Rick and Morty
I haven’t reviewed a TV show in a while and as I have been binge watching Rick and Morty on Netflix recently, I might as well do that.
Rick and Morty is an animated science fiction comedy on Adult Swim. It follows the adventures of a genius alcoholic scientist and his grandson – Rick and Morty respectively. It is, to cut a long review short, absolutely brilliant. While it may not be quite as laugh out loud funny as Futurama (the obvious comparison), the scifi ideas and concepts explored are superb, thoughtful and generally pretty fun. Futurama has some pretty cool ideas but Rick and Morty explore slightly different areas.
Among other things, the show explores the idea of multi-dimensional existence. Rick, Morty, and sometimes the older sister Summer, are always popping through portals and occasionally meeting other versions of themselves. At times the show can be quite bleak in a nothing really matters and everything is just chance, kind of way. This existentialist element can get a bit much for some I guess, but I like it. Some quite violent stuff happens to some of the characters, even the main ones, but it doesn’t really matter in a multiverse. Rick frequently destroys entire worlds but if you can just pop to another universe where everyone is ok, it becomes hard to care. Rick in particular is massively selfish, amoral, and just enjoys science without much thought to consequence.
I am getting a slightly deep but basically, if you like science fiction that explores philosophy and deep scifi ideas, but also has drunk people, chases and lots of aliens, then Rick and Morty is worth a watch. I love it. It is on Netflix but you should be able to find it elsewhere if you are vaguely intelligent. Season 3 is due out sometime soon-ish.
To give you an example of the sort of thing you can expect, here is a brief clip that is vaguely reminiscent of Star Trek Next Generation episode “The Inner Light”. Just to give you an insight into the moral ambiguity of Rick, just before this clip, he had invented an incredible gun which he then sold to a hit-man so he could play games.
While I’m at it, here is a Rick and Morty in the Simpsons couch gag. Enjoy: