Rick And Morty Season 2 Review

Yes, “A Rickle in Time” is classic Rick and Morty. But simultaneously, it seems to hue a shade stranger than the first season, revelling in the conceptual complexity of its multiple-timeline setup with kick-ass action sequences (Rick decides to engage in an inter-dimensional shoot-out with slightly alt-timeline versions of himself) and an overload of intricate jokes. Harmon and Roiland promised a darker season this time around, and there are already some small hints at that will be exciting to see flourish in coming episodes (after all, Evil Morty is still out there, planning everyone’s annihilation, and I’m holding out hope for Abradolf Lincler’s survival).

The requisite Jerry-Beth subplot is a little dull, though that was a problem last season too, and it doesn’t really make a huge difference here because the Rick-Morty-Summer A-plot (oh yeah – Summer is taking on just as big a role as Morty so far, and if the dynamic between all three of them continues to be as interesting as it is, I’m completely on board with that) is so deliriously loopy. Rick and Morty still could benefit from completely going down its universe-bending rabbit hole and away from the monotony of Jerry and Beth’s regular life (no matter how much roadkill the latter attempts to resuscitate to assert her own medical prowess).

Regardless of where the season ends up going, Rick and Morty is sticking to its guns in terms of tone. The demented creativity of the storytelling, rapid-fire humor and off-the-wall energy are still very present, and that alone is enough to make the premiere a must-watch. In its first season, Rick and Morty was a brilliantly written deconstruction of the very concept of genre, and the way it plays with format in this season’s premiere suggests that Harmon and Roiland remain committed to pushing the envelope however they can. With Harmon’s gift for cuttingly meta dialogue and Roiland’s coarse sensibilities both firing on all cylinders, it’s going to be a joy to watch them at work with little idea of what they’ll come up with.

That’s the ultimate gift Rick and Morty provides – it’s the most ballsy show on television because it unmoors itself from all genre tropes or constraints. It subverts genre and in doing so, ensures that its creativity can run rampant and its weird, original voice will never be muffled. If there’s a mission statement for this season, it probably reads something like this: keep calm, and wubba lubba dub dub. I almost don’t care to learn what it means, because like Rick and Morty, it’s weird and wacky and never less than completely wonderful.