Rick and Morty: Season 3

Earth now knows of the existence of alien life and has been "inducted" into the Galactic Federation. Rick Sanchez is a prisoner of the Federation, his mind constantly being probed for information. Needless to say, it isn't long before Rick has escaped, reunited with his family and once again begins a new series of adventures...that is, if his own self-loathing doesn't destroy him and everyone around him in the process.

For its first two seasons, Rick and Morty was a cult show with a solid but small fanbase. In the two years since Season 2 aired, however, the show's fame has exploded. DVD, Blu-Ray and Netflix have brought the show to a more widespread, global audience, Ricky and Morty T-shirts are now everywhere and memes from the show are widespread.

As the first season to air in the full view of a global audience, this third go-around for Rick and his grandson Morty starts off feeling a bit off, like Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland are a bit blinded by the glare of worldwide publicity. Where jokes and ideas in the first two seasons came naturally, the humour in the third season feels a little forced, at least to start with, and going for a Mad Max: Fury Road spoof in the second episode feels a bit lazy (and rather late). Once the show gets a couple of episodes under its belt, however, things relax and we're back into Rick and Morty as we know it: an escalating series of crazy intergalactic adventures rooted in the characters' mundane home life.

The home life side of things is somewhat reduced this year, though. Jerry and Beth have separated (and aside, from a couple of key episodes, Jerry sits out a large chunk of the season) and what focus there is on Earthside adventures instead delves deeply into Rick's psyche. One of the more interesting twists of the show is that Rick is often simultaneously the protagonist and antagonist (and sometimes the villain, but not really the hero) of the series, with this season showing his uglier, nastier side in even greater detail then we've seen it before. The show seems to want to hammer home the idea that Rick is not a nice or mentally well-adjusted person, which is a reasonable move as it adds character depth, but sometimes the show feels like it's going overboard with it (especially since, almost invariably, Rick eventually comes good before the end of the episode).

This dark journey into Rick's soul is effective, if a bit overdone, but the season is at its best when it relaxes a little and goes bananas. The "Pickle Riiiick!" episode successfully mixes the two approaches, and the season finale works as a knockabout adventure. The best episode of the season, in fact, is the seventh, where "our" Rick and Morty sit out the episode in favour of a storyline set entirely on the Citadel, where Ricks and Mortys from across the multiverse live together. This clever and inventive episode sets up what should have been a long-term plot developing over the season, although this was sabotaged as production delays meant that the season was cut by four episodes. Hopefully we should see this plotline developed next season instead.

The third season of Rick and Morty (****) is therefore watchable, reliably entertaining and full of quite a few genuine laughs and thought-provoking moments. However, it's arguably the least consistent in terms of quality, some storylines are not really well-developed and its decision to stare into the rotten soul of Rick for episodes on end can become repetitive. There's also a distinct lack of memorable new characters this year. But it remains one of the most interesting and amusing animated shows on air.

The series is available to watch now via Adult Swim in the US and Netflix in the UK and most other territories.

Rick & Morty: Season 2

Rick and Morty's adventures through space and time continue. The intrepid twosome have to defend Earth from an interstellar musical reality show, avoid the long arm of the galactic law, repair Morty's parents' marriage and attend the wedding of Rick's best friend Birdperson. Needless to say, things go horrendously wrong.

Rick and Morty's first season was by turns hilarious and clever, witty and coarse, smart and nuanced. Few shows even try to employ a fart gag followed by a humorous riff on quantum theory, but Rick and Morty does so with aplomb.

This second season picks up after the first and continues several continuing subplots, such as the dubious state of Beth and Jerry's marriage and Rick's ongoing self-loathing and pain that he is trying to bury through his scientific work. The second season amps these up to eleven, going beyond even the pathos that Season 1 evoked on occasion and hitting poignancy along the way. Like the best SFF comedies (Red Dwarf and Futurama), Rick and Morty succeeds through not just its comedy, but its intelligence and fine grasp of characterisation.

Season 2 revisits some supporting characters from Season 1 like Birdperson but there's also some new characters, such as the enigmatic Poopy Butthole (around whose bizarre character various fan theories of varying credibility circle), and also a willingness to change things up. In Season 1 Earth was unaware of the existence of alien life and higher dimensions. Season 2 rather dramatically changes that up with major ramifications for the rest of the series, showing a willingness to change the format to keep things fresh. There's also more of a willingness to involve Summer, Beth and Jerry on adventures and continue making Morty more of a grown-up, stronger character.

But the star of the show remains Rick, whose brilliance and humour hide a lot of pain and growing existential fear of death. He has flashes of humanity but these are challenged by his amorality, something that previously he didn't care about but now he has family members acting as his moral compass and making him question some things about his life. For an animated TV show with a character called "Poopy Butthole", Rick and Morty does have some damned fine writing.

It's also still brilliantly funny, with Season 2 featuring a brilliant riff on the classic Star Trek: The Next Generation episode The Inner Light through a video game called Roy, as well as playing with sitcom conventions when Jerry's hitherto-completely-unmentioned brother Steve shows up to stay, with spectacularly gory results.

Season 2 of Rick and Morty (****½) is available now on DVD (USA) and Blu-Ray (UK, USA). It is also now available to watch on Netflix in the UK and Ireland. Season 3 is due to start airing in the USA in December or January.

Rick and Morty: Season 1

Rick Sanchez is a brilliant but morally dubious inventor who has the ability to travel through time and space. Forced to move in with his daughter Beth and her "normal" family, Rick has soon embroiled them in his misdeeds, particularly his easily-influenced and hyper-sensitive grandson Morty. Rick and Morty set off on intergalactic adventures, but things soon become odd at home, as Morty's sister Summer gets a job with the devil, and Beth's husband Jerry gets fired after being inadvertently kidnapped by aliens and placed in a low-AI VR simulation of his own life.

Rick and Morty is an animated series airing on Adult Swim in the USA. It's the brainchild of Justin Roiland, a voice actor and writer, but given some additional creative firepower by Dan Harmon, the creator of Community and recent projets including the excellent HarmonQuest.

To sum up, Rick and Morty is a mash-up of Back to the Future, Futurama, South Park and an everyday family sitcom, with a light sprinkling of Archer over the top. The series is ribald, madcap, zany but it is also surprisingly restrained and occasionally even reaches pathos, especially when it deals with Jerry and Beth's strained relationship, and the fact that Morty was once diagnosed with learning difficulties. It can also occasionally be rather unsettling, going for a funny gag that then becomes outright disturbing, such as the encounter between Morty and a sexually-frustrated royal jelly bean in a toilet that has you reaching for the remote in horror before, fortunately, the scene ends on a non-vomit-inducing note.

It's an interesting mix of the cynical and post-cool (particularly with Rick's apathetic, amoral attitude to life) with the genuinely heartwarming and optimistic. The comedy mixes toilet humour with much cleverer and more subtle gags about genuine scientific issues (the planet/not-planet status of Pluto fuels one of the stronger instalments of Season 1), catchphrases you'll soon be yelling at uncomprehending non-viewers and some wry observations on school, work and home life. It also has giant space genies which can be summoned to perform simple tasks but then meet a totally insolvable problem (how to make Jerry a good golfer) which turns them into rampaging psychopaths.

Rick and Morty's greatest asset is that it is simply hilarious, employing a wide variety of mundane and science fiction inspirations to generate humour from almost every scene and line of dialogue. But, like all of the best comedies (and especially SFF comedies, which often settle for lazy stereotyping), it generates that comedy from having very well-defined, conflicted and interesting characters. This is a well-judged comedy with brains and heart to offset its cynicism.

Season 1 of Rick and Morty (****) is available now on DVD (USA) and Blu-Ray (UK, USA). It is also now available to watch on Netflix in the UK and Ireland.