Rick and Morty: Pickle Rick

August 6, 2017 11:16 PM - Season 3, Episode 3

Rick turns himself into a pickle in one of his crazy experiments. The Smith family attends therapy.

I stole that synopsis from wikia and love that it is literally accurate but thoroughly inadequate.

posted by potrzebie (37 comments total)

Has Jaguar/Krombopulous Michael slash fic been spotted in the wild yet? How is this show so great at creating these compelling one-off violent killers? I guess having a cast of fascinating peripheral weirdos was what kept me watching Community through the gas leak times too.

Susan Sarandon was great in this. I have confidence that someday the show will explain what happened to Summer's tattoo.
posted by potrzebie at 11:27 PM on August 6, 2017 [2 favorites]

I can't remember the previous Mefi thread but it was something about men recommending the show to women but rarely the other way round (totally true locally, anecdotally). IIRC something to do with Rick's fundamental dilemma of being all-powerful,caring/not caring etc. falling flat with many women because it's a lot of male privilege and entitlement...? (I wish I could remember it better. Need to find it again in my favourites.) Interesting to think about how the therapist's exchange with Rick in this episode relates to that - does it change anything or does it kind of confirm it?
posted by yoHighness at 2:40 AM on August 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

We can probably expect to see Tammy and Phoenix Person again. And Mr Poopy Butthole. You're right about the amazing one off characters though. Abradolf Lincler. Gazorpazorp. John Oliver's scientist amoeba character in the Fantastic Voyage homage. Stephen Colbert's character in Rick's car-battery miniverse. They're one off guest stars but I have a feeling there's more to Ms Wong than coprophagia, and they totally left it open for Susan Sarandon to come on back.

What surprised me was there was no shout out to that other Adult Swim cartoon that's way over the top, Mr. Pickles.
posted by adept256 at 2:52 AM on August 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

I love Rick and Morty. And I'm a woman. And I love RICK. And man what the therapist said to Rick....I was like oh man, that kinda....hits home. I mean not that I turn myself into a pickle with rat parts, but the disinterest in doing normal maitenance stuff that so many people seem to b e able to manage with ease and for me it's just like such a struggle.

So I don't know if that explains anything at all for anyone else, but man, I definitely feel I should see Dr Wong once a week.
posted by miss-lapin at 6:53 AM on August 7, 2017 [26 favorites]

Oh and if anyone has the video clip of Dr Wong dressing down Rick, I would LOVE it if you posted that clip here.
posted by miss-lapin at 6:56 AM on August 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

The therapist's speech seemed to speaking directly to a particularly bad part of the show's fanbase. I'm glad that Rick didn't deadpan and then kill her, as I was expecting him to do.
posted by codacorolla at 8:23 AM on August 7, 2017 [10 favorites]

mefi superhero request: what was Concerto playing after the credits, while r+m were tied to the piano strings?
posted by adept256 at 8:53 AM on August 7, 2017

Moonlight Sonata., 1st movement.
posted by grumpybear69 at 9:32 AM on August 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

Part of Rick's problem caring about others is that there are infinite versions of them, right? The individual doesn't matter, because they're not really so individual. But at some level, Rick felt bad enough to fight his way back to his daughter, like the Jaguar really tried to do.

And Morty is not just paranoid about weirdness around Rick, but astute enough to notice the hanging needle and the Rube Goldberg/Heath Robinson contraption and what the timer indicated.
posted by filthy light thief at 10:51 AM on August 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

Grumpybearbride & I have decided that the show is way funnier when they bleep out the F word. Thoughts?
posted by grumpybear69 at 12:51 PM on August 7, 2017

goddamn... I think this show is therapy for me.
posted by numaner at 1:45 PM on August 7, 2017 [4 favorites]

Yeah, having failed at therapy multiple times and concluded I'm "too macho for therapy" I found myself wishing for a Dr Wong in my life.
posted by potrzebie at 2:20 PM on August 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

Everything in this episode was amazing.
posted by GuyZero at 11:22 PM on August 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

Since so many people resonated with the ep, I recommend you watch the inside the episode with the writers. they talk about their own views of therapy. One overtly connects therapy to physical therapy. He says the TV myth about therapy is it's about breakthroughs, but in reality it's about doing things that are uncomfortable so you can be more functional. It's clear they designed Dr. Wong to be one of the few people who really was able to nail Rick's attitude.I'm pretty sure given that both children WANT to return to Dr. Wong that she'll reappear in the future in some form.
posted by miss-lapin at 11:30 PM on August 7, 2017 [13 favorites]

Do you have a link to the 'inside the episode' thing?
posted by adept256 at 11:42 PM on August 7, 2017

Moonlight Sonata., 1st movement.

...which actually does feature E s̶p̶l̶a̶t̶ flat as the first six notes of the melody.
posted by qxntpqbbbqxl at 11:52 PM on August 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

We can probably expect to see Tammy and Phoenix Person again. And Mr Poopy Butthole.

I hope there's a happy ending for Phoenix Person. And I'm kind of glad they've been parsimonious with their use of Mr. Poopy Butthole, because that is a character you could easily turn into an annoyance with too much exposure, but man do I want me more Mr. Poopy Butthole.

I mean not that I turn myself into a pickle with rat parts, but the disinterest in doing normal maitenance stuff that so many people seem to b e able to manage with ease and for me it's just like such a struggle.

I struggle with this too, sometimes, and I kind of wish that the answer was periodically turning into a pickle with rat parts. Though not if I have to tongue a cockroach's brain to get there.
posted by middleclasstool at 5:22 AM on August 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

Probably the funniest thing about this whole episode is that it dropped at the same time as Game of Thrones and managed to be actually more violent despite the fact that the main cause of the violence was a goddamn pickle.

A pickle out-performed a dragon that night.
posted by middleclasstool at 5:30 AM on August 8, 2017 [6 favorites]

I do love that Rick is such a genius that the danger for him lasts only up to the point where he gets the leg of a dead cockroach to twitch. From there he's basically home free.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 6:10 AM on August 8, 2017 [9 favorites]

I have nothing deep to add to the conversation, but did anyone else get a weird Dark Souls feeling from Pickle Rick killing the sewer rats?
posted by giraffe at 7:55 AM on August 8, 2017 [4 favorites]

I have nothing deep to add to the conversation, but did anyone else get a weird Dark Souls feeling from Pickle Rick killing the sewer rats?

No, I got the same feeling. It reminded me of going on a tear in Bloodborne.
posted by codacorolla at 7:57 AM on August 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

That plus the Oldboy hallway scene. I feel like this episode established that we're one bad day away from Rick transforming himself into some unspeakable omniscient 10-dimensional horror that will open one of its six mouths and sing the song that ends the earth.
posted by middleclasstool at 8:00 AM on August 8, 2017 [11 favorites]

miss-lapin: I recommend you watch the inside the episode with the writers

adept256: Do you have a link to the 'inside the episode' thing?

Perhaps this thing?
posted by jprind at 8:48 AM on August 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

I think it's this: Inside Pickle Rick over at Adult Swim.
posted by bjrn at 11:31 AM on August 8, 2017 [5 favorites]

I love that Pickle-Roach-Rat-Rick was just continually building Rube-Goldberg machines.
posted by LizBoBiz at 11:44 AM on August 8, 2017 [2 favorites]

That's how you can tell he's a scientist.
posted by Stanczyk at 3:16 AM on August 9, 2017 [1 favorite]

A great piece of writing by Javier Grillo-Marxauch. (I think Jessica Gao and the Rick and Morty writers saw this, too):

“my favorite example of the perfect fusion of plot, story and operational theme is the film “die hard”. the entire movie is a metaphor for marital therapy, the operational theme is a husband trying to earn back his (for good reason, by the way) estranged wife.

the terrorists in “die hard” are really a metaphor for what keeps john mcclaine estranged from holly: as with any person in marriage counseling, john mcclaine loses his metaphorical armor as he fights the barriers to the point of emotional exhaustion… he ends up blubbering to his “therapist,” having lost his weapons, shoes and clothes.

he’s bleeding both thematically and practically.

the bathroom confession in “die hard” could have just easily been an episode of “in treatment”: a man denuded through adversity of all the trappings of pride.”

posted by 1970s Antihero at 3:48 AM on August 9, 2017 [4 favorites]

Also of note: the Film Crit Hulk take on the episode.
posted by bigendian at 4:41 AM on August 9, 2017 [6 favorites]

Polygon: Pickle Rick is a breakthrough for the series
posted by numaner at 10:48 AM on August 10, 2017 [1 favorite]

Here's that speech from the therapist, for posterity:

Rick, the only connection between your unquestionable intelligence and the sickness destroying your family is that everyone in your family, you included, use intelligence to justify sickness. You seem to alternate between viewing your own mind as an unstoppable force and as an inescapable curse, and I think it’s because the only truly unapproachable concept for you is that it’s your mind within your control. You chose to come here, you chose to talk, to belittle my vocation, just as you chose to become a pickle. You are the master of your universe, and yet you are dripping with rat blood and feces, your enormous mind literally vegetating by your own hand. I have no doubt that you would be bored senseless by therapy, the same way I’m bored when I brush my teeth and wipe my ass. Because the thing about repairing, maintaining, and cleaning is it’s not an adventure. There’s no way to do it so wrong you might die. It’s just work. And the bottom line is some people are okay going to work, and some people, well, some people would rather die. Each of us gets to choose.

posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:14 AM on August 10, 2017 [27 favorites]

That polygon article is not wrong, but man the writing quality in that article is so far beneath the Film Hulk piece that it might as well feature Captain Nemo.
posted by absalom at 2:01 PM on August 10, 2017 [1 favorite]

And Film Crit Hulk's writing is barely serviceable, so …
posted by kenko at 5:13 PM on August 10, 2017 [1 favorite]

I'm just so relieved that Hulk has given up the ALL CAPS GIMMICK - I don't know when they stopped, but I had stopped trying to read them because of it
posted by Gordafarin at 3:40 AM on August 11, 2017 [5 favorites]

Meet the Women Behind 'Rick and Morty's' Third Season [THR]
posted by melissasaurus at 6:27 AM on August 11, 2017 [4 favorites]

That polygon article is not wrong, but man the writing quality in that article is so far beneath the Film Hulk piece that it might as well feature Captain Nemo.

I know, I wish I could rewrite the whole thing if I had the time, but it made some very astute observations.
posted by numaner at 11:16 AM on August 11, 2017

it's 2 days from the next episode and I'm still reading and watching media digesting and analyzing this episode. I just can't stop thinking about it.
posted by numaner at 11:17 AM on August 11, 2017

Just watched it, and one of things that I took away from it is that Dr. Wong is a commentary/pisstake on Hannibal Lecter. She does that astute, concise analysis of Rick after having talked with him for a matter of seconds, pinpointing the essence of his Rickness, but she's not doing it to manipulate or bully him as Lecter would--she's doing it because she's a therapist doing therapy, not some fantasy cannibalistic übermensch.
posted by Halloween Jack at 9:22 AM on September 9, 2017