements of which there are many and far outweigh the show’s bad or below average qualities. To start, the show is absurdly creative with a concept or joke a normal human being would never think to make appearing every few minutes and lends to the strange atmosphere of the show. “Rick and Morty’s” world also feels fully fleshed out as though it could actually exist and be functional. The show’s entire cast of characters is energetic and interesting, though none hold a candle to the character of Rick, the genius inventor Grandfather of Morty who is so narcissistic and selfish that he destroys whole planets, communities and families for personal gain and shows no remorse or empathy and yet he still makes the audience root for him to succeed thanks to his rare human moments. The whole cast of voice actors do a great job, especially the show’s co-creator Justin Roiland who voices both Rick and Morty. The animation is fluid and unique and uses its style to portray the show’s world as a filthy and sleazy one that shows signs of reality. Darkness pervades the show, both in plot and humor with a brother accidentally murdering his sister to mock the overindulgence of rich alien parents within an immortality shield. As should go without saying at this point, the writing is concise and interesting with dialogue taking a backseat to the more far-fetched and weird imagery. The creators’ goal to make a strange yet believable world pays off greatly as they succeed effortlessly.
“Rick and Morty” does unfortunately have a fair share of faults. Most prevalent is the fact it falls into the same error most cartoons have fallen into since the dawn of animation: it is extremely formulaic. The formula is Morty is unwittingly pulled into an adventure by his Grandpa and hilarity ensues. This makes most of the episodes rather predictable and removes most of the tension from a large portion of the show. That’s why most of the superior episodes are the ones that remove this formula. Fortunately, in comparison to the show’s previous two seasons, season three contains many such episodes that forego the show’s basics with episodes like “Pickle Rick”, “The Whirly Dhirly Conspiracy” and the “Ricklantis mixup” all dropping the shows titular team-up to go on more personalized adventures for each character but the show is still plagued by its “by the numbers” episodes. This show is also one that I can see being divisive as many of its jokes depend on how dark a person’s sense of humor is, so if you feel you wouldn’t like the show, don’t watch it.
In conclusion, “Rick and Morty” is a strange and creative show with quirky characters and fun environments, however it’s not everybody’s cup of tea. On the whole, I give Rick and Morty an A- out of 10.