The Philosophy of Rick and Morty

He’s been afk for quite a while now, and the mods have removed my PM ability.

Have you been abusing your PM privileges, Trixie?

Why do I keep thinking Mork and Mendy?

You know, James and Trixie, I’ve been thinking:

I think the color purple is proof that the brain can invent new colors. In fact, any non-primary color is. See, the eye can only really see three colors: red, green, and blue. In order for the brain to mix these colors and get things like orange, yellow, brown, and yes, purple, it has to create new ones out of the primary three.

It has to invent the experience of seeing a color that would make one behave and speak as though it saw a color mid-way between red and green (for example). There is no color receptor in the eye for yellow, but if the brain receives the right amount of signal from the red receptors and the right amount from the green receptors, it will produce the visual experience of seeing yellow.

Purple was an especially tricky one for the brain to create because it is stimulated by both the red receptors and the blue receptors in the eye, and if you look at any ordinary linear color spectrum, you find that exactly mid-way between red and blue, you have a kind of yellow-ish/green. But this color is already produced by the brain as a mix of a certain amount of red and a certain amount of green. So it is already spoken for. In order to invent a new color, the brain had to somehow come up with something that actually looks like a mix of red and blue. That way, the organism can distinguish between when it is seeing a mix of red & green versus a mix of red & blue. It pulled it off with purple. Somehow, purple looks exactly mid-way between red and blue without being a yellowish/green. The brain can invent whatever experience it wants. The only condition is that the neural circuitry for such an experience causes behavior and speech as if the organism was having that experience.

This is the only reason we can draw the color spectrum as a circle–the brain invented two colors that stand mid-way between red and blue.

I know one of them.

[size=50]…yeah right…[/size]

Btw, detecting and naming a color (or anything else), is not “inventing”, but “discovering”.

It’s not even discovering, it’s just naming.

Some cultures have the same word for green and blue. They can obviously see the difference between grass and sky, they just denote them with the same word.

English speakers see red and pink as different colours. Russians do too, but they have exactly the same with blue - navy and sky blue are not different shades, but different colours.

Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language.

Don’t tell me you don’t know our beloved Trixie!

That would be the case if you bought into what I call the “window to reality” view of consciousness (a.k.a. “naive realism”). The color yellow is just there on the banana, and we merely see it. But my view is what I call the “system of experiences” view–I say consciousness, with its subjective experiences, creates the reality of what it experiences. Therefore, the color yellow is invented first by consciousness (all colors are, even the primary ones). But since this makes it real, we inadvertently end up “discovering” it out in reality. The point is: invention first, then discovery–not the other way around.

Now, I’ll agree that the self doesn’t invent its own experiences, at least not all of them, but that’s because I believe the self is just another artifact of mind being created like everything non-self that we experience. That is, I distinguish between consciousness and self. I prefer to define the “self” in relatively conventional terms–as the person I see in the mirror. For me, the self definitely has a physical presence on top of a mental/spiritual one. It’s being projected by the mind just like trees, cars, and tin cans. So in that sense, it makes perfect sense to say “I’m not inventing that, I’m just discovering it.”

But naming a color definitely is inventing.

We do something similar with brown. Brown is really a very dark yellowish/orange.

So society tries to prevent our intelligence from being bewitched?

Not anymore. I am an upstanding citizen now.

I’m surprised you substitute Society in for Philosophy and not language

Yes. language fits.

I guess, you know something about the linguistic relativity, Only Humean.

Rick and Morty - S1E5 - Meeseeks and Destroy

Unlike all the other episodes so far, Episode 5 begins right in the thick of a terrifying action-packed climax to another one of Rick and Morty’s insane adventures. It begins with the fearless duo on some kind space station trying to escape from the rest of the family–or at least “clones from an alternate reality possessed by demonic alien spirits from another dimension’s future.” Morty knows what he has to do to destroy them, but he can’t because “they’re [his] parents and sister.” But Rick manages to convince him and Morty does what he has to do. The adventure ends with the duo returning to their “home” reality, where his “real” family are without any thing possessing them, with the demonic alien spirits contained in what looks like the ghost trap from Ghostbusters. Morty runs to the corner of the garage and pukes because of how traumatizing the whole experience was. After purging himself, Morty has a few stern words with Rick, talking about how “adventures are supposed to be simple and fun,” not “crazy and chaotic,” to which Rick responds “That’s real easy to say from the side-kick position, but, but, uh, how 'bout next time why don’t you be in charge and we’ll talk about how simple and fun it is.” Morty actually gets a kick out of this idea, saying “Seriously Rick? You’ll let me call the shots?” to which Rick agrees–on the condition that if Morty’s adventure turns out to be lame and boring, he loses the right to bitch (and do his laundry for a month). Morty ups the ante with the condition that if his adventure is awesome, he gets to be in charge of every 3rd one, to which Rick comes back with: every 10th (personally, I thought this would be a prelude to every season–you know, one episode in every season being Morty’s–but season 2 proved this wrong).

I take this whole intro scene to be a kind of “leap” to a higher level of understanding of the whole Rick and Morty theme: it’s almost as if it were saying “Ok, by now, we know what Rick and Morty is all about–they go on crazy and chaotic adventures, visit other dimensions and alien planets, dive into alternate worlds and sci-fi realities, and every time they do, they encounter monsters, dangers, and terrifying experiences like ‘demonic alien spirits’. It’s time we kick it up a notch, add a twist, and maybe do a sort of ‘meta-analysis’ on this theme–have an in-depth look at what an adventure is all about.” This is what this episode is going to examine. It’s going to look at certain misconceptions (Morty’s) of what an adventure is really all about. And this is also why I think this episode marks a turning point in the series beyond which each episode is no longer just a series of isolated adventures; the first three (plus the pilot), therefore, count as just samples of what the entire series has in store for us, but there are going to be deeper and continuous themes that make the entire storyline more interesting than just that. This episode in particular isn’t quite up to those specs but it does count, in my mind, as the turning point after which we will begin to see this playing out.

On another note, there is in this episode, as always, the parallel storyline involving Jerry as the central figure, and in fact the title of this episode–Meeseeks and Destroy–is, like Lawnmower Dog, an exclusive allusion to this secondary storyline. But I suppose there is an interesting twist here as well–we will see, for the first time in the series, Jerry “manning up”–but like the main storyline, not quite in the full sense of the term.

The Meeseeks theme here refers to the “Meeseeks”–a kind of being or creature who, like a Jeanie from a magic lamp when rubbed, can be summoned by one of Rick’s inventions–a box that produces a Meeseeks out of thin air when a button on it is pressed. Rick explains to the family after they come barging in making stupid requests they could easily fulfill themselves if they just put a little effort in:

“You press this [a Meeseeks appears and says “I’m Mr. Meeseeks! Look at me!”], you make a request: Mr. Meeseeks, open Jerry’s stupid mayonnaise jar [“Yessiree!”]; the Meeseeks fulfills the request [“All done!” Jerry: “Wow!”] and then stops existing [Meeseeks “poofs” out of existence]… Knock yourselves out. Just burp keep your requests simple, they’re not go-burp-ds.”

They gladly accept the Meeseeks box except for Morty who, more eager to take on Rick’s challenge, ushers them out in a hurry: “I’ve got a bet to win!”

Gathered around the dining room table, Jerry, Beth, and Summer contemplate the box, speculating on, as Beth says, all the possibilities. Jerry tries to remind the family of what Rick said: keep it simple. They don’t listen. Before Jerry even finishes his sentence, Summer hits the button first. The Meeseeks appears and she makes her request: “I want to be popular at school!” followed by Beth who requests: “I-I-I want to be a more complete woman!” They both walk off with their respective Meeseeks to fulfill their requests, leaving Jerry to take his time to contemplate his request before rashly jumping into it, saying to himself “You guys are doing it wrong… he said simple.”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUYvIAP3qQk[/youtube]

Here again, we will see the irony of Jerry’s life: his attempt to keep it simple results in his request (taking 2 strokes off his golf game) being the most complex to fulfill while Beth’s and Summer’s, though seeming virtually impossible to fulfill in any simple way, being extraordinarily easy to meet. And once again, the reason will be because Beth and Summer simply go with the (Meeseeks’) flow (in fact, Summer doesn’t have to do anything–she just has to watch the Meeseeks make a speech to the school that wins them over–I suppose it’s the whole school that “goes with the flow”).

Jerry has the toughest time taking the Meeseek’s advice–everything from “square your shoulders,” “keep your head down,” to “you gotta relax”–to which (later) he responds: “Have you ever tried to relax? It is a paradox!”–which, again, reveals something about his personality–he tries, he believes in trying, and this is the main crux of his problem: it means he can’t relax. But in golf, the key is to relax–only by enjoying the game, or anything, and taking it easy does one perform well. This is also why Beth’s and Summer’s requests are so easy to fulfill–by going with the flow, they are able to relax, making the Meeseek’s end of the job simple. Ultimately, Rick was right–the Meeseeks aren’t Gods–they can only do so much–but it requires the cooperation of the other to fully meet the latter’s request, and if the latter can’t follow through, even the simplest of requests can’t be fulfilled.

In fact, Jerry’s inability to relax is the impetus for the whole premise of “Meeseeks and Destroy”–the Meeseeks assigned to help Jerry with his golf game gets a little desperate to achieve his goal–you see, Meeseeks have one motive and one motive only–to end their existence–and they know that the only way to do so is to fulfill the request of their summoner–for after that, they disappear. Existence is painful to a Meeseeks, but at least the pain is only experienced after a certain amount of prolonged existence–at first, they seem fine with being brought into existence, but the hope is that the request asked of them will be easy to fulfill, for then they don’t have to spend too much time existing. But in Jerry’s case, everything the Meeseeks advises seems to fail. So the Meeseeks takes an extra measure: he summons a Meeseeks for himself:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rSqFM2pAQU[/youtube]

Now while all this is going on, Morty is trying to win a bet. Rick is being pretty honorable, keeping his word and letting Morty call the shots (though still dishing out rude sarcasm at every turn), but the adventure is starting out pretty lame. It starts out kind of comical, actually–the setting is a medieval village with a flute and a lyre playing in the background, like something out of a children’s fantasy book, with dragons, sorcerers, and giant bean stocks–in fact, Morty calls it a “quest,” not an “adventure”.

This is Morty’s idea of what an adventure should be–something simple and easy–no life threatening “demonic alien spirits”–you know, something he can handle. Rick, on the other hand, is totally unimpressed. They do find a giant atop a magic bean stock, however, whom they are told has riches that could bring the villagers they first encountered out of their poverty (remember: this is Morty calling the shots). But this is where things start to get a little hairy. When the giant comes stomping into the room uttering the quintessential giant slogan “Fe fi fo fum…” they hide behind a giant cookie jar and Rick says, holding up his portal gun, “I’ll take us home right now, you just say the word.” However, Morty doesn’t give up so easily. He says, “No way Rick, this is all part of it. Adventures have conflict–deal with it.” ← So it’s not like Morty buckles under the slightest pressure. He knows he’s up against a challenge and he knows he has to stick it out, so he presses on.

Rick does keep putting the offer on the table though: he keeps reminding Morty, through the episode, that at any time, if things get too hairy, he can take them both back home with his portal gun. Morty keeps declining the offer, however, and keeps going. In a sense, this serves as a kind of “safety net”–like training wheels on a bike; though Morty keeps declining, he knows he can bail any time he wants–unlike if he were alone, or unlike if he were Rick on one of his adventures (yes, Rick always has his portal gun too–sort of–kind of–but as we will learn later in the series, the threats that loom over Rick’s life are cross-dimensional and can’t be made to go away by jumping through a portal).

Anyway, as I said, in the giant’s fortress is where things get hairy–right after his quintessential giant utterance–“Fe fi fo fum”–the unexpected happens (and this is key–the unexpected–for the adventure at this point takes a turn completely away from any formulaic fairy tale)–the giant slips on a patch of water on the ground, hits his head on the corner of the table, and bleeds to death on the floor–quite graphic for a children’s fairy tale–and I think this is the impression the writer’s wanted us to have: that of a bit of shock. I mean, it’s nothing compared to some of the more gruesome and violent movie scenes that most adults are used to, but this is why I say it’s the unexpected that is key. We certainly don’t expect this fairy tale adventure to feature blood gushing out of a giant’s head as he bleeds to death all over the floor–would you read such a fairy tale to your children?–and because we don’t expect that, we are unprepared, caught off guard, and thus the scene does shock us just a little more than usual.

This is, I would think, what we are to presume Morty experiences–Morty’s reaction is that of slightly more heightened shock compared to his “deal with it” just a moment before (even though, ironically, the threat is now extinguished)–and it is a sort of testament to the character of reality: fairy tales tell us how adventures are supposed to pan out, reality doesn’t care–and yes, they are in an alternate reality, but no less a reality than any other. The point here, I think, is that even if you had the ability to jump to any reality you want, escape whatever hardship you want, you will never escape reality’s thwarting of your expectations. So long as it as a reality, it will dictate its terms on you, not the other way around.

Well, if Morty thinks at this point that things can’t get any hairier, they do: the giant’s wife comes in carrying their now fatherless baby (adding to the impression that this is no children’s fairy tale) and says “Oh Jesus, Dale!.. You sons of bitches!” and traps them in a drinking glass. Scene cuts to Rick and Morty getting mug shots in a giant police ward. The mood is swiftly turned inside out–from exciting fairy tale adventure to serious trouble. They are now in a very sticky bind from which it is almost certain they can’t escape (Rick’s portal gun is confiscated, in fact). Rick, as usual, isn’t phased by this–he simply continues with the sarcasm and digs into Morty: “Oh boy, Morty, you’re really showing me how it’s done. Reee–burp–aaal straight forward and fun.”

But reality can be just as merciful as it can be cruel–just before it seems the duo are doomed to spend the rest of their lives in giant prison, a giant lawyer from a “tiny person’s advocacy group” enters the court and produces a motion to dismiss on the grounds that Rick and Morty were never read their rights. Lucky break! Again, it’s not so much that reality is harsh, it’s that it defies expectation.

And to be fair to Morty, at no point did he lose his cool or his optimism–even after the judge announced his (unofficial) opinion that the two were guilty, Morty says to Rick: “We’re gonna be okay, Rick.”

Now on their way back down (the court is still up in the clouds), they stop in a tavern cut into the side of the steps (they’re climbing down a giant set of stairs) to take a break. Morty digs into Rick at the table–kind of a moment of cheering for the underdog in my opinion–that is, in the sense that Rick had it coming and Morty is in the right to tell Rick off:

“You keep heckling my adventure Rick! You know why?! [Uh, because it’s lame?] It’s because you’re petty, you know?! How many times have I had to follow you into some nonsensical bull crap?! I always roll with the punches, Rick! Why can’t you?!”

Morty makes a pretty good point here. He does always roll with the punches, the best he can. But Rick here is going out of his way to be snide and pessimistic. At the beginning, when the adventure was innocent and relatively harmless, Rick called it lame; when they were in the thick of danger, seemingly with no way out, Rick blamed Morty for fucking up, and now that they’re free of all that due to a stroke of luck, relaxing at a pub, Rick is still calling Morty’s adventure lame. No matter what happens, Rick refuses to play fair. Rick really does owe Morty something here. If not just a little respect, then some show of good sportsmanship for the fact that they got through the thick of it–and it was pretty damn thick–without Morty giving up. But this is Rick refusing to swallow his pride, which is not much more than we can expect from him.

Anyway, Morty takes a break to go to the bathroom where he meets Mr. Jelly Bean (literally a giant walking talking jelly bean). After explaining to Mr. Jelly Bean that he and his grandpa are on an adventure but he thinks it might have gone too far off the rails, Mr. Jelly Bean says “Isn’t that what adventures do?” Morty replies “Hey, you know what? You’re right. Everything’s going fine. I just gotta relax and go with the flow.” Now, although this is a sound point–kinda the whole gist of the episode–things once again get a little hairy at this point–really hairy–in fact, I’m inclined to say Morty finally learns a lesson here that highlights the irony of what he just said: everything’s going fine because adventures are supposed to go off the rails. ← He doesn’t get it. Imagine yourself on a train and it’s going off the rails. Is everything going “fine”? Yes, adventures are supposed to go off the rails, but that doesn’t make them fine. The point of an adventure is that things don’t go fine–things go South, things become not okay–you must be afraid, you must be traumatized, you must reach that breaking point at which you just want out (wishing you had a portal gun)–what Morty doesn’t get is that if you’re having fun, that’s not quite the idea of an adventure (though it will very much seem like it). So far Morty has managed to keep it together, to stay positive and in control (at least of his determination)–he hasn’t reached his “freaking out” point–which means he hasn’t really experienced an actual adventure–he hasn’t yet lost control, he hasn’t yet given up his conviction that things are going the way they’re “supposed” to (i.e. how he expects them to)–yet the message he takes home from Mr. Jelly Bean is that just because adventures are supposed to go off the rails that means things are okay–which is a complete oxymoron if you think about it.

This is what Mr. Jelly Bean subsequently challenges–not that this is his intention, but that he puts Morty into a position in which he can’t possibly think of this as okay, a position that compels Morty to regard it as something that should never happen again. What does Mr. Jelly Bean do? He attempts to rape Morty. He begins by trying to persuade Morty to “go with the flow” which, if Morty new what he was talking about just a second ago, he would just do in order to make this a “proper adventure”. But the thought of being raped doesn’t even show up on Morty’s radar as something that’s “supposed” to happen on an adventure, so he is compelled to resist. Mr. Jelly Bean pushes him into one of the stalls, telling him “Stop being such a fucking tease, you sweet little twat!” (<-- yeah, not really a child’s fairy tale anymore).

Morty is in a position now in which he has no training wheels–no portal gun with which he can escape to a different reality, no protective mentor like Rick to swoop in and rescue him–he’s pretty much fucked (well, not yet but pretty soon). Where is Rick right now? He’s out at the bar having a good time (believe it or not)–there’s a brief scene while this is going on in which Rick is singing on stage: “Sweet home Alabama!”–and then later, reaping in his winnings at a lucky hand of poker with the pub locals.

^ It’s a real contrast of irony–both are learning valuable lessons here: Morty, that adventures can’t always be all fun and games if they are to be adventures at all, and Rick, that adventures can’t just be all misery and cynicism, that you’ve gotta have a little fun sometimes and (in this case literally) make a game out of it.

Luckily for Morty, he gets out of it by (basically) beating the shit out of Mr. Jelly Bean. This is not so much Morty “dealing with it” but Morty reacting to survival instincts. He manages to knock Mr. Jelly Bean out by repeatedly slamming his head on the rim of the toilet with the toilet seat. Then he leaves the bathroom.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8sf8zpwb8M[/youtube]

Morty reconvenes with Rick, who is winning at a game of poker with the locals, and immediately, the first words out of Rick are: “Oh hey Morty, listen, I’m really sorry about all the stuff I said earlier about your adventure earlier. I’m having a good time, Morty. It’s not so bad.” to which Morty responds: “Let’s just go home, okay? I’m calling it. The adventure’s over.” ← It’s interesting as both character’s, in this brief interim, have completely done a 180 in their respective attitudes. As Morty admits defeat in the bet and asks to be taken home via Rick’s portal gun, Rick catches a glimpse of Mr. Jelly Bean stumbling out of the bathroom and wondering off (as if not wanting to draw attention). It’s obvious from Rick’s discerning eye that he’s putting together what just happened: Morty seems obviously defeated and is admitting that he lost the bet while this Mr. Jelly Bean stumbles out of the washroom looking all beat up: they must have had an altercation in the washroom (not sure if Rick infers attempted rape per se) and that Morty has evidently learned a lesson, the lesson that Rick wanted him to learn. So being in the good mood that Rick is already in, and finally being able to take in the satisfaction that Morty has learned this valuable lesson about the nature of adventures (I’m not going to say: because he won the bet), he shows a bit of compassion for Morty and actually goes out of his way to be a good sport:

Rick: “Listen Morty, I just won a bunch of Schmeckles. Why don’t we use 25 of them to pay Slippery Stair her for a ride back down to the village and we’ll give the rest of the schmeckles to the villagers, huh?”

Morty: “Really?”

Rick: “Sure Morty, yeah. You know, a good adventure needs a good ending.”

(According to reddit.com/r/rickandmorty/c … alue_of_a/, this is the proper spelling of “schmeckles”.)

This is interesting, not only because Rick is now calling Morty’s adventure “good” but because, all of a sudden, when Rick is in a good mood, and in charge, the resolution to the adventure becomes obvious, plain in sight. While Morty was talking about getting some treasure somehow, from somewhere, right before they faced the ominous giants steps down, Rick conjures up a simple and elegant solution right there on the spot as soon as he feels motivated to do so (plus an easy way to get down the steps to boot).

Now back to the parallel story about Jerry’s difficulty with his golf swing, the problem has multiplied beyond control. The original Meeseeks summoned to help Jerry with his problem has set off a chain reaction whereby each new Meeseeks that the one before summons to aid in the problem summons another Meeseeks of his own. I haven’t counted, but looking at the clips of the Meeseeks all gathered together in the Smith’s living room, I’d say there are at least 20 of them–none of whom can make any more headway than the other in their ultimate goal to knock 2 strokes off Jerry’s golf game. They are gathered together in angst over the fact that none of them can grant Jerry his request–and this is a big deal to a Meeseeks–they’ve been in existence for quite while in Meeseeks time, and that means they’re getting desperate. For a Meeseeks, this literally drives them insane.

Before we get to that, however, a little backtracking is in order to explain Beth’s Meeseeks experience (the series has not delved into Beth’s life in nearly as much depth as Jerry’s, Rick’s, or Morty’s at this point, but in this episode, it starts to–apologies to Summer, but the two seasons don’t really present her as a deep character at all). In their effort to make Beth a “more complete woman,” she and her Meeseeks have a meaningful talk over a glass of wine over lunch at some fancy restaurant. Beth summarizes her life story to the Meeseeks:

Beth: “I got pregnant at 17 [with Summer]. And I still put myself through veterinary school. Yes, I’m successful, but… what if I hadn’t… I’m just saying, somewhere along the way, I lost that wide-eyed girl from Muskegon.”

Meeseeks: “She’s still there, Beth.”

Beth: “Well… her waistline isn’t. [snicker]”

Meeseeks: “Beth [grabs her hand], having a family doesn’t mean you stop being an individual. You know the best thing you can do for people who depend on you? Be honest with them, even if it means setting them free.”

Beth: “[tearing up] You’re saying I should leave Jerry. [The Meeseeks didn’t say anything of the sort–Beth just added that in.] I can’t believe I’m finally having this conversation.”

Beth leans in to kiss the Meeseeks only for him to disappear just before it happens, signifying that he fulfilled his purpose. Beth’s words are very telling: she’s finally having this conversation, as if it had been repressed this whole time, as if it’s what she’s always needed to set herself free–to become a more complete woman. However, like Jerry in the simulation of M. Night Shaym-Aliens when he got himself fired, then re-hired, then promoted, then nominated, and finally got himself an award for his Hungry for Apples slogan, Beth has no idea how much she drew herself to this conclusion; the Meeseeks are very simple–they don’t have all the answers, but they are very good at nudging you in the right direction such that, as long as you go with the flow that they initiate, you can, with a bit of effort, fulfill your own request.

Anyway, back to Jerry’s storyline: as he and the army of Meeseeks in the Smith’s living room are working painstakingly on Jerry’s golf game, Beth walks in with a killer dress on and her purse strapped over her shoulder. She informs Jerry that she’s going out for dinner, and asks:

“Do you want me to be happy or do you want me to be in prison?” ← Symbolic for leaving the marriage: Beth wants to leave the house (the marriage), in which case she’ll be by herself but happy, which is better than together with Jerry in a prison.

Jerry, being caught off guard, offers to take her out. She doesn’t seem all that appreciative, responding with a sigh of annoyance when he says “I’ll be right there.” ← A bit mean spirited if you ask me, but this is very characteristic of their marriage. The Meeseeks, in response to this, aren’t very appreciative either–the last thing they want is to wait for Jerry to come back from a date with his wife before they continue with his golf lesson. So while they’re gone, the Meeseeks consort together to figure out what to do about this oh-so-serious problem:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kYSYASpNiw[/youtube]

^ So yeah, long story short: they go to war with each other, tearing limb from limb, and then finally concur on the consensus that if they just kill Jerry, they will get all strokes off his game (not just two). ← Desperate indeed!

Cut to the scene at the restaurant with Beth and Jerry. Beth talks about taking the trip she always wanted to take–to Italy or Greece–to which Jerry responds: “Countries known for their sexually aggressive men.” ← Not sure what the idea is here, but I think it’s supposed to convey that Jerry doesn’t want to let Beth go.

Suddenly, the Meeseeks come barging in (the lead one literally barges through the window on a white horse), some with weapons including a gun. They shoot at Jerry and Beth. Beth yells: “Run Jerry!” and takes the lead in a dash to the kitchen. She opens the door to the meat locker, allowing Jerry to go in first. They lock themselves in. Like terrorists stipulating their demands, the Meeseeks take several customers hostage. The lead Meeseeks says:

“Meeseeks are not born into this world fumbling for meaning, Jerry! We are created to serve a singular purpose for which we will go to any lengths to fulfill!”

^ What this says about the difference between a human being and Meeseeks is that humans don’t really know their purpose–they “fumble” their whole lives looking for it, never knowing for sure whether they’ve grasped it or not. Meeseeks, on the other hand, know for certain the minute they are created. The question raised by this is: would humans to go to any lengths to fulfill their purpose if they could know for certain what it is? If so, it means Rick didn’t have to build into the Meeseeks this extreme determination, this resolve, in order for Meeseeks to be so motivate to fulfill their purpose–they just need to know what it is (which itself doesn’t have to be built in: as soon as they are creator, their summoner simply tells them what their purpose is–can’t be any more clear than that).

After Jerry despairs a bit about how innocent people are going to die because of his mediocrity, Beth takes charge. She rips a pillar from a nearby food shelf and hands it to Jerry. She instructs him in a commanding tone:

“Jerry, turn around! Straighten your back! Bend your knees, bend them! Square your shoulders. Take a deep breath… [and whispers into his ear] I love you.”

^ These three words are the trigger he needs to “man up”. He is suddenly infused with confidence–manliness surges through his veins. He kicks the meat locker door open, steps out with the look of a man who’s in control of the situation, and with a tomato in hand, puts it on the ground and using the shelf pillar Beth handed him as a golf club, swings at the tomato sinking a hole in one as it lands squarely in a pot on the kitchen table. After exclaiming a unanimous “oooh!”, the Meeseeks, one by one, disappear in the reverse order they were created (all but one who claims to be a stickler Meeseeks because Jerry technically didn’t prove his short game, but this is no problem for Jerry in his (temporary) state of confidence: he simply putts an onion into a coffee cup lying on its side on the ground).

^ This is what I meant earlier when I said this is the first episode in the series in which Jerry “mans up” but not in the full sense of the word. Just as Morty requires training wheels to have his first successful adventure (sort of, kind of), Jerry too needs training wheels to sort of, kind of become a man–those wheels being Beth and the words uttered from her lips: “I love you.” ← It shows that though Jerry is capable of being a man, he still needs that little bit of external validation to do it–he needs to know that someone else loves him; he cannot do it on his own.

This is followed by a passionate kiss between Jerry and Beth–really passionate as Beth moans in a genuine way that says she was “aroused” by Jerry’s show of manhood. ← It kind of says that the potential for true manhood that is there in Jerry is matched by the potential for their marriage to be salvaged–and this is not the first time we will see this in their marriage.

Rick and Morty’s adventure ends with both returning to the villagers cheering their praises as Morty hands the shmeckles to them. Rick says to Morty:

Rick: “Good job, Morty. Looks like you won the bet.”

Morty: “Thanks Rick, but I don’t know if I should. You know, you were right about the universe. It’s a crazy and chaotic place.”

Rick: “Well, you know, maybe that’s why it could use a little cleaning up every now and then, you know. This one’s wrapped up neat and clean because we did it Morty style.”

^ So here we are at the end, each of the two main characters echoing the other’s attitude from earlier, each one learning valuable lessons from the other, learning to be more like the other. And again, we see that rare side of Rick that betrays a bit of compassion and bonding with his grandson.

When one of the villagers offers to introduce them to their king, who happens to be… drum roll… Mr. Jelly Bean, Morty urges Rick to use his portal gun to get them out of there. Rick, having no qualms with this request, promptly does so. And just before the portal closes after them, Rick reaches his gun back through the portal and shoots Mr. Jelly Bean, blowing him up into a plastered mess of blue jelly goo all over the villagers. (There’s no indication that this is done on behalf of Morty’s request, so we are lead to presume Rick did out of a person desire to avenge his grandson.)

The episode ends with Beth and Jerry in their torn living room (due to the Meeseeks war) talking about their marriage:

Beth: “Jerry, look, we don’t have a perfect marriage, but I’m not going anywhere. When we were in that freezer, I realized that the Meeseeks are like the guys I went to high school with: willing to say anything to complete their task.”

Jerry: “Was I one of those guys?”

Beth: “The difference is, you didn’t disappear afterwards. [hugs him]”

Jerry: “Well, I got you pregnant.”

Beth: “Yeeeaaah.”

This is pretty characteristic of Jerry and Beth’s relationship, particularly Beth’s feelings towards Jerry. On the one hand, she does want to leave him, but there will be moments in the series like this one in which something happens that rekindles some of the passion she once felt for Jerry, and this keeps her in a kind of bind–unable to escape like being hooked to something that isn’t good for you. This is not an uncommon psychological phenomenon, and we’re all familiar with it. You see it often in children when they get into tiffs with each other: little Toby says “I’m never gonna be friends with you again!” but the next day, Toby and his friend are playing freely as if nothing happened. We get into these moods that make things seem so ultimate–like I just want out of this relationship and I’ll clearly be happier once it’s over–but the mood shifts, it swings the other way, and then we reflect on our thoughts a moment ago: I was silly to think I wanted out of this relationship or that I’d be happier if it were over. Beth seems to be caught in something like this. She has mixed feelings, but she can’t feel both feelings in the mix simultaneously. Thus, she either feels one emotion–disgust for Jerry–and is seduced by it into thinking that’s all there is to the story–or she feels the other emotion–love–and is seduced by that into thinking her marriage to Jerry is worth saving.

Then Morty and Rick come waltzing in. Rick makes a snide comment about cleaning the place up followed by his new catch phrase:

“Wubalubadubdub!”

^ The only reason this is worthy of mention is that, despite its meaninglessness on the surface, this catch phrase turns out to have a deep meaning which “Bird Person” (a character introduced later in the series) explains to Morty.

But that’s it for this episode. Now you know why I say it’s a little different than just another isolated adventure. This one’s sort of doing a “meta-analysis” on adventures and making a statement on not only the universe being a crazy chaotic place but on what it’s like for Rick being the lead in this action seeking, adventure going duo. Yes, he drags Morty through hellish situations, yes he puts Morty’s life at risk, but to a certain extent, it’s really life itself doing it to them both. Morty, in a sense, is damn lucky to have Rick around who is not only capable of getting him out of sticky situations but can do so with exceptional ease given his brilliance. Like Rick always being there to offer Morty a quick escape with his portal gun, we have to question whether Morty is really ever in any serious danger after all. Things may not always go as Rick plans, he may not always do the responsible thing, but he can fix any situations as quickly as he can mess it up. ← But this last point is what will come into question in the next episode.

Now for some final, randomly scattered, thoughts:

Mr. Jelly Bean and the Meeseeks: they seem very similar in certain ways. Both blue for one thing, but also sweet and innocent seeming on the outside, but dangerously psychotic on the inside (at least in the Meeseeks case, that psychopathy had to wait for a level of desperation to be reached, but they did eventually try to kill Jerry and terrorized a bunch of innocent people in the process). ← I doubt there’s anything to this, but the thought did come to mind.

There’s also the Frankenstein’s monster theme that re-appears in this episode. The Meeseeks are Rick’s invention, like the Frankenstein monster, but like Victor Frankenstein, it’s questionable whether we can say that Rick recognizes, or cares for, his responsibility for them. How responsible is it to create a creature whose shear existence brings it great pain? Mind you, if the request made of the Meeseeks is simple and can be fulfilled in a timely manner, there appears to be minimal pain suffered by the Meeseeks, and maybe this is Rick’s intention: to never burden a Meeseeks with unreasonable or exceptionally difficult requests (I doubt it, but maybe). But even if that’s how Rick consistently intends to treat a Meeseeks, the question remains about whether it was responsible for him to hand over the Meeseeks box to his family without giving any thought to the torture they might end up putting the Meeseeks under (and consequently the damage the Meeseeks could end up doing). But it isn’t like Rick to take responsibility for his mistakes and the damage he advertently or inadvertently causes; he is far more likely to blame someone else. The theme of the Frankenstein monster and Rick’s stubbornness to take responsibility will be especially played out in the next episode: Rick Potion #9.

Now I caught what might have been a minor goof on the part of the writers, but maybe not: the tiny person’s advocate actually called it their “giant rights”–which would imply they don’t apply to tiny persons. I would chock this up to a goof on the part of the writers if it weren’t for the fact that the insertion of “giant” in “giant rights” seems superfluous and unnecessary–i.e. it seems like it would have to be deliberate if it is to be inserted at all–did it simply slip into the script or was that on purpose as a kind of slight of hand to add a hidden underhanded twist?

Finally, the steps scene: this is actually kind of a “boring” scene, and Morty says something interesting in response to another one of Rick’s hecklings: “All right, okay, if this was a story, this part wouldn’t be included, stupid.” ← In Morty’s mind, not only aren’t adventures supposed to be crazy and chaotic but they aren’t supposed to have boring parts either. And he makes a good point that if this were the kind of adventure you read in stories, the boring parts would simply be left out. But again, the point is that you can’t just erase boring parts from reality.

Oh, one more thing: at the start of this post, I said: “(personally, I thought this would be a prelude to every season–you know, one episode in every season being Morty’s–but season 2 proved this wrong)” ← But in the course of writing this post, I started wondering if the reason one episode in ever season didn’t turn out to be Morty’s is because, in reality, Morty actually lost the bet. Yes, Rick told Morty that he won the bet, but that might have been Rick humoring his grandson (you know, in a moment of affection). In reality, maybe they both knew that Morty lost the bet. ← But maybe that’s just stupid. After all, why would the writers “hint” at one episode in every season being Morty’s only to make it so that one episode in every season won’t be Morty’s?

Now, as usual, here are a list of philosophical topics to choose from:

What is an adventure really? What is an adventure “supposed” to be? On the one hand, if you went through a series of trials and mishaps but found it fun and exhilarating, you might call that an “adventure”–and there would be nothing wrong with this word usage–but would it be the kind of adventure you could tell as a story and have listeners on the edge of their seats? The kinds of adventures that really grip us, that we see in action movies–like Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Terminator–would most likely have you traumatized if you were the protagonist and were forced to go through it in real life.

How crazy and chaotic is the universe really? Though this seems to be the main message of this episode, I think the writers were milking it little. They took what’s possible in the universe in principle and seemed to sell it as what happens all the time. So yes, things like getting raped, accidentally slipping and cracking your head open, being wrongly accused and sent to jail are all possible, but how often do things like this really happen in ordinary people’s lives? Is everyone’s life really that crazy and chaotic? Or is this a misunderstanding of the point of this episode? Is the point rather that though life, for the most part, is relatively comfortable and predictable, it’s not on account of the universe caring for our safety and well-being. The universe is indifferent and will allow whatever to happen in our lives if that is the course of events that must unfold. We cannot impose our expectations of how life should be onto reality–rather reality, if we’re lucky, grants us our expectations, and if we’re not so lucky, outright thwarts them.

Knowing one’s purpose in life: what effect does that have on the quality of one’s life? In the Meeseek’s case, the purpose of their lives is crystal clear from the start–their summoner simply tells them straight up–but as we see, this can lead to great tribulation if the purpose proves cruelly difficult to fulfill. Is a good quality life, then, one in which there is no purpose? One in which a person doesn’t care for his or her purpose, or if there is one? ← In this case, there is never anything left unfulfilled, nothing needing to be made right–so in a sense, there’s never anything wrong with the world, and one can just relax and enjoy life.

How much do we seek out and come to rely on magic wands to solve our problems or make the efforts of life easier? Recall that the only reason Rick gave the Meeseeks box to his family was because they all came barging in making petty requests of him, requests they could have easily fulfilled themselves if they just put a little effort in. Mind you, the requests they subsequently made of the Meeseeks were different, and in Beth’s and Summer’s cases, not so simple to fulfill, at least on the surface. But that’s beside the point. The point is–if a magic wand were sudden dropped into our laps with which we could accomplish whatever we wanted, who would put it aside in favor of putting ordinary human effort into achieving our goals, desires, and life dreams? And is that a good thing or a bad thing?

^ I feel this episode should afford a few more topics, but I think that other than these three, the other topics would be one’s we’ve touched on already–for example, the need for external vs. internal validation, trying too hard having paradoxical results, how much we might be inventing our own realities without realizing it, etc., but this is a discussion forum: bring up any philosophical topic you want.

As usual, I have more thoughts that came at me after I posted. Here they are:

For one thing, this was not just an episode in which Jerry “manned up”, but Morty too–except in Morty’s case, he did it at the beginning and on his own accord–unlike Jerry who did it at the end and on accord of those 3 sweet words: “I love you”. The son becomes the man before the father.

Not only that but Morty proves in this episode that he’s not afraid to stand up to Rick. He may be naive, he may be inexperienced, he may be flat out wrong (thus losing the bet), but he definitely knows how to man up.

I sometimes wonder how important Morty’s character is in the Rick and Morty series. Is he a more important character, a more central character, than Rick? It’s an interesting question. I think if Rick earns the title of “protagonist” then at least Morty’s the “good guy”. ← And he is genuinely good. Stupid, but good.

Morty is like the perfect mix of Rick and Jerry–and genetically speaking, he well might be–he’s like the ego between the id and the superego.

Also, something else redeeming about Morty’s character, revealed in this episode, is he chose to take on the bet rather than follow the rest of the family to try out the new Meeseeks box. While they go looking for a magic wand, Morty wants to put all his own efforts into what he desires. I mean, he could have done this: he could have followed the family, got himself a Meeseeks, and said: “I want to win the bet with Rick.” But he didn’t.

Speaking of effort, there seems to be something very paradoxical about the conclusion I drew in the last post: namely, that in order to go with the Meeseeks’ flow, you have to put in your own effort (at least for some of it). But Jerry ends up putting in a lot of effort–too much–and it backfires. So what gives? I think it’s that Jerry tries to try. IOW, trying isn’t off the table when you go with the flow. A lot of flow going does require trying, passionate trying, but Jerry takes it to a whole other level because he values trying in itself. Flow going trying is like peddling really hard when you’re biking, while valuing trying in itself is like a dancer thinking too much about her moves and thus fumbles up.

I also thought episode 5 was a good place to tie this whole analysis back into something I said at the beginning, and I was going to in the last post but forgot: this whole theme of jumping through worlds reminds me a lot of getting high on drugs–and remember, I’m watching these episode while high on drugs–and in this episode, the theme of trying to escape prickly situations by jumping into alternate realities comes overwhelmingly to the fore. But it’s interesting because the key message seems to be: that won’t help you escape. And in my experience, this is so true. The world of drugs can be just as scary, if not more scary (hallucinating “demonic alien spirits”), than the ordinary mundane world. Why? Because drugs don’t let you just invent whatever reality you want, like writing a children’s fairy tale, they dictate their terms on you. But they certainly can give you one hell of an adventure.

Oh yeah, and is the Meeseeks war a metaphor for religious fanaticism and its outcome? I mean, what is religion suppose to do? Tell us what our purpose is. And doesn’t it seem that those with the strongest conviction in their purpose are the most likely to be fanatical and ready to go to war for that purpose?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vN_PEmeKb0[/youtube]

I must apologize to anyone who’s clicked on any of the links on this thread and consequently contracted a virus (or some kind of malware). KissCartoon didn’t used to be this bad, but lately I’ve been noticing some pretty shady browser behavior when I’m over there (like additional tabs opening–happens in both Chrome and IE for me). Most recently, I was there gathering some research for my next post (in Chrome), and it asks me to install the latest version of Flash Player, so I say: Ok, I’ll update Flash Player. The install wizard asks me to do a short survey before continuing (which should have tipped me off right there). I skip the survey and finish the install. Then of course, that fucking disc scan utility comes up that you usually get with viruses. I’m kicking myself. Lucky for me, this one was rather easy to remove (unless it’s still hiding deep in bowls of my hard drive)–it actually allowed itself to be uninstalled through the usual Windows 10 channel: Uninstall Programs in Control Panel (usually you can’t do that with a virus). But anyway, now I can’t see any videos anyone posts here at ILP, including my own. Needless to say, if I did get rid of the virus, it left behind some damage. Uninstalling and reinstalling Chrome didn’t help. It happens in IE too. I’ll be spending the weekend trying to clean this up (I don’t foresee it being that hard).

So yeah, from this point on, be forewarned: KissCartoon is questionable–click at your own risk.

Good news is, the videos are downloadable as mp4’s! Don’t worry, I’ll do the work. I’m downloading both seasons as we speak (on a different computer I can re-format any time I want). I’ll do 2 or 3 virus scans on them, then upload them to my own website.

Then I’d like to change the links in this thread to point to my website.

Unfortunately though, I can’t edit posts a short while after I make them. I’m going to have to ask Carleas or some other mod for help. Hopefully, they’ll see this as a reasonable request. [MOD EDIT: this change has been made --Carleas]

Oh, and the videos in this thread are fine–I just got those off youtube.

All right! Carleas is the man!

IOW, all links in this thread which used to point to KissCartoon now point to my server. It’s not as fancy or possessed of as many bells and whistles as KissCartoon but it ain’t possessed by demonic viruses either. I scanned all videos with Windows Defender, MalwareBytes-Anti-Malware, and SuperAntiSpyware and confirmed they’re clean.

You can go to shahspace.com/R&M/allepisodes.html to view links to all episodes.

Thanks Carleas!

Lol, people should sit for a license before they get to use computers (comedy of errors)…

Rick and Morty - S1E6 - Rick Potion #9

In my opinion, episode 6 of the Rick and Morty series represents a pivotal turning point. This is the point at which we come to understand that the entire series is going to be about not just a bunch of adventures that Rick and Morty embark upon–not just a series of isolated dilemmas that the heroic duo find themselves ensnared in (though that will continue nonetheless)–but a more enduring adventure into the souls of the primary characters involved, an exploration of what makes each character (especially Rick) the person that he or she is, and how they change and evolve. ← It becomes undeniable in this episode that this is really what Rick and Morty is all about, and each adventure, crazy and chaotic as they are, full of demonic alien spirits, is just a bit of superficial icing on the cake. Personalities, and how they evolve, is an adventure that goes much deeper than immediate scares and trills, and takes more than a season to fully unfold.

In this episode in particular, we get a good look at Rick’s character on its deepest strata, and we find that he is not nearly–not even close–as awesome as he likes to think he is. Yes, he is extraordinarily intelligent, and yes, he can get himself and Morty out of any bind he gets them into, but this is matched by an undoing sloppiness and irresponsibility that might as well make him the stupidest person on the planet.

This theme is brought to light by the same old theme that keeps recurring in the series: the Frankenstein theme–and here especially–Rick creates an absolutely grotesque monster and “solves” it in the most irrepsonsible way. And interestingly, it all begins in the same way that all other instances of the Frankenstein theme in the series begin: in Lawnmower Dog, the Frankenstein monster (i.e. an ultra-intelligent and rebellious Snuffles) begins with Jerry asking Rick to invent an intelligence boosting device so that he doesn’t have to train Snuffles to not pee on the carpet. In Meeseeks and Destroy, the Frankenstein monster (i.e. the umpteen Meeseeks who go insane and attempt to kill Jerry while terrorizing restaurant customers) begins with the Smith’s (save Morty) asking Rick to solve their measly problems with something like a magic wand. In this episode, it begins with Morty (ironically given his steadfast refusal to use a magic wand in the last episode) asking Rick to whip up something to fulfill one of his deepest desires. All things they could accomplish themselves if they put in a bit of effort.

Morty is in love with Jessica, a beautiful girl he knows from school–at least as much in love as a 14 year old teenage boy can be–and the high school “Annual Flu Season Dance” is fast approaching. Morty wants to make the night “special” between himself and Jessica (who hardly notices him)–something romantic that will lead to (maybe) a relationship–so he asks Rick for something like a “love potion”.

This idea of Morty’s is inspired by a “counter-lesson” that Rick teaches him about girls and love. I say “counter” because it is counter to the lesson that Jerry, in a sort of “birds & bees” talk, attempts to convey to his son. To cut to the chase, Rick tells Morty:

“Listen, Morty, I hate to break it too you, but what people call ‘love’ is just a chemical reaction that compels animals to breed. It hits hard, Morty, then it slowly fades, leaving you stranded in a failing marriage. I did it, your parents are gonna do it; break the cycle, Morty. Rise Above. Focus on science.”

As an aside, we catch a brief glimpse from this short speech of Rick’s of why Rick is so hardnosed and closed off; Focusing on science seems to be, based on this, not just a interest of passion but an escape from a love once pure but since gone bad.

Well, the message certainly hits home with Morty–he does divert his thoughts away from his love for Jessica and onto science–the result being: how to use science to make Jessica fall in love with him! If love, as Rick says, is just chemicals in the brain, then it should be possible to make Jessica fall in love with him by way of a “potion”.

Morty walks in on Rick in the garage while he’s finishing up his “ionic defibrillator” and asks Morty to hand him a screw driver. Morty puts forward the proposal. Rick rejects it on account of what a waste of time it would be for him, and repeats the request for the screw driver. Morty, as in the last episode, starts to get all pissy, whining about how he’s always abiding by Rick’s requests, always doing everything he says; and why can’t Rick help him out for once? Rick, seeming obviously annoyed by Morty’s grievances, goes to the shelf and pulls out a vile of some yellow liquid:

“Listen, this is called oxytocin. I extracted it from a vole. Do you know what a vole is, Morty? Do you know what a vole is? It’s a-It’s a rodent that mates for life, Morty. This is a chemical released in the mammal’s brain. You know, it makes it fall in love.”

He follows that up by pouring the chemical into a machine that looks like a slow cooker and asks Morty for a sample of his DNA. Morty begins by unzipping his fly before Rick informs him that he only needs a hair. Rick puts the hair into the machine and pushes a button which churns the liquid into a kinda orange substance. So the potion itself makes whoever it’s applied to fall in love, and whoever’s DNA is in that potion is whom the person falls in love with. Morty is thrilled.

Before leaving the garage, Morty asks:

“Hey, there’s no dangers or anything or side effects, right?”

“W-w-what am I, a hack? Go nuts, Morty. It’s fool proof.”

After Morty leaves though:

“Huh, unless she has the flu.” but shrugs it off. ← Obvious foreshadowing, and Rick’s shrugging it off a sign of his reckless irresponsibility (he kinda is a hack).

Cut to a scene with Jerry and Beth having a discussion in the bedroom. Jerry is obviously in a bit of angst over the prior discussion he and Morty had with Rick. Before teaching Morty about the ways of love (with his “chemical” explanation), Rick points out to Jerry how obvious it is that his marriage is hanging from a thread and that Beth is looking for the door. This coupled with Rick’s theory that love fades as quickly as the chemicals has Jerry in a bind. Sitting on the bed while Beth is tapping away at a computer, he asks “Beth, do you still love me?”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLrEuUybw7I[/youtube]

^ Here we see a side of Beth that, more than in any other scene in the series, shows how she is truly her father’s daughter: completely insensitive but bang on in hitting a person with the hard truth. And she’s right: she does love Jerry (sort of, kind of) but only because she makes herself love him. It doesn’t come naturally; she has to work at it. And her final comment is very telling: stop asking and maybe I’ll love you more; in other words, this very angst he feels betrays a certain insecurity which turns her off–she has to work at making him feel loved but this at the expense of her love for him. It’s like love is a limited resource: the more you give, the less you have. (And in this instance, she is already on low, thus the unhindered insensitivity.)

This, for me, reinforces Rick’s point: love is a chemical reaction. In Beth’s case, it must be biologically stimulated. Jerry has to act in a certain way (confident) and say the right things (or at least not say the wrong things: like “do you still love me?”). There are obviously many forms of love–universal compassion for fellow human beings, for example, or love for one’s children, or an inspired commitment to the morality of treating others right. The most selfless form of love, people say, is that which devotes itself to the needs and feelings of others even when at the expense of one’s self, which I would classify as a commitment to morality (and specifically when inspired, not when guilted or just out of an impulse to conform to social standards). But Beth here seems to be driven mostly by her own biology–she only feels in love with Jerry when he displays that which turns her on–confidence, security, manliness, etc.–chemical indeed. But like Morty, she is not entirely as vein and base as her father–she still at least tries (which, in accordance with prior themes we have seen, doesn’t entirely work, and in this scene in particular, kind of backfires); she puts in the work to at least try to love Jerry a bit more than her biology allows, and thereby kind of “sort of” loves him. ← But hearing this doesn’t feel very reassuring to Jerry, thus making him feel less loved.

Beth gets a text message: a horse is injured and she’s needed (along with Davin, another surgeon) at the hospital. She leaves. In Jerry’s mind, with a look of consternation, he keeps repeating: “Davin. Davin. Davin…” (the clip above seems to crop the repetition of “Davin” out, but trust me, he keeps repeating it in the original).

Meanwhile, at the school dance, Morty dabs his hand with Rick’s love potion and motions over to Jessica. He fakes a gentle collision by which he manages to rub some of it on her arm. The effects are immediate. She turns around and instantly falls in love with him. She falls in love with him hard. She grabs him in her arms: “I love you, Morty. I love you so much it burns.” Jessica’s “boyfriend” (it’s not made clear that Brad is her boyfriend) sees this and intervenes: “Is this punk bothering you, Jessica?” to which she responds: “Leave him alone, jerk! I’m in love with him! He’s more man than you’ll ever be!” And then she sneezes on him. Her snot particles, along with the flu virus, make their way into Brad’s body, and the virus makes its way into his brain. Brad consequently falls in love with Morty too (it’s explained later by Rick that the serum piggy backs on the virus). He embraces Morty grabbing his ass: “There’s somethin’ special ‘bout you, Morty, somethin’ special.”

His and Jessica’s noticeably inappropriate behavior results in principle Vagina (yes, that’s his name) escorting Brad out of the gym (he doesn’t want Brad injuring his football arm). Kicking and screaming about how much he loves Morty, Brad sneezes snot particles into the punch. He sneezes again launching snot particles into the ventilation system (obviously foreshadowing that the whole school’s about to be infected).

Meanwhile at the Smith’s house, after announcing that he’s stepping out to “get some ice cream” (and maybe support his wife at the hospital with his confidence), Jerry exits the scene leaving Summer and Rick alone in the living room. Rick asks “How come you’re not at the stupid dance everyone loves so much?” to which she responds “Screw that. I don’t want to get sick. It’s flu season.”–“It is?”–“Yeah.”–“Oh-oh.”

Back at the school dance, the love serum is hitting Jessica hard: she drops to the dance floor on all fours sticking her ass in the air growling to Morty: “Rip my close off and mate with me for life!” Morty says “Um, can we maybe go somewhere more private?” Then almost immediately, the virus hits the whole school, the love serum piggy backing on top of it. And remember, this love serum is seeded with Morty’s DNA. Ergo, everyone falls in love with Morty.

This is quite overwhelming for Morty. The whole gym encroaches on him with beady love struck eyes, without any thought of how inappropriate this is or how it makes Morty feel. Morty is extremely, and understandably, uncomfortable. As soon as they break out into physically fighting over him, Morty makes a dash for the door where (surprise, surprise) Rick is there to save the day:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXWsiEufOi8[/youtube]

While explaining to Morty that the serum is piggy backing on the virus (at an alarmingly fast rate), he blames Morty for not telling him that Jessica had the flu: “You know, th-th-th-that might have been valuable information for me, Morty!” This is so incredibly ironic as the dangers of having the flu was information that Rick knew about, that Morty asked for, and that Rick shrugged off the minute it occurred to him that it was an example of the kind of information that Morty asked for–underscoring not only Rick’s irresponsible nature and his lack of accountability, but his hypocrisy as well.

To be fair to Rick, however, as soon as he does find out (through Summer) that there’s a flu going around, he goes out of his way to make a trip out to the school and rescue Morty, even admitting he made a mistake (as unbelievable as that is according to him). As much as he rejects responsibility for his mistakes, he does try to fix them.

In this case, Rick whips out an antidote he concocted (after he and Morty get into their ship and rise above a zombie-like hord of love struck teenagers):

“We’re gonna be fine, Morty, relax. I whipped up an antidote. It’s based on praying mantis DNA. You know, praying mantises are the exact opposite of voles, Morty. I mean, they-they mate once and then they, you know, decapitate the partner; I mean, it’s a, it’s a whole ritual, it’s really gruesome and totally opposite, there’s no love of-at all. I-I-I basically mixed this with a more contagious virus; it should neutralize the whole thing, Morty. It’ll all be over very shortly.”

Rick also explains that no one with similar DNA (i.e. Morty’s family) is affected by the serum, which is why he isn’t the least bit interested in having sex with Morty, and why no one in his family succumbs to what happens next.

During his speech, Rick pours the antidote into a tube on the ship, then after the speech, pulls a lever releasing the antidote (now in gaseous form) onto the crowd. What happens next can only be described by the gruesome transformation scene from David Cronenberg’s awful 1986 The Fly:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYAguOfDjmo[/youtube]

…except with praying mantises instead of flies:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKyuucth2eA[/youtube]

Cut to Jerry driving like a mad man to catch his wife in the act of cheating on him with Davin. He slams on the breaks at the site of a major traffic jam, a traffic jam caused by what looks like, off in the distance, mayhem and chaos–that is, flames and car accidents, sirens sounding off in the distance. Presumably, we are seeing the first consequences of a world that, in Rick’s phrase which he coins later, has been “Cronenberged”. Jerry gets out of the car not noticing the herd of pray mantis / human hybrids fast approaching behind him. One of them says “Morty!” Jerry dives across the hood of his car. Another says “You’re not Morty! Bring us Morty!” ← So far from canceling out the love spell that Rick’s first serum caused, his second serum resulted not only in these genetic abominations but a whole population of creatures who want to have sex with Morty and then eat him.

Jerry runs and finds a dead police officer slouched half way out of his police car, his riffle on the ground. Jerry picks up the riffle and starts shooting at the praying mantis freaks, blowing their heads to bloody bits. Finishing off the first round of mantises, he says “Nobody’s killing me until after I catch my wife with another man.” ← As cheesy as this sounds, this is the beginning of a transformation on Jerry’s own part. Just as in the last episode, Jerry sort of, kind of “manned up”, in this episode, he goes through the full transformation and becomes the most manly we’ll ever see him–kind of matching the sort of, kind of turning point in the series that the last episode was compared to how emphatically a turning point this episode is.

Cut to Summer watching the news at home: mantis/human news casters are reporting that Morty’s whereabouts are still unknown. “What… the hell,” says Summer. She switches the channel to find that even in the Middle East, people have transformed to mantis freaks screaming out Morty’s name amidst crazed Arabic ramblings (apparently, this flu travels fast). More mantis freaks crash down the front door. “Where is Morty!!!” Summer bashes one over the head with a lamp and rushes out of the house, dodging mantis freaks as she dashes down the street.

Cut back to Rick and Morty: they’ve landed out in the desert where no one knows where they are. Rick has a makeshift laboratory setup from a pull-out desk extending from his ship as he works out yet another serum. Turning off a television after seeing that the flu, with the mantis serum, has reached as far as China, Morty is freaking out:

Morty: “Oh my God Rick, the whole world is infected.”

Rick: “Yeah it’s pretty wild how fast that spread. I’ve really outdone myself.”

Morty: “Outdone yourself?! Wha-wha-wha-Are you kidding me, Rick?! This is not OK! Not only do they all wanna have sex with me, but you know, now they want to eat me afterwards!”

Rick: “Yeah, I don’t know what I was thinking. Mantises are the opposite of Voles? Obviously, DNA’s a little more complicated than that…”

I find this line interesting. It puts a bit of a monkey wrench into the interpretation of Rick’s personality that we’re going with: that he’s simply an irresponsible man who doesn’t take accountability for his own actions. Here he seems to be fessing up… after the fact, of course. It’s a sort of accountability, which I guess is something coming from Rick. On the other hand, this fessing up after the fact might just be what scientists do all the time when they find that their initial theory was wrong–recognize the flaws and the leaps of logic that were there all along. I should know. I’m a computer scientist myself. I come up with a design for an algorithm, I implement it, and it fails to work–this is followed by a bit of reflection: what went wrong? And it doesn’t take long to realize: ah, yes, of course my design didn’t work! I was missing vital component X! It just seems so obvious after the fact, and it’s funny how the brain waits 'til after it fumbles over its own gaping holes to recognize how obvious they were.

Morty is freaking out here. Rick is calm and collected, really quite unbothered by the whole situation. It could therefore be that his fessing up is just a matter of not caring. It’s a nice contrast though: while Morty’s panicking does little to ameliorate the situation, Rick’s nonchalant attitude keeps him focused on finding a solution.

But perhaps the most likely explanation for Rick’s fessing up is a subtle manner on the writers’ part of making fun of Rick’s sloppiness: Rick continues…

Rick: “…you know what though Morty? This right here’s gonna do the trick, baby. [holds up yet another serum] It’s koala, mixed with rattle snake, chimpanzee, cactus, shark, golden retriever, and just a smidge of dinosaur… should add up to normal humanity.”

Morty: “I don’t-that doesn’t make any sense, Rick! How does that add up to normal humanity?!”

Rick: “What, Morty, you want me to show you my math? I’m sorry–ar-ar-are you the scientist or are you the kid that wanted to get laid.”

So Rick fesses up to being sloppy after the fact followed immediately by something even more poorly thought out and sloppy. Even Morty realizes how much of a hack Rick’s being in this scene. Rick’s nonchallant attitude may keep him focused on finding a solution, but it also keeps him from putting any serious effort into being careful. His response to Morty above betrays a dangerously cocky attitude that results in wild over-confidence, over-confidence that is only corrected by seeing his mistakes after the fact.

Cut to the animal clinic, Beth and Davin (a young, handsome man with flowing blond hair) retire to the office after a job well done on the horse. Davin turns the lights low, plays some soft semi-romantic music, and turns on an automatic candle with a remote control. In response to Beth’s question “What are you doing?” Davin replies “I’m playing African Dream Pop. What do you do after a long night?” Beth, demonstrating her faithfulness to her marriage, says she’d better get going and opens the door to leave. Davin shuts the door before Beth can leave. He moves in close as Beth backs off:

Davin: “Just once, I’d like to know… [sneeze! ← Obviously catching the flu… eyes dilate, face becomes twisted and maniacal-looking] …what it was like to give your son a bath. [Beth: ‘What?!’] What does Morty’s skin smell like? [grips her shoulders] How soft-grunt-how soft are his privates?”

She shouts at him: “Let go of me, Davin!”, pushes him out of the way and runs behind the desk. Davin, on the other side of the desk, transforms, in the same Cronenberg style, into a mantis freak right in front of Beth*. He demands: “Take me to Morty!”

Then, like a swash-buckling hero swooping in to save the day, Jerry kicks down the door. Mantis-Davin turns around: “You’re not Morty.”

Jerry: “No, I’m Mr. Crowbar. And this is my friend, who is also a crowbar.”

Mantis-Davin: “That’s stupid.”

Jerry proceeds to beat Mantis-Davin with the crowbar into a dead bloody mess on the ground, then says: “Yeah? Well, look where being smart got ya.”

Beth comes out from behind the desk and embraces his arm: “Jerry! Thank God!”

Jerry, with a raspy Clint Eastwood voice: “God? [looks off into the distance] God’s turning people into insect monsters, Beth. [Looks back at Beth] I’m the one beating them to death. Thank me.”

She does: “Thank you, Jerry. [hugs him] Thank you.”

Now, I think it’s worth taking a screen shot of Jerry here:

Look at his shirt: dirty, ripped up, sleeves torn off, exposing a bit of arm and shoulder muscle–that coupled with the crowbar in hand and the look on his face, staring off into the distance while the woman he loves embraces him in her moment of vulnerability, all adds up to a complete 180 from the Jerry we’re used to. He has finally, for real, manned up–like some kind of Rambo or Clint Eastwood–all in the course of a short trip to the hospital.

And what is Beth’s reaction? Well, it’s too early to tell at this point–her embrace, though certainly from the heart, is too wrapped up in feelings of vulnerability and fear at this point, but it doesn’t take much to recognize that this is the Jerry she could really fall head over heals in love with, and that will definitely show through the rest of this episode. And so what if it’s instigated, at this point, by feelings of vulnerability and fear, by Jerry’s manly “swooping in” to save her–this reinforces the theme touched on earlier: that love is chemical. This is just the stimulus Beth’s brain needed in order to feel the intoxicating ecstasy of love.

Cut back (again) to Rick and Morty flying over the city taking in the horror of what they (or just Rick) turned the people into. Rick is no rush. He kinda finds the whole thing amusing and wants to take at least a few minutes to soak it all in. “Just do it already,” says an annoyed Morty. Rick asserts that there’s no rush and when’s the next time he’s gonna see something like this. But Morty’s not having any of it, and he pulls the lever. The gas descends, engulfing the mantis creatures, and when it clears, everyone looks normal again. Rick gloats:

“Well, what do we have here, Morty? Looks like I was right and you were wrong, huh? I-I-I be-bet you feel pretty stupid right about now, huh? I-I-I bet you feel like the world’s smallest man that you were doubting me about this whole thing, Morty.”

^ Things go right, and Rick takes credit. Things go wrong, and he blames Morty (or whoever’s the closest person around).

But Morty’s not listening. Instead he’s staring out the window at the people down below. He’s noticing something’s wrong:

Morty: “Oh, Rick, something’s not right.”

Rick: “[Takes a sip from his mickey] Yeah, you, you’re not right, ever.”

Morty: “No! No! Look you idiot!”

Morty pulls Rick over to his side of the ship and forces him to look down below: the people are writhing on the ground in what looks like agonizing pain. What happens next can only be described by that gruesome end scene from Chris Walas’s even more aweful 1989 The Fly II:

…except with koala, mixed with rattle snake, chimpanzee, cactus, shark, golden retriever, and just a smidge of dinosaur instead of… well, just some unspeakable abomination of the human genome:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1O4xyoT0yg[/youtube]

It’s too bad Cronenberg didn’t actually direct The Fly II–it makes Rick’s dubbing of the whole situation as having been “Cronenberged” a little less fitting.

In any case, Rick has seriously fucked up–he’s fucked up big time–he’s essentially destroyed humanity. Yet he still digs into Morty for this–not so much blaming him but still taking it out on him:

“Bet you’re loving this, Morty. This must be the best day of your life. You get to be the maaayor of I told you town. [takes another sip from his mickey] You’re welcome.” ← Not only taking it out on Morty, but still managing to take some credit (with the “you’re welcome”) for giving Morty the opportunity to gloat for being right–as if Morty could ever be happy about this outcome.

Meanwhile, Jerry and Beth are cruising down the street in some kind of makeshift armored vehicle–like something out of Mad Max:

^ It has a chain-linked fence with a few metal panels on the side strapped there by chains, iron bars over top the windshield for protection, all sorts of bladed weapons (swords, knives, machetes) sticking out the grill, a set of extremely powerful head lights propped at the top… Jerry’s at the wheel, Beth clutching him, looking frazzled and terrified. They’re stopped before a horde of Cronenbergs. Jerry says “Hold on.” Beth clutches tighter. He steps on the gas and butchers the horde as he plows through them. He’s actually got a sadistic look on his face, like this is a rush for him, Beth just looking shocked, as he not only bludgeons the Cronenbergs, but actually aims for one when he clearly has plenty of room to pass through.

Then he stops the vehicle and steps out (for some reason) with a machete in hand, followed by Beth, now seemingly no longer scared but a kick-ass alpha bitch, with a riffle in hand (presumably the same one Jerry got earlier). Jerry slashes while Beth blows off heads. Jerry even chops a Cronenberg in half with something like a Karate kick… all the while, some hardcore heavy metal playing the background. After the blood bath ends, Jerry looks at Beth and says:

“I wish that shot gun was my penis.”

Beth: “If it were, you could call me Earnest Hemingway.”

Jerry: “[Pulls Beth in] I don’t get it, and I don’t need to.” ← Neither do I, frankly. Then they embrace in a passionate kiss. Beth obviously liking it (Jerry likes it too, but that goes without saying).

Then Summer enters the scene. She cries: “Mom! Dad!” They call back: “Summer!” and run to her. She asks:

“Do you think grandpa Rick had something to do with this?”

Jerry: “It’s not fair to assume that, Summer.”

Beth: “Oh, not fair? Give me a break. He is a selfish, irresponsible ass, and he left my mother. [Comes in closer, caressing Jerry’s shoulder and chest.] A real man stands by his woman.” Again, they embrace and kiss passionately… kinda making out… right in front of Summer (obviously feeling awkward).

^ This is an interest scenario. Jerry, who is usually the first to point out the dirt on his father-in-law, now defends him on the off chance he had nothing to do with this. And Beth, who usually defends her father even when it’s painfully obvious he’s in the wrong, now admits passionately that he is a selfish, irresponsible ass. And that he left her mother. ← This part’s important because, though we haven’t quite seen it yet, it’s the crux of Beth’s issues. Jerry’s definitely got a whole swack of insecurity issues (well, at least at all other times), but Beth’s got her fair share as well. She’s got daddy issues. He left her and the family when she was just a girl. But this is the first time in the series she’s openly blamed him for doing so. It’s almost as if she’s now able to do so because Jerry has become the man she’s always wanted–as if, finally, Jerry, in this new manly persona of his, is an adequate substitute (at least) for her father, ridding her of the need to defend her father so that she can keep at least one man in her life who can be relied on for protection and shelter.

^ It probably sounds sexist, but there is a wide-spread theory that what turns a woman on is a show of manliness because it demonstrates an ability to protect, provide, and shelter–yes, love, at the end of the day, is chemical through-and-through.

Once again, we cut back to Rick and Morty. Morning is dawning and they’re sitting atop a building, just watching Cronenberg world, safe from all the Cronenberg madness. I like this scene because I think it epitomizes everything we’ve said so far about Rick’s personality (though revealing nothing new)–the shrugging of responsibility, the lack of concern, the blaming of anyone but himself, and even the subtle admittance that he “really Cronenberged the world up” without actually owning up to his responsibility–and finally the resolution of coming up with yet another alleged solution:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6j06wyVdO8[/youtube]

I like this scene for another reason: we see something of Morty which we saw in the last episode–that he’s not afraid to stand up to Rick, and this time we see it mixed with a strong sense of responsibility and morality–Morty actually accepts part of the blame–he did after all play a part in starting the whole chain reaction–none of it would have happened if he just forgot about the magic love potion and handed Rick the screw driver he asked for. ← Wow! That’s taking accountability!

Morty really is an amazing character. He’s young and gullible, not very experienced with the ways of the world, it’s true, but this demonstration–that of being a man and owning some moral accountability–if it carries through to adulthood, will really make him into an amazing human being.

Yet, at the same time, he doesn’t let Rick walk all over him. He insists that Rick take his part of the blame. Though Rick doesn’t quite do this, he does move on to look for the next hack.

We cut one last time to a suburban neighborhood–the sun is shining, the bird’s are singing, the leaves on the trees are green, there’s a paper boy on his bike delivering news papers and a man mowing his lawn as he waves to the biker… everything seems back to normal. The paper, with a picture of Cronenbergs on it, reads: “GENETIC EPIDEMIC AVERTED”. We are lead to believe that Rick’s last fix actually solved the problem.

Rick and Morty land their ship in the drive way as the garage door opens. They step out as Morty says, “You really pulled a rabbit out of your hat this time.” They step into the garage and Rick stands in front of his “ionic defibrillizer” saying to Morty: “Now Morty, what do you say, buddy? Will you hand me a screw driver so I can finish my ionic defibrillizer?” Morty says “Sure thing, Rick.” and hands him a screw driver. Rick applies the screw driver to the device:

“I got one screw turn… and two screw turns… and–”

BOOM!!!

The defibrilator blows up. Blood splattered everywhere. Rick and Morty’s bodies, after being thrown violently against the shelf, limbs busted, skin charred, and one of Rick’s eye balls popped out of its socket, are unquestionably dead.

However, a portal opens right after this and Rick and Morty step through–another Rick and Morty. Rick (the living one) says: “All right, Morty, here we are.”

^ This is Rick’s solution: abandon Cronenberg world and hijack another that isn’t fucked up. He essentially found a reality in which they both died right after (somehow) solving the Cronenberg problem–conveniently allowing them to simply slip into their dead counter-parts’ places. Everything in this world is exactly the same as it was in the last world (before the Cronenberg incident) so, theoretically, or on the surface, life should carry on as normal–so long as no one figures out that the native Rick and Morty are actually dead and the one’s that took their places are impostors. ← That’s Rick’s solution.

Rick essentially abandoned his mess–the ultimate Victor Frankenstein move–he abandoned his family, his daughter, Morty’s mother–and poor Morty has no choice but to be dragged along. This is now Morty’s new life–a new life Rick serves him on a silver platter.

Before this sinks in, however, Morty has to get over the initial shock of seeing their bloody, broken, dead counter-part selves–with limbs twisted in every wrong direction–lying on the ground in a horrifying mess:

“Oh my God, Rick! Is that us?! We’re dead!”

Morty freaks out. Rick tells him to calm down. He won’t, he can’t. Rick slaps him across the face:

“Shut up and listen to me! It’s fine! Everything is fine! There’s an infinite number of realities, Morty, and in a few dozen of those I got lucky and turned everything back to normal. I just had to find one of those realities in which we also happened to both die around this time. Now we can just slip into the place of our dead selves in this reality and everything will be fine. We’re not skipping a beat Morty. Now help me with these bodies.”

After Morty brings up the issue of the reality they left behind, Rick says:

“What about the reality where Hitler cured cancer, Morty? The answer is: don’t think about it.”

Though this answer is typical of anyone who wants to solve problems by ignoring them, the question is very telling of what drives Rick’s thinking: if there really are an infinite number of realities, then for every reality in which a problem is solved, that very solution, in another reality, will be the cause of an even greater problem. What if, in this reality, Hitler would have actually cured cancer if the allies had not killed him? Did defeating Hitler really solve more problems than it created? Rick’s point here seems to echo the theme of chaos and craziness we saw in the last episode–more specifically, the theme about how for every attempt at solving a problem, at making the world a better place, you stand a significant chance of inadvertently making the world a worse place. Given this outlook of Rick’s, it would really seem that it doesn’t matter one iota what you do. Anything you do–whether it seems morally right or morally wrong, whether it seems like a solid solution or a poorly thought-out hack–can result in absolutely any outcome you can imagine. Is it possible that, though this “solution” of Rick’s seems like a cop out on the surface, it’s really the best one given the options they had available–that anything else, like a “real” attempt to solve the actual problem they faced, would have resulted, like it had two times already, in making the world worse off than it was before? If so, if we really have that little control over the outcomes our actions bring about, why think about it at all?

This very incident they are now enmeshed in–coming face to face with their dead selves–is an prime, and very ironic, example. Rick says, as he holds his dead self in his arms:

“I-I-I don’t suppose you’ve considered this detail, but obviously if I hadn’t screwed up as much as I did, we’d be these guys right now, so again, you’re welcome.”

^ Unbelievable! Even now, Rick is taking credit and making Morty feel like he owes a debt to him. But by a certain logic, he’s right. If Rick had actually fixed Cronenberg world, they would have done what these guys did. Come back to their cozy home, went back to whatever it was they were doing (finishing up an ionic defruitalizer), Morty obediently handing Rick a screw driver, and BOOM–killed themselves!

Yet, by the very same token, this could all be accredited to Morty: when Rick first asked him for the screw driver at the beginning of the episode, Morty refused on account of the fact that Rick wouldn’t grant him his request of making him a love potion so that Jessica would fall in love with him. ← They are only alive now, taking the place of their dead counter-parts, because of Morty. ← Something that, just earlier, Morty accepted blame for.

^ This scene is really brilliant in the way it blends so many paradoxical ironies, at how it brings the whole arbitrariness of causes and blaming and who gets credit for what brazenly to the fore. It’s really hard, after you understand this, to simply brush off Rick’s point about Hitler curing cancer.

Well, what other choice does Morty have? As usually, he follows suite and does what Rick says: he helps to bury his own dead body so that he can take its place without anyone, even his own (pseudo-)family, finding out he’s an impostor in a reality he doesn’t belong to.

^ And this will be his reality from here on in. Even we, as we move through the episodes, one after the other, will forget about it. As far as making this “solution” appear seamless on the surface, it works. It really will seem, eventually–even to us as spectators–like this is Morty’s ordinary “home” reality–not skipping a beat. You’ll see.

But this adaptation, this “getting used to it” and “forgetting about it”, has not yet sunk in for Morty. He is really overwhelmed in shock over what Rick has just pulled him into–a traumatizing shock that, ironically, he will get very used to very soon–and yet the trauma of this initial shock doesn’t even register on Rick’s radar as the following scene makes clear:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNa4NKFE6wE[/youtube]

Now, there are many corny and cheap adult comedies on Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim, but I think after watching this episode of Rick and Morty–this scene in particular–one can’t deny that the creators are going for something a little deeper, something a little more meaningful than wise-ass fart jokes and juvenile sleaze humor. ← For me, this was the episode which made this clear. This episode not only appeals to a higher intelligence in its audience but an interest in really thinking about moral questions and what matters to us as human beings. Perhaps, then, the reason I say this episode marks a turning point in the series (and the last, a foreshadowing of this turning point) is merely psychological on my part–but I dare anyone to say differently after watching each episode from the pilot to this one without knowing what to expect. This is why I think Rick and Morty really is worthy of a philosophical dissection, if not just a plot and character analysis (both, obviously, feeding into each other)–worthy in a way that no other adult cartoon is (Simpson coming in at a close second ).

(And if you think about it, this episode is literally a turning point in Morty’s life).

As usual with most of the Rick and Morty episodes, there is a post-credit scene. In this one, we have one worth looking into: whatever happened to Jerry and Beth (and Summer)? Well, in Morty’s new reality, nothing really happened to them–life goes on as usual. But in the reality they left behind, here’s what happened:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNQF1AwWMjM[/youtube]

Let’s just focus on Jerry, shall we? Look at how frickin’ beefed up he is. Jerry, here, has reached the pinnacle of manliness–he’s really done better than in the last episode–he’s basically the equivalent of Rambo or Arnold Schwarzenegger in, well, any of his movies (except Twins)–he’s even got a bullet belt across his chest and a head band around his forehead.

And look at Beth, all snug and cozy on his lap, resting on the couch, looking very comfy and dreamy.

After asking whether she ever thinks about what happened to Rick and Morty, Beth says: “Sometimes… but I’m ashamed to admit, now that they’re gone… I’m finally happy.”

Why would she be happy that her own father and her own son are gone?

Well, her father, we can understand. I did put forward above the interpretation that, now that she finally has a “real man” who loves and fends for her, she no longer has a need for a father figure in her life to fill that roll… but her son–that I’m still at a loss to understand; perhaps it’s as simple as the fact that she is her father’s daughter. If Rick can be insensitive enough to not give a damn about the shit he puts Morty through–including, in this episode, forcing him to abandon his own family forever–why can’t Beth not give a shit about abandoning her own family–at least her father and son? Or maybe this was just a hole the writer’s of Rick and Morty accepted in order to get the point across that, really, she’s only happy because she finally found a substitute for her father and the need for a protector and provider that she naively hoped Rick would be.

And just a note: keep in mind that this “happy ending”–at least for Beth–only occurs in the world that Rick and Morty abandoned–the world they hijacked featuring a Jerry and Beth whom are still in conflict, still at each other’s throats, and whose marriage still hangs by a delicate thread (although, obviously, in this new reality, if the Cronenberg problem got to the point beyond that of the mantis freaks–i.e. the koala, mixed with rattle snake, chimpanzee, cactus, shark, golden retriever, and just a smidge of dinosaur–then Jerry and Beth must have at least shared a moment in which she got to taste a bit of Jerry’s inner manliness).

• Odd that the flu/serum has, at this point, already reached as far as China yet Davin has yet to be infected. I guess the sterility of the operating room bought him some time.

PHILOSOPHICAL SPRINGBOARDS:

• We’ve already touched on the question of the crazy and chaotic character of the universe in the last episode, and what implications that has for our attempts to control reality according to our prescribed designs, and this question rears its head again in this episode; except it takes it a bit further. It asks: things not occurring the way we expect notwithstanding, can we even say we are responsible for whatever does occur–even when we know it was our actions that lead to those unanticipated occurrences? Who really was responsible for Cronenberging the world? The intuitive answer would seem to be Rick: it was his recklessly concocted serum, and his decision to infect the population with it, that resulted in the Cronenberg disaster. But then again, he’s right that if Morty had just told him that there was a flu going around, he would have been able to warn Morty, and none of this would have ever happened. But then again, if Rick had only flagged Morty down the minute it occurred to him that the mere possibility of the flu might result in disaster, he might have prevented what followed. But then again, if Morty just handed him the screw driver instead of pestering him for a love potion, there would be nothing to worry about. But then again, if Morty did hand him the screw driver, they’d be dead. Does it make any sense, therefore, to cherry pick one cause out of a seemingly infinite sea of others as the one that was the “actual” cause? Is it really that arbitrary, at the end of the day, who we blame?

• Is love just chemistry? I think it is metaphorically, but the question here is: is there nothing more to love than chemicals in the brain making us feel certain feelings. And is all it takes to get those chemicals flowing just the right stimulus? In Beth’s case, it seems to be. Although her behavior towards Jerry wasn’t quite as pronounced as Jessica’s towards Morty, you could say it really seemed like a watered down version of the same thing. That was after Jerry’s transformation, obviously, for before his transformation, he just didn’t seem to have what it took to stimulate Beth, and so Beth had to “work” at trying to love him (at least she was smart enough to recognize that). If this is just the way our biology works, what does that say about love itself? Surely, there are other forms of love that aren’t so reliant on our biology: what about universal love for our fellow men and women, the impersonal kind? What about love for a good friend? What about love for our children? ← This one clearly has biological links too, but isn’t so given to waxing and waning due to stimuli coming and going. And what about love for glory and honor, that which inspires us to fight for morality, for the oppressed and the poor? ← Is this really a selfless love, or is it for one’s own greatness? No doubt, there’s brain chemistry involved in all of these (I don’t know how we can escape our biology), but are any of them truly selfless? Do any of them rise above simple stimulus-response mechanics? Does it even make sense to suppose that love–whatever form it takes–raises us above our own biology when that very biology, with its tendencies towards love, was crafted by a very long and meticulous evolutionary process? A process geared towards ensuring our survival as best it can? And isn’t survival about defending one’s self against death? Therefore, how selfless can love really be?

• Last time we had a look at the theme of escaping reality (with a nod towards drug use), questioning whether it really is an escape or not. This time we question whether one can escape one’s responsibilities by the same strategy. How effectively can one hide one’s mistakes by brushing them under a rug? Is slipping into the places of their dead selves in an alternate reality really a “fix” to the problem that Rick (and Morty by proxy) created? Or is it more of a way to, in Rick’s words, “not think about it”–a way to pretend it’s not real because, for all intents and purposes, it isn’t real, not in this reality. How long can one go on ignoring what one is escaping from? Rick probably can indefinitely, but Morty… the fact that he is an impostor in this new reality, the fact the people he is living with are not his real family–these are not things he’ll forget so easily, and though for the most part he will be able to ignore it and fully submerge himself in the fantasy of fitting into a world to which he belongs, these facts are going to haunt him from the back of his mind forever. What kind of escape is ever truly 100% effective?

RANDOM THOUGHTS

Jessica on the love serum: is this a metaphor for drugs? I mean, it is a high school dance after all; and there’s always one in every teenage crowd. Jessica certainly starts acting like she’s high on ecstasy–and MDMA is said to function the same way in the body as the naturally occurring neuro-chemical oxytocin, the chemical Rick said he got from a vole. And Morty, when the whole school lustfully encroaches upon him, tries to escape like he’s having a bad trip.

Mixed signals from Rick: though it seems clear what we’re supposed to get out of Rick in this episode (that he’s careless and irresponsible), it comes mixed with signs that he has no problem taking credit for what he’s done. I’m not sure this counts as taking accountability, but it certainly contrasts with his more usual habit of blaming someone else. In the case of the mantis freaks, he seems to take credit only to gloat about how he’s “really outdone [him]self.” And in the case of the full-on Cronenbergs, he says “Boy Morty, I really Cronenberged the world up, didn’t I?” but he says it in such a nonchalant way that you could almost guess he’s proud of his handiwork. In any case, I think there’s more to this character flaw of his–and if I may drop a spoiler alert, we’ll get a hint of what this is in Season 2, Episode 6 (The Ricks Must be Crazy): he’s better described as an opportunist than irresponsible. He’ll take responsibility only when it suits him–i.e. when he can spin it to his credit.

A couple questions: If Rick could find an alternative reality in which his alternate self found a real solution to the Cronenberg problem, why couldn’t he also figure out what that solution was? I mean, you may not recognize what that device he puts around his head is (the visors he puts on right before it cuts to the alternate world where everything is made perfect again), but he’ll explain it in Episode 8 of Season 1: it’s a device that let’s you see the world through the eyes of an alternate self in another reality. He’s actually looking for an alternate self, one who actually solves the Cronenberg problem. But if he’s looking through his alternate self’s eyes, why can’t he just see what the solution is and apply it to his own world? Furthermore, why doesn’t he just jump to that world and ask his alternate self: “Rick, how did you solve the Cronenberg problem?”

Second question: After telling Morty that “there’s an infinite number of realities…” he says “…and in a few dozen of those, I got lucky…” ← But how does this make sense? How is there only a few dozen? Shouldn’t there be an infinite number of realities in which he got lucky? Maybe much “less” of an infinity (like the number of odd numbers compared to the number of real numbers), but no matter how rare an event or a set of circumstances, if you allow for an infinite number of chances, there will be an infinite number of those events or sets of circumstances. It’s like saying there’s a bag with an infinite number of marbles in it, but only a few dozen are red. If we don’t assume any limit on what color an arbitrary marble is, there can’t just be a few dozen that are red. This point has been brought up before on the internet. I remember finding this observation on google along with a theory that though there may be an infinite number of realities out there, there is only a limit number of them that are accessible (or discoverable) by Rick. This was brought up to account for an odd observation made in Episode 10 of Season 1 (Close Rick-Counters of the Rick Kind): that the “evil Rick” had cataloged only a finite number of alternate Ricks. Ok, so Rick may have access to (or know about) only a finite number of alternate realities with other Ricks in them (perhaps a finite number of alternate realities period), but the same principle about these realities should apply: if we can think about “accessibility” or “discoverability” as a property of realities, then there should be an infinite number of such realities. Maybe Rick just hasn’t had an eternity to find them.

Does Rick leaving Beth in Cronenberg world symbolize Rick leaving Beth when she was a child? It conveniently coincides with just the time when Jerry mans up and becomes more than an adequate replacement for her dad.

Speaking of Jerry, it occurs to me that what began his transformation was jealousy. His original phrase: “Nobody’s killing me until after I catch my wife with another man,” shows that there was more than one motive for him to blow off mantis heads, more than just self-defense–he was already enraged (and you could tell by the look on his face as he was racing down the road like a mad man). But why does he want to catch his wife with another man? Could it be that he’s just as miserable in the marriage as Beth but he needs an excuse to leave her? Jerry can’t do anything unless it is deemed socially acceptable, and catching her cheating on him would be the green light to divorce if nothing else was. This aspect of Jerry’s personality will be brought to the fore in Season 2, Episode 8: Interdimensional Cable 2: Tempting Fate–his inability to do what he wants for himself unless it meets social approval. It’s interesting that this is not how things turned out once he got to the hospital. In fact, the exact opposite occurred. He caught Beth trying to fend herself against Davin while Jerry swooped in to save her, thus reinvigorating their love for each other.

Speaking of transformations, we have a complete reversal of rolls between Rick and Jerry. Well, almost… it’s more like an inversion of inner personalities with outer personalities–with Jerry redeeming himself and Rick condemning himself. Jerry not only gets in touch with an inner “Rambo” he never knew he had (nor did we) but it completely overtakes him. The old “pussy” Jerry is completely gone. Meanwhile, Rick’s exterior demeanor of super genius and always-right and the best-damn-shit-that-ever-walked-the-planet is exposed for the fraud it is and beneath it is a pathetic loser who can’t even figure out that normal human DNA is definitely NOT koala, mixed with rattle snake, chimpanzee, cactus, shark, golden retriever, and just a smidge of dinosaur. He’s exposed for the drunken, careless, irresponsible, asshole he really is. There’s absolutely nothing glorious about him under the lustrous ego. If Jerry finally becomes a “real man”, then Rick is exposed for the child he is. They both do a 180–one going from pathetic to great, the other from great to pathetic.

^ Is it possible that the Cronenberg effect, at least the first one where mantises burst out of human shells, was symbolic of this? Symbolic of the inner becoming the outer, or a transformation at the very least?

And finally, I just wanted to point out that not only will Morty never see his real family again, but he’ll never get to fall in love with Jessica (not the original one at least). He won’t get the girl. The whole thing that started this ends up being an impossibility forever.