SPOILER My Thoughts On Rick And Morty, Season 4 (so Far)

I just finished watching the first 5 episodes of the 4th season of Rick and Morty, and it was... meh.

Each episode was somewhat interesting, but I never even chuckled except for once in the heist episode. I know that it’s too early to judge the season as a whole, but something about the show feels a bit... off for some reason that I can’t quite explain. Which is the main reason I’m making this thread.

Maybe it’s just having too much of anything, but I remember enjoying the previous seasons more. One noticeable difference between this season and the others is that there is absolutely no overall change. Yes, most episodes of Rick and Morty were random and brought up and discarded elements (like the hive mind episode), but there was an attempt to have some serialized storytelling (Season 3 premiere, Beth and Jerry getting divorced, whether Beth is clone or not, etc.). While I didn’t like some things like whether Beth was a clone or not, it kept the show fresh by having payoff, raising the stakes of the show, and rewarded you for, you know, paying attention?

After the season 3 finale, I feel like they threw all of that out of the window and went full in the absurdist element of the show. Which I felt that was OK at first, because it was always an absurd, nihilistic satire anyway, and I don’t mind episodic storytelling. Though now paying attention to anything in the show is seen a joke. This was exemplified with the whole talking cat.

Like okay, it’s supposed to be random and troll people like MatPat who read into things too much, so what? I didn't even care about that cat or that it had no purpose to begin with, so why are you trying to troll the rest of us when you’ve already beaten that horse dead with Pickle Rick and the Season 3 Premiere?

It’s like having someone pull the same prank over and over again. Yes, we already know that nothing matters. You don’t have to tease some mystery and then say it doesn’t matter. Can we please just move on then?

At this point, Rick and Morty reminds me of SuperJail, but more smug and cynical, less creatively violent, and slower-paced. For those that haven’t heard or seen it before, these clips speak for themselves:



TL:DR I’m not quite sure why I didn’t enjoy this season as much as the others. Wasn’t bad, but just mediocre. Maybe it’s because I’m just tired of it, maybe it’s that they don’t have the benefits of continuity anymore. Either way, something about the show changed, and idk if it was for the better.

What do you guys think?

 

I find also fine the current season less enjoyable but I'd like to say the episodes have way more references (for example you won't enjoy episode five if you haven't watched the terminatior movies and other science fiction creations). This increases the enjoyment of the episodes where you've seen the right movies in order to understand the references but overall decrease the enjoyment as you probably haven't seen everything.

 

I’ve only seen the first terminator, but I did see the trailers for the other ones so I still understood the joke. I thought the episode was pretty standard; I liked it better than the dragon episode and the heist one.

I guess I should be bit more fair about consistency, since they did use the time travelers as a reference. But that felt more as a cheap plot device than actual progression.

 

season 4?!!? there's a new season?

 

Yep; I watched it on Xfinity. There’s also pirated videos on YouTube too. I’d give it a watch.

 

Popcorn time is the best

 

???

 

Popcorn time is a streaming platform for basically everything

 

Is it better than Twitch?

 

Well you only stream movies and TV shows there

 

Oh, all right.

I think I figured out why I don’t like the new season as much as the others. While it is true that there are more pop culture references than before like you said, they don’t seem to do much with them.

For example, the Hive Mind episode is a reference to the Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Star Trek. However, instead of just referencing those stories, it takes it one step further by posing a question about freedom versus safety and subverts the audience’s expectations by making Unity (the hive mind) appear benevolent. By adding an extra layer of complexity, it makes things interesting.

Whereas in the snake episode, it’s just a reference to the terminator franchise. They don’t use the setup to create some theme or ask some deeper question, and instead just make fun of how far the franchise has gone up its own butt. Same with the dragon episode; it makes fun of D&D and fantasy, and that’s it. Which that is the point of satire, but it doesn’t elevate the show beyond every other Adult Swim show like Robot Chicken. Nor does it go beyond, “look a reference!” being the entire joke.

This also explains why I didn’t really pick up on it before because I was used to having an absurd setting.

 

The series is very hard to bear. If earlier delirium was pleasant and unique, then now there is too much senseless vulgarity, and the plot has turned from an interesting story into a mess. But the worst thing is that I'm ready to watch it, only it stopped being released. I hope they just correct their mistakes.

 

Yeah, that’s what I don’t get the most; why are they taking so many weeks in between each episode? It causes the whole season to lose steam. I hope this doesn’t become like Steven Universe...