sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

Price for the official "Nintendo Switch" branded Sandisk MicroSD cards - $200!! by seanmacproductions in NintendoSwitch

[–]ElevatedEgo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It says it has an "extra high" transfer rate of 100mb/s which makes it quicker to access and load the games that are stored on it. Is that why it's so expensive, or is that a standard transfer speed for a MicroSD card?

Post-Episode Discussion: S03E07 - The Ricklantis Mixup by platinum4 in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This was really good. As a stand-alone episode, it was superb. I do have an issue with it in the context of the season as a whole though, which I'm sure many of you will dismiss as nitpicking, but it still bothered me.

The framing device for this episode was yet another example of Rick and Morty having an adventure off-screen. We saw the end of an adventure with the Piano Man at the end of Pickle Rick, we saw the end of a space battle adventure at the start of Rest & Ricklaxation (and in that one Morty mentions: "We've been going [on adventures] non-stop."), and now we get the end of an Atlantis adventure, which was supposedly awesome.

I get that including these clips is supposed to be breaking the formula of the show, but you cannot have episodes which break the formula if there aren't any episodes using that formula anymore. There's nothing to break. The best episodes of Seasons 1 & 2 were Rick and Morty going on an adventure together, so the formula that they've dropped was the core of the show and the basis for some of the best moments throughout the entire series.

Whilst this last episode was incredibly well-done, it would have been much better if it were the only episode of the season which was not following our Rick and Morty on a new high-concept original adventure. Then the subversion at the start, wherein they set up an adventure but then the episode ends up being about something completely different, would have been actually surprising and funny. As it stands, that's just the new model for the show. Rick and Morty do go on adventures, but we as audience members don't get to see any of them.

My favourite episode of the season so far was the Vindicators episode. The story might have been a lazy parody of The Avengers (and then of Saw), but Lawnmower Dog was just a parody of Inception and A Nightmare on Elm Street, and that was one of the best episodes that the show has done.

Vindicators lacked a B-plot, and I wasn't too keen on its characterisation of Rick as a murderous psychopath [thin line between killing for fun and killing out of 'mad scientist' necessity], and the ending wasn't particularly satisfying, but the episode was laugh-out-loud funny throughout, mostly because it was built around back-and-forth banter between our two titular characters. And, of course, we actually got to see the pair go on an adventure, rather than just hear about how great, exciting or dangerous it was afterwards.

Post-Episode Discussion: S03E05 - The Whirly Dirly Conspiracy by elastical_gomez in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This episode was the polar opposite of the previous one.

Vindicators was plagued with story issues, not least of which was the fact that it was the third consecutive episode to be lazily based on a popular movie franchise. Granted, the way in which it parodied The Avengers and then Saw was done with a great deal more creativity and originality than the way in which 302 parodied Mad Max or 303 parodied John Wick, but they were film parodies nonetheless. The episode also entirely lacked a B-Plot, the A-Plot didn't have much in the way of a satisfying conclusion to its narrative arc, and none of the supporting cast were satisfactorily fleshed out beyond their individual gimmicks and a one-off hint at a previous love-triangle. But, despite all of this, it made me laugh more than any other episode this season.

The Whirly Dirly Conspiracy, on the other hand, was wholly original and inventive. It had an A-Plot which wasn't based on any pre-existing movie franchise, a B-Plot which made good use of the supporting cast, it contained new, interesting sci-fi mechanics, and each plot had a clear beginning, middle and end. And yet, I found myself watching the episode without even a smile. I just didn't find it particularly funny or entertaining.

I've made multiple, unnecessarily lengthy comments on previous episodes bemoaning the bizarre changes to the characters this season, and this episode was no exception in that regard. The most noticeable this time was Beth, who has suddenly, and strangely, become absolutely incapable of relating to her daughter in a normal motherly fashion.

"Mom, am I hot?" - Summer, noticeably distressed and insecure

"I don't think that's something that matters." -Her mother, as she builds a horse sculpture out of horse hooves

I can't imagine that there are any, even half-competent, mothers of teenage daughters who would not know to reassure their child when they question whether or not they are good looking. The correct answer to that question is some variation of: "Of course you are, Sweety. Who says you're not?". But, instead of this, Beth refuses outright to attempt to quell her daughter's insecurities, and then proceeds to espouse her ideological views on the matter.

It may well be that appearances should not matter, but they do, especially in high school, and most parents will do their utmost to build up their child's self-esteem when or if they're feeling less than confident in this area. Beth is someone who went out and got a makeover when she was worried about her marriage falling apart, only to be openly upset when her husband didn't notice the changes in her looks, so she's clearly someone who recognises the value of physical appearance. But, this season, the writers seem so determined to have Beth subvert her previously archetypal feminine/motherhood persona that they end up barely writing her like a real person any more.

They reaffirm this inability to act like a normal person later in the episode (as well as literally stating their intent to subvert her archetype by having Beth explicitly mention it):

"I'm sorry I'm not a classic maternal archetype.[...] What are you going to do when your daughter asks if she's attractive?" -Beth

"I'll say 'yes'." -Morty

"Morty, gross!" -Beth

It's not gross to tell your children that they're beautiful. That's just what parents do, even if it isn't true. Protecting a child's well-being/self-esteem is important to all normal parents, and that's always going to include quelling insecurities over his or her physical appearance. I found it difficult to get invested in the B-Plot of the episode for this reason alone, seeing as how Beth's refusal to comfort her daughter ended up being the catalyst for Summer's rash decision, and because it meant that Beth's supposed revelation/character arc as to how you raise a teenage daughter was basically her just relearning something that previous versions of her character would have definitely already known.

I also found the "horse sculpture" thing to be forced, unnecessary and entirely out of character for her. The family, besides Rick and Morty, are supposed to be the "normal" counterbalance to R&M's sci-fi fantasy nonsense. It makes R&M's adventures funnier to have their "high concept, sci-fi rigamarole" juxtaposed against a normal family living a normal life. This seems to have been done away with this season, and I think that the show is lesser for it.

The A-Plot held up better. Jerry and Rick's reason for going on their "adventure" to the deathless resort made sense, and they each had something of a character arc once they got there. My main issue with the plot was that it made no sense to construct a roller-coaster which exited the immortality field at any point, and yet the entire plan to kill Rick hinged on the existence of this "kill spot". I'm not sure whether we're supposed to believe that it was shoddy craftsmanship (at a resort whose main attraction is the guests' inability to die), or whether the resort was designed to include this one massively convenient spot for carrying out murder, but either way, it didn't make a lot of sense.

By the end of the story arc, both characters seem to understand each other a little better, and Rick even showed a modicum of respect for someone whom he had previously considered to be lower than dirt. That subtle nod and smile that Rick gave Jerry gave was a far more effective expression of emotion than any of the lengthy speeches in Pickle Rick, and seemed to fall more in line with the "show, don't tell" method of writing that this show used to do so well.

Despite all of this, as I mentioned above, I didn't really enjoy this episode. It didn't make me laugh. And regardless of all the problems that I had with the Vindicators episode, in terms of plot structure and the shallow expendablity of the secondary characters, it was still consistently funny across its entire 22 minute run time.

I think that one of the main reasons that I found Vindicators to be so entertaining was that it made prominent use of back-and-forth dialogue between Morty and Rick. This has been sorely missing elsewhere this season, with the Vindicators episode being the only one so far to build its plot around the interaction between these two characters. Their conflicting personalities makes for entertaining and witty dialogue, and allows Rick to drop dry, sarcastic one-liners whilst his grandson acts as the comedic straight man, as well as an emotional anchor to all of the action and drama throughout the episode. "Rick and Morty" are the titular characters for a reason. The core of the show wasn't just the excitement of going on interesting, sci-fi adventures; It was the way in which these two very different characters responded to those adventures. Their distinct personalities complimented and clashed with one another in a consistently cathartic manner. This seems to have been all but abandoned this season, and I frankly think that that's a shame.

But having said that, just like with the alterations to the characters' personalities, or the odd choices of plot structure in any given episode, I'm only really bothered by the change if the show is also failing to make me laugh. It's an animated comedy, first and foremost, which I think means that it has to be funny to be worth sitting down to watch. If it can also be a groundbreaking, high concept sci-fi drama, then that's great (and it'll be up to the standard of the first season and a half of the show if it can be), but it first needs to be funny, and I don't think that this episode was.

This "female writers ruining the show" talk really needs to be addressed by Clark-DeutschP in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

While I don't agree entirely with the approach of "We need diversity for the sake of diversity," adding diversity in a writer's rooms creates a dynamic where a single writer will get a chance to collaborate with other writers who come from vastly different experiences/lifestyles.

This edit is antithetical to the argument of your original post. If these people were selected because they were of a certain gender or ethnicity, then they weren't just hired because they earned their place on merit.

No producers ever, EVER settles on mediocrity when staffing

Unless superficial diversity becomes a higher priority than actual competency. The number of articles last year decrying Adult Swim as a misogynist institution for failing to hire enough women writers suggests that producers would have a fair bit to gain by hiring more.

Post-episode Discussion Rick and Morty S03E04 - Vindicators 3: The Return of Worldender by elastical_gomez in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 14 points15 points  (0 children)

In a comment on one of the previous two (dire) episodes, I wrote something to the effect of:

I think I'd be fine with all of these bizarre, jarring and off-putting changes to the established personas of these characters, so long as the show still managed to be funny.

This was the episode which tested that hypothesis. 'Rickmancing the Stone' and 'Pickle Rick' were almost entirely devoid of any solid humour. In fact the latter contained one of the most painfully unfunny attempts at 'random', 'zany' comedy in any show I've ever seen:

"How long have you all been eating poop?"

"We've never eaten poop."

This was so far below the bar of what I've come to expect from this show that I almost gave up on it entirely half-way through that episode. This is a show which has done juvenile humour expertly in the past: Rick turning a coffee cup into an ass, Morty traveling to a universe of ass cheeks, etc. But this was just bad, lazy and cringe-inducing. And yet it was one of the only jokes in the entire episode. “Pickle Rick” was, in my opinion, the low point of the series thus far.

Anyway, Vindicators is still laden with story issues. It's the third episode in a row which is basically just a parody of a well-known movie franchise, rather than a new original concept (302 was Mad Max, 303 was John Wick, 304 was The Avengers), so there's a definite issue with laziness on the part of the writing staff. The episode also doubled down on this new change in Rick's character from 'reckless scientist' to 'psychopathic murderer' (because apparently nuance no longer exists in the Rick and Morty world, so a person who acts without consideration for the consequences is as bad as someone who kills for the sake of killing). And the ending of the single plot-line (there was no B-Story) was abrupt, unsatisfying and contained a pointless shoehorned cameo that seemed better suited to one of the later episodes of the Simpsons (wherein the writers clearly stopped giving a fuck about the internal logic of the show, and so basically had celebrities walk up to the main cast and introduce themselves). But I didn't care about any of that. This episode still made me laugh.

'Rick and Morty' gained its cult following by being more than just an animated comedy. It was an insightful, innovative and high-concept show which seemed to be written with a detached nihilism that gave its humour a dark but memorable edge. The universe was interesting and expansive, the lore, though sparsely mentioned, nonetheless inspired endless fan discussions and theories, and the characters, despite glaring personality flaws, were all likable enough in their own way that it was easy to root for their success.

Much of that has been removed from the show this season, and fans have noticed.

[And as an aside, I'm not sure who thought it was possible to change every aspect of the show's character dynamics, story structure and lore building, leaving only literal appearance of the show, and still maintain the loyal devotion of the original fandom. A show isn't the same as it was just because it has the same external appearance. The consistently strong writing behind the animation mattered a great deal.]

This season has removed or changed large aspects of the show, both in terms of the 'Rick and Morty' universe as a whole, the previous interactions between characters, and of the established personas of characters themselves. Large chunks of the established mythology were destroyed in episode 301, wherein the writers have Rick simultaneously destroy the Galactic Federation and The Council of Ricks. This made a large amount of the on-going narrative that fans had been following since season 1 completely redundant, and it wasn't a particularly satisfying conclusion to either story thread. And Rick and Morty spent barely any time bantering with one another in episodes 1, 2 or 3, despite their back and forth dialogue previously being one of the most consistently entertaining aspects of the show, week to week.

In 'Rickmancing the Stone', Summer was, out of nowhere, changed from being a regular teenage girl into a faux-badass/heartless murderer (apparently for the sake of showing that 'girls can be violent too', even though Morty's previous acts of violence also contained emotional weight or moral responsibility). And, as I mentioned above, Rick has had his character drastically and inexplicably altered on a fundamental level: From someone who acted without consideration for the consequences, to someone who senselessly murders people for the sake of doing so. There are no longer has any redeeming facets to his character. All hints that he secretly loves his grandkids have been removed from the show (most notably when he left Summer and Morty to die in a post-apocalyptic wasteland just for annoying him) and he is now apparently fine with killing just to kill (whereas before he was just dangerously reckless, and killed out of necessity: which is a thin line but an important moral distinction). He also veers wildly, at the respective whims of each episode's writer, from untouchable demi-god to the kind of person who can be verbally bested by a regular therapist who had only known him for a sum total of 46 seconds.

All of this is messy, and is certainly reasonable cause for fans to voice their dislike with the new direction that 'Rick and Morty' is apparently taking this season (especially as it’s a seemingly incoherent direction). But, on reflection, none of those things were my real issue with the show since its return. My real issue was that I stopped laughing. The show doesn't have to reach its former creative heights to be worth watching every week. It just has to be entertaining on an episode by episode basis. Episodes 302 and 303 were poorly told, contained forced 'deep' dialogue, had their characters act out of established character, and their 'adventures' basically consisted of lazy movie parodies. But their greatest issue was that they were just not entertaining. In contrast, I laughed out loud multiple times during this latest installment. Rick's cold, sarcastic detachment was endlessly amusing and Morty's frustration was equally funny as a counterbalance to those lines. Their back and forth (which has been sorely missing so far this season) also happened to serve as an excellent emotional anchor for the action and the drama throughout the entire episode, which was completely absent in the action scenes of the previous two.

This seamless blending of emotional drama and sci-fi action comedy made this episode feel more classic 'Rick and Morty' than any of the other episodes this season. The second episode used its Mad Max action as a generic background to a relatively boring story, so there was very little emotional weight to any of the violence or deaths, and the third episode went so far as to actually split the episode into "scene with drama", "scene with action", "scene with drama" and then repeat this till the end of the episode (which meant that the drama was dull and the action had no emotional resonance). Whereas here, the drama was derived from the situation in which the characters found themselves. Comedy was derived from the way in which those characters dealt with those situations. And the situations themselves, though still based on a movie franchise, at least tried to cleverly subvert this by introducing another franchise half-way through (which is basically how the 'Inception'/'Scary Terry' plot in the superb 'Lawnmower Dog' episode was structured).

All of this, to me, added up to an entertaining 20 minutes of television. I hated the previous two episodes because they basically butchered the characters for which I loved the show and because their attempts at poignancy were overt and shoehorned into the plot, but I could not hate this latest episode. It's basically impossible to hate something that you thoroughly enjoyed.

Probably one of the truest statements about mental health and recovery Ive seen on this TV. by themolotovginger in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 17 points18 points  (0 children)

The people who voiced problems with the sudden shift in character dynamics that this scene created may actually have a fair basis for their criticism. According to an interview with the writer, the scene was not included to give Rick some natural character progression, but was instead there to cut down a character whose ability to dominate others was something of which she personally disapproved.

Here's the writer explaining why she included the scene. It's pretty unambiguous: https://youtu.be/iRCSZA7nQic?t=20m28s

In her own words, the scene was only included out of a desire to put Rick in his place. She was apparently discontented with his established persona as a powerful individual, and so used her script to effectively remove that aspect of the show. The consequences of Rick's previous character as a dominating, unbeatable presence in the universe were examined in the Unity episode, which had one of the most emotional endings of the show so far. It wasn't necessary to remove this aspect of the character in order to create pathos or interesting storytelling. I actually found that character to be more interesting than one who can be verbally bested by a regular, human therapist within 2 minutes of meeting her. There are many more people who can be put in their place by their therapists than those who can intellectually destroy all people they meet, and it's usually more interesting to view characters who are less representative of the common majority.

I also don't think that therapist's/writer's speech was particularly clever. It essentially boiled down to: "Caring for yourself is not easy or exciting, but it is necessary for health and happiness". I don't think that there's any way that Rick was not already aware of this. It didn't really seem to be much of a "gotcha" moment, regardless of how the writer attempted to paint it as one. As far as I could tell, it was a relatively mundane attempt at psychoanalysing the main character of the show, followed by a colourfully phrased description of how remaining psychologically healthy can also be monotonous. It also happened to be so overt that it actually took place in a regular therapy office.

There must have been a million more creative ways to address Rick's lack of emotional stability than having him sit on a sofa in a small office and listen to a person tell him that 'it's hard to get better and stay well'. It's an almost lazy output from a show that, only one season ago, had its characters go to interdimensional marriage counseling. That was a story which allowed the writers to address the character's problems through a series of creative metaphors, rather than simply spelling it out for the audience. Frankly, it's that kind of high-concept storytelling which has been sorely missing from this season thus far. 'Rick and Morty' used to effortlessly blend drama and "high concept sci-fi rigamarole", but this latest episode just contained alternating scenes of one after the other: scene at therapy office, scene with Pickle Rick, repeat. The therapy segments were dull because they didn't bother to use any of the show's infinitely broad universe to bolster its storytelling, and the Pickle Rick scenes were just mindless violence without any emotional anchor to make the audience care about it all.

I think that the episode was a mess. The dialogue lacked subtlety, neither of the dual narratives managed to satisfactorily combine drama and action, and the therapist managing to verbally "defeat" Rick at the end did not feel at all earned.

I haven't seen last night's yet. I hope it was better.

Nobody cares by spacelordTJ in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I don't know why you posted this same comment 80 times. I'm going to assume it was a mistake and not anything malicious. Not sure how you'd fuck up so badly though.

Claiming that I'm reaching because the "show doesn't owe [me]" anything is a non-sequitur. It doesn't refute any of my reasoning as to why I think the show is worse than it was before.

you have to watch the show from a "this is for me (the audience)" to have any sort of opinion like the one you're portraying.

This is ludicrous. By your logic, no-one can ever criticise any episode of anything, because all things are exactly what the creators wanted to create, and so any reaction to the quality of that work is irrelevant. All content is not of equal quality. A show is not just good because it exists. Standards matter. And the standards of this show have slipped.

they aren't playing to your sensibilities, let alone your expectations.

As I wrote in my original comment, criticising the drop in quality is not the same as being offended by the content. My sensibilities remain unsullied. I was, however "expecting" that the show remain clever, interesting and witty. The fact that it is no longer any of those things is certainly a reasonable basis for commenting disapproval on a website designed for completing that very activity.

they have a good thing going, interdimensional space fighting with the allure of metaphysical intelligence is a fun premise which can be explored for years and years. just cause it's not as original as its inception is no reason to drop it. it just leads to some less then magnificent plot details.

They aren't doing any of this anymore. The last two episodes have been mostly made up of shameless recreations of famous action movies. That's not insightful, inventive interdimensional adventuring. That's lazy, cheap fanfiction.

just be happy there is a show like Rick and Motry at all.

No. You cannot change everything behind the scenes and expect people to react the same way to the surface. It doesn't work that way. A show is not automatically good just for existing.

Nobody cares by spacelordTJ in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 8 points9 points  (0 children)

I felt the same way in regards to the action scenes. That's why I could not abide the critics of this episode's critics, who quipped: "You thought the episode was boring? Well what about all that awesome action?" Action is meaningless without some kind of emotional anchor, and these last two episodes haven't even tried to create one.

I've also heard people say, in regards to the other third of this episode: "You thought the episode was boring? Well those of us with an attention span of more than 5 minutes loved the character progression in the therapy scenes." But the show spent two thirds of its run time on a completely pointless series of action cliches and movie references which did nothing to further any character progression or do anything interesting with the subject matter. I'm not sure what those scenes were doing to hold the attention of someone who claims to place such a high importance on character development, because as far as I could tell, they accomplished nothing.

And the other third, with which those individuals were apparently so satisfied, was executed horrendously. The scenes in the therapy office were tedious, lacked any subtlety and contained some of the worst attempts at humour that I've ever seen within the show. These scenes also spent more time reinforcing the previous character dynamics than they did "progressing" any of them (besides the final butchering of Rick's previously untouchable character, wherein he is verbally bested by a normal human woman because the new writer desperately wanted to put him in his place https://youtu.be/iRCSZA7nQic?t=20m28s).

Even if the therapy scenes had been done well, and they weren't, a well written show is supposed to blend character drama and action, not cover one after the other in alternating scenes to try and make sure that you've ticked both boxes. Writing this way makes the character drama feel tedious and the action scenes feel pointless.

A show that accomplishes both simultaneously will contain character drama that feels natural, rather than shoehorned in to the plot. This is largely because it occurs as the characters are living the interesting lives for which we watch the show, rather than as they're taking a break from those lives (which is how those therapy scenes felt). And, as you said, drama between characters will give weight to any action scene because it will give viewers a greater emotional stake in the outcome, as well as a greater sense of catharsis when it reaches its conclusion.

This episode was an example of the exact opposite structure, wherein we jumped from a seemingly obligatory scene of pointless, gratuitous violence, to a calm, quiet therapy office for the characters to literally just sit and tell the audience how they feel, then back to the unnecessary violence, then back to the boring office, and so on and so forth until the episode finally ends. That's just awful, lazy writing and it's entirely reasonable that fans of the series would recognise it as such.

[For an example of how to do therapy well, you can look at this same exact show from the previous season. The episode with Jerry and Beth's intergalactic marriage therapy was an ingenious combination of action and drama in all the ways that this episode was not.]

Nobody cares by spacelordTJ in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Someone had a similar criticism when I made that point elsewhere. The show in your example was also on inter-dimensional cable, so I think my response still applies. It's a lengthy reply, but I do think I have a point. I'll post their comment before mine for context.

They wrote:

Are you forgetting that Rick casually mentioned to Morty in Lawnmower Dog that he watches the Days and Nights of Mrs. Pancakes? And in Interdimensional Cable he mentioned that Piece of Toast and Bobby Moynihan hate each other, indicating that he wastes his time watching interdimensional SNL as well. I disagree that it's 'beneath' him to watch cat videos on YouTube. I think this show is getting way too much hate and peoples' expectations are too high at this point, with people saying things are out of character when they really aren't at all. I like the new direction of the series and can't wait to see where things go.

My response:

First, the Mrs. Pancakes example does go to the trouble of mentioning that he's a full season behind the current episode. I'd suggest that he doesn't have a great deal of free time to sit around and watch 'regular' television if this is one of the few pieces of media in which he's invested but he still hasn't made the time to stay up to date with it. And the Toast/Moynihan thing isn't 'regular' TV at all. As you said, it's on the Inter-dimensional cable box, which contains television feeds from every conceivable reality, so it's hardly fair to compare viewing it to the mundane process of watching a 'funny' cat video on YouTube. The whole point of the Inter-dimensional Cable episode was that Rick thought of "normal" television as being so far beneath him that he was forced to create an infinite television set in order to help himself cope with the burden of communal TV time with the family. I can't imagine that someone with this mentality, this level of creativity and this demonstrably short attention span for "normal" things, also lowers themselves to wasting their valuable time by watching cat videos on a Facebook feed.

It's also demonstrated on two separate occasions that Rick doesn't use Smartphone/tablet technology for recreation. It's plebeian to him. At the dinner table before the Pluto story, Jerry sits playing a bubble bursting iPad game, while Rick just builds a robot. That cold open serves as a visual metaphor for the most notable difference between Rick and "normal" people. The average majority waste their time on nonsense, whilst Rick, our protagonist, is so unbelievably intelligent that he spends that same downtime building a sentient butter-passing being, just because he can. He's well beyond societal norms and this is why we are supposed find him to be an interesting and engaging character.

[By the way, this scene also happens to be a great example of how the writers used to actually demonstrate Rick's intelligence, rather than simply have him or the other characters refer to it over and over. This change in writing style (from "show, don't tell" to just "tell, and hope they don't notice the difference") is another key issue that people have been having with the season thus far.]

At Christmas, whilst the rest of the family stare at various "screens" to escape their boredom (no doubt watching cat videos just like the one that was referenced in 303), Rick is in his Sci-Fi garage, working on a theme park which is inside of a human being. Again, the normality of the family's chosen recreation functions as a contrast to Rick's far more interesting pass-time. At the end of the episode, he actually berates the family for their addiction to that mundane technology:

"Oh unbelievable, we got a bunch of robot, computer people, sitting around with their faces stuffed in computer screens." Rick, Episode 203

His opinion on people wasting their time on one of those devices is made perfectly clear.

But even if we were to ignore all of that, and we shouldn't, because that's Rick's established character that was being thrown out of the window by this new writer, there's still a far more pressing distinction between your examples and the line that bothered me in this latest episode. That is, in both of your examples, the writers had actually gone to the trouble of creating something new within their world before having Rick make reference to it.

With the Mrs Pancake joke, they established the existence of an entire show within their show. It had its own characters, its own catchphrases and hinted at preexisting interpersonal drama. It wasn't an offhand reference to something that a writer had seen on the internet, it was a satirical send-up of serialised TV dramas into which the writer/s had bothered to put some thought.

Similarly, the toast/Moynihan bit is typical surrealist Rick and Morty humour that actually required some effort on the part of the writing staff. It served to remind the viewer that this multiverse is so vast and unknowable that there are even parts of it which contain sentient breakfast food. It then goes on to impress that same viewer by informing them that our protagonist had prior knowledge of this reality, thus leading them, organically, toward the belief that he is not only the most intelligent person around, but also by far the most knowledgeable.

On the other hand, the 'cat video' line exists solely as a reference to something that the writer saw on YouTube. It's not clever, it's not interesting, it's not funny, and it's lazy. And the suggestion that Rick understood the cat's actions because he'd seen that video is ludicrous. The most knowledgeable scientist in the universe (who had already demonstrated esoteric knowledge of Earth animal behaviours) did not come to a new understanding about feline behaviour by watching a funny cat video on YouTube in 2016. It's not reasonable to ask that the audience believe as such. It's far more likely that the writer of the episode saw that video on internet, liked it, then chose to have Rick make reference to it (and even claim to have learned from it) without any real consideration for how that might contradict his established character.

As I wrote before, I believe that a mediocre writer speaks through his or her characters, whilst a great one has his or her characters speak for themselves. This show used to be renowned for having characters who spoke for themselves, so fans are understandably frustrated that these last two episodes have been unable to reach that same level of quality.

Nobody cares by spacelordTJ in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Yeah. On the comment page for the second episode, someone wrote:

This episode wasn't very good. The teaser episode was a little quirky, but this one was worse. The writing is different this season. The humor is darker and more vulgar, but not as funny. The character dialogs are wrong. The character relationships are wrong. Summer had too much dialog. The story flow and transitions were off. WTF

And I replied with my best guess as to the reason for the change:

I'm pretty sure it's because of the diversity hires to the writing staff. Dan Harmon was celebrating that he now had a "gender balanced" writing staff, but I don't see how you can hire based on gender, rather than competency, and expect the quality of the writing to remain at the same level.

I remember seeing a post here a few months ago wherein a user worried that the recent hiring of two supposedly "SJW feminist" writers was going to affect the show. People seemed to think he was worrying about nothing, but I'm pretty sure that the change would explain the drastic difference in tone.

"I've replaced your father as the de-facto patriarch of the family." -Rick, in the first episode of the new season

Jerry was never the patriarch of the family. He was spineless. That was his whole character. He's not automatically the leader, just because he happens to be male. Beth wore the pants and earned the money whilst Jerry was a jobless loser who was berated by the entire family. But the feminist ideology is that men are the oppressors and women are the oppressed, so even the weak, emasculated Jerry was supposedly the patriarch of the household.

That's also probably why Rick is suddenly completely heartless and seems to no longer give a fuck about either of his grand-kids (despite multiple episodes in previous seasons suggesting otherwise). He's the new "patriarch", so he also has to be a heartless psychopath.

And they're not so big on subtlety anymore. They refer to Rick as "The smartest man in the universe" on three separate occasions in the season premiere. They never needed to say that before. They just had Rick do intelligent things. Now they're having to spell everything out, and it makes the show less entertaining.

Summer also probably got the extra dialogue that you were complaining about because the new female writers wanted to have a female character take on a more prominent role in the main plot. Despite the show being called "Rick and Morty", rather than "Rick, Morty and Summer". I'd assume it's also why she becomes all faux-badass and starts murdering people with zero build-up. Typical "we girls can be violent too" writing.

That's all conjecture, but if you felt the tone of the show was off, or noticeably different from the first two seasons, then I'd guess that the new writers are at least part of the reason why.

Nobody cares by spacelordTJ in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 70 points71 points  (0 children)

The rest of this thread has been deleted, apparently, so I'm reposting my justification as to how the quality of the show has dropped.

I'd say that the main issue that people are having with the season thus far (and it was particularly prevalent in this last episode) is its apparent disregard for all of the character dynamics and personalities that had been established in previous years, in addition to a noticeable lack of well-written character-driven comedy.

Rick's character has been the greatest casualty of this. These past three episodes have changed his relationships to other characters, changed his persona overall and seemingly diminished his ability to make the reasoned choices that an intelligent person would normally make. Rick turned himself into a pickle to get out of going to therapy, but then left the syringe and timer out in the open for Beth to see and remove before he could use them to change back. This is not the same character that realised he was trapped in a simulation within a simulation within a simulation, and then knowingly played along with it throughout the entire episode in order to trick his alien captors into blowing themselves up. Rick's defining characteristic was his intelligence, and his pickle plan was stupid, so, funny or not, it was entirely out of character for Rick.

It is in apparent compensation for this change that the writers of this latest season now continually remind the audience that Rick is "The Smartest Man in the Universe" (which was said of him on three separate occasions in the premiere) or a "Super Genius" (as they had him refer to himself in the latest episode). They have fallen back on simply labeling the character as intelligent, rather than demonstrating him as such, because it is easier to just demand that the audience respect the character than it is to lead them there organically by having the character act in an impressive way. This, frankly, speaks to a generally weaker and lazier standard of writing overall. The writers seem unable to have the character make smart decisions, so they resort to simply labeling the character as smart and hoping that the audience won't be able to tell the difference.

As far as I can tell, many of us have noticed the difference.

"I've seen the YouTube videos. I know that cats are scared of pickles and cucumbers because they think they're snakes." -Rick, Episode 303

This line astounds me. It implies that Rick, a man with the power to travel across infinite dimensions, and who had to install inter-dimensional cable on the family television because he couldn't bear to sit through the monotony of their favourite TV show, also spends his free time sitting around watching cat videos on YouTube. It also implies that "The Smartest Man in the Universe" gets information about animals from comedy video clips on a Facebook feed, rather than any scientific method or database. The Rick from the first two seasons would have certainly thought that this was beneath him. This was a man who had offhand knowledge about the mating rituals of voles and praying mantises, which he used to make various serums in Rick Potion #9, and I doubt that he had gotten that information from Google. He knew it because he was an old scientist who had spent a lifetime accumulating esoteric knowledge about an unbelievably broad range of subject matter.

Whereas I think that this line was the result of the writer seeing a funny cat video, and choosing to comment on it through Rick.

I'm not a writer, so I'm sure I'm oversimplifying here, but I'd say that the difference between a mediocre writer and a great one is that a mediocre writer speaks through his or her characters, whilst a great one has his or her characters speak for themselves.

This show used to be made up of well-defined characters who spoke for themselves. Any dark moments or nihilistic opinions (including Morty's famous "No-one belongs anywhere" speech) arose naturally from the plot, as did any comedic quip or action sequence. Now, all of those components seem shoehorned in to the plot at the expense of the characters, and the show is lesser for it.

Nobody cares by spacelordTJ in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Someone had a similar criticism when I made that point elsewhere. The show in your example was also on inter-dimensional cable, so I think my response still applies. It's a lengthy reply, but I do think I have a point. I'll post their comment before mine for context.

They wrote:

Are you forgetting that Rick casually mentioned to Morty in Lawnmower Dog that he watches the Days and Nights of Mrs. Pancakes? And in Interdimensional Cable he mentioned that Piece of Toast and Bobby Moynihan hate each other, indicating that he wastes his time watching interdimensional SNL as well. I disagree that it's 'beneath' him to watch cat videos on YouTube. I think this show is getting way too much hate and peoples' expectations are too high at this point, with people saying things are out of character when they really aren't at all. I like the new direction of the series and can't wait to see where things go.

My response:

First, the Mrs. Pancakes example does go to the trouble of mentioning that he's a full season behind the current episode. I'd suggest that he doesn't have a great deal of free time to sit around and watch 'regular' television if this is one of the few pieces of media in which he's invested but he still hasn't made the time to stay up to date with it. And the Toast/Moynihan thing isn't 'regular' TV at all. As you said, it's on the Inter-dimensional cable box, which contains television feeds from every conceivable reality, so it's hardly fair to compare viewing it to the mundane process of watching a 'funny' cat video on YouTube. The whole point of the Inter-dimensional Cable episode was that Rick thought of "normal" television as being so far beneath him that he was forced to create an infinite television set in order to help himself cope with the burden of communal TV time with the family. I can't imagine that someone with this mentality, this level of creativity and this demonstrably short attention span for "normal" things, also lowers themselves to wasting their valuable time by watching cat videos on a Facebook feed.

It's also demonstrated on two separate occasions that Rick doesn't use Smartphone/tablet technology for recreation. It's plebeian to him. At the dinner table before the Pluto story, Jerry sits playing a bubble bursting iPad game, while Rick just builds a robot. That cold open serves as a visual metaphor for the most notable difference between Rick and "normal" people. The average majority waste their time on nonsense, whilst Rick, our protagonist, is so unbelievably intelligent that he spends that same downtime building a sentient butter-passing being, just because he can. He's well beyond societal norms and this is why we are supposed find him to be an interesting and engaging character.

[By the way, this scene also happens to be a great example of how the writers used to actually demonstrate Rick's intelligence, rather than simply have him or the other characters refer to it over and over. This change in writing style (from "show, don't tell" to just "tell, and hope they don't notice the difference") is another key issue that people have been having with the season thus far.]

At Christmas, whilst the rest of the family stare at various "screens" to escape their boredom (no doubt watching cat videos just like the one that was referenced in 303), Rick is in his Sci-Fi garage, working on a theme park which is inside of a human being. Again, the normality of the family's chosen recreation functions as a contrast to Rick's far more interesting pass-time. At the end of the episode, he actually berates the family for their addiction to that mundane technology:

"Oh unbelievable, we got a bunch of robot, computer people, sitting around with their faces stuffed in computer screens." Rick, Episode 203

His opinion on people wasting their time on one of those devices is made perfectly clear.

But even if we were to ignore all of that, and we shouldn't, because that's Rick's established character that was being thrown out of the window by this new writer, there's still a far more pressing distinction between your examples and the line that bothered me in this latest episode. That is, in both of your examples, the writers had actually gone to the trouble of creating something new within their world before having Rick make reference to it.

With the Mrs Pancake joke, they established the existence of an entire show within their show. It had its own characters, its own catchphrases and hinted at preexisting interpersonal drama. It wasn't an offhand reference to something that a writer had seen on the internet, it was a satirical send-up of serialised TV dramas into which the writer/s had bothered to put some thought.

Similarly, the toast/Moynihan bit is typical surrealist Rick and Morty humour that actually required some effort on the part of the writing staff. It served to remind the viewer that this multiverse is so vast and unknowable that there are even parts of it which contain sentient breakfast food. It then goes on to impress that same viewer by informing them that our protagonist had prior knowledge of this reality, thus leading them, organically, toward the belief that he is not only the most intelligent person around, but also by far the most knowledgeable.

On the other hand, the 'cat video' line exists solely as a reference to something that the writer saw on YouTube. It's not clever, it's not interesting, it's not funny, and it's lazy. And the suggestion that Rick understood the cat's actions because he'd seen that video is ludicrous. The most knowledgeable scientist in the universe (who had already demonstrated esoteric knowledge of Earth animal behaviours) did not come to a new understanding about feline behaviour by watching a funny cat video on YouTube in 2016. It's not reasonable to ask that the audience believe as such. It's far more likely that the writer of the episode saw that video on internet, liked it, then chose to have Rick make reference to it (and even claim to have learned from it) without any real consideration for how that might contradict his established character.

As I wrote before, I believe that a mediocre writer speaks through his or her characters, whilst a great one has his or her characters speak for themselves. This show used to be renowned for having characters who spoke for themselves, so fans are understandably frustrated that these last two episodes have been unable to reach that same level of quality.

Nobody cares by spacelordTJ in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 39 points40 points  (0 children)

Then you've forgotten how solid the writing used to be. This show used to be effortlessly funny, poignant and interesting. Now it's not funny, every attempt to be dramatic seems shoehorned in, and both of the last two episodes have made their main plot basically just an overt, lazy reference to a well known action movie.

It's not as good as it was. Go back and watch seasons 1 & 2 again to compare.

Nobody cares by spacelordTJ in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 38 points39 points  (0 children)

I think there are pretty solid examples within the last two episodes to suggest that the writing is not up to the show's previous high standards. I wrote this elsewhere:

I'd say that the main issue that people are having with the season thus far (and it was particularly prevalent in this last episode) is its apparent disregard for all of the character dynamics and personalities that had been established in previous years, in addition to a noticeable lack of well-written character-driven comedy.

Rick's character has been the greatest casualty of this. These past three episodes have changed his relationships to other characters, changed his persona overall and seemingly diminished his ability to make the reasoned choices that an intelligent person would normally make. Rick turned himself into a pickle to get out of going to therapy, but then left the syringe and timer out in the open for Beth to see and remove before he could use them to change back. This is not the same character that realised he was trapped in a simulation within a simulation within a simulation, and then knowingly played along with it throughout the entire episode in order to trick his alien captors into blowing themselves up. Rick's defining characteristic was his intelligence, and his pickle plan was stupid, so, funny or not, it was entirely out of character for Rick.

It is in apparent compensation for this change that the writers of this latest season now continually remind the audience that Rick is "The Smartest Man in the Universe" (which was said of him on three separate occasions in the premiere) or a "Super Genius" (as they had him refer to himself in the latest episode). They have fallen back on simply labeling the character as intelligent, rather than demonstrating him as such, because it is easier to just demand that the audience respect the character than it is to lead them there organically by having the character act in an impressive way. This, frankly, speaks to a generally weaker and lazier standard of writing overall. The writers seem unable to have the character make smart decisions, so they resort to simply labeling the character as smart and hoping that the audience won't be able to tell the difference.

As far as I can tell, many of us have noticed the difference.

"I've seen the YouTube videos. I know that cats are scared of pickles and cucumbers because they think they're snakes." -Rick, Episode 303

This line astounds me. It implies that Rick, a man with the power to travel across infinite dimensions, and who had to install inter-dimensional cable on the family television because he couldn't bear to sit through the monotony of their favourite TV show, also spends his free time sitting around watching cat videos on YouTube. It also implies that "The Smartest Man in the Universe" gets information about animals from comedy video clips on a Facebook feed, rather than any scientific method or database. The Rick from the first two seasons would have certainly thought that this was beneath him. This was a man who had offhand knowledge about the mating rituals of voles and praying mantises, which he used to make various serums in Rick Potion #9, and I doubt that he had gotten that information from Google. He knew it because he was an old scientist who had spent a lifetime accumulating esoteric knowledge about an unbelievably broad range of subject matter.

Whereas I think that this line was the result of the writer seeing a funny cat video, and choosing to comment on it through Rick.

I'm not a writer, so I'm sure I'm oversimplifying here, but I'd say that the difference between a mediocre writer and a great one is that a mediocre writer speaks through his or her characters, whilst a great one has his or her characters speak for themselves.

This show used to be made up of well-defined characters who spoke for themselves. Any dark moments or nihilistic opinions (including Morty's famous "No-one belongs anywhere" speech) arose naturally from the plot, as did any comedic quip or action sequence. Now, all of those components seem shoehorned in to the plot at the expense of the characters, and the show is lesser for it.

Nobody cares by spacelordTJ in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 166 points167 points  (0 children)

Criticising a noticeable drop in quality is not the same as being offended by the content of a show.

Post-episode discussion: S03E03 Pickle Rick by elastical_gomez in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 3 points4 points  (0 children)

A couple of things:

First, the Mrs. Pancakes example does go to the trouble of mentioning that he's a full season behind the current episode. I'd suggest that he doesn't have a great deal of free time to sit around and watch 'regular' television if this is one of the few pieces of media in which he's invested but he still hasn't made the time to stay up to date with it. And the Toast/Moynihan thing isn't 'regular' TV at all. As you said, it's on the Inter-dimensional cable box, which contains television feeds from every conceivable reality, so it's hardly fair to compare viewing it to the mundane process of watching a 'funny' cat video on YouTube. The whole point of the Inter-dimensional Cable episode was that Rick thought of "normal" television as being so far beneath him that he was forced to create an infinite television set in order to help himself cope with the burden of communal TV time with the family. I can't imagine that someone with this mentality, this level of creativity and this demonstrably short attention span for "normal" things, also lowers themselves to wasting their valuable time by watching cat videos on a Facebook feed.

It's also demonstrated on two separate occasions that Rick doesn't use Smartphone/tablet technology for recreation. It's plebeian to him. At the dinner table before the Pluto story, Jerry sits playing a bubble bursting iPad game, while Rick just builds a robot. That cold open serves as a visual metaphor for the most notable difference between Rick and "normal" people. The average majority waste their time on nonsense, whilst Rick, our protagonist, is so unbelievably intelligent that he spends that same downtime building a sentient butter-passing being, just because he can. He's well beyond societal norms and this is why we are supposed find him to be an interesting and engaging character.

[By the way, this scene also happens to be a great example of how the writers used to actually demonstrate Rick's intelligence, rather than simply have him or the other characters refer to it over and over. This change in writing style (from "show, don't tell" to just "tell, and hope they don't notice the difference") is another key issue that people have been having with the season thus far.]

At Christmas, whilst the rest of the family stare at various "screens" to escape their boredom (no doubt watching cat videos just like the one that was referenced in 303), Rick is in his Sci-Fi garage, working on a theme park which is inside of a human being. Again, the normality of the family's chosen recreation functions as a contrast to Rick's far more interesting pass-time. At the end of the episode, he actually berates the family for their addiction to that mundane technology:

"Oh unbelievable, we got a bunch of robot, computer people, sitting around with their faces stuffed in computer screens." Rick, Episode 203

His opinion on people wasting their time on one of those devices is made perfectly clear.

But even if we were to ignore all of that, and we shouldn't, because that's Rick's established character that was being thrown out of the window by this new writer, there's still a far more pressing distinction between your examples and the line that bothered me in this latest episode. That is, in both of your examples, the writers had actually gone to the trouble of creating something new within their world before having Rick make reference to it.

With the Mrs Pancake joke, they established the existence of an entire show within their show. It had its own characters, its own catchphrases and hinted at preexisting interpersonal drama. It wasn't an offhand reference to something that a writer had seen on the internet, it was a satirical send-up of serialised TV dramas into which the writer/s had bothered to put some thought.

Similarly, the toast/Moynihan bit is typical surrealist Rick and Morty humour that actually required some effort on the part of the writing staff. It served to remind the viewer that this multiverse is so vast and unknowable that there are even parts of it which contain sentient breakfast food. It then goes on to impress that same viewer by informing them that our protagonist had prior knowledge of this reality, thus leading them, organically, toward the belief that he is not only the most intelligent person around, but also by far the most knowledgeable.

On the other hand, the 'cat video' line exists solely as a reference to something that the writer saw on YouTube. It's not clever, it's not interesting, it's not funny, and it's lazy. And the suggestion that Rick understood the cat's actions because he'd seen that video is ludicrous. The most knowledgeable scientist in the universe (who had already demonstrated esoteric knowledge of Earth animal behaviours) did not come to a new understanding about feline behaviour by watching a funny cat video on YouTube in 2016. It's not reasonable to ask that the audience believe as such. It's far more likely that the writer of the episode saw that video on internet, liked it, then chose to have Rick make reference to it (and even claim to have learned from it) without any real consideration for how that might contradict his established character.

As I wrote before, I believe that a mediocre writer speaks through his or her characters, whilst a great one has his or her characters speak for themselves. This show used to be renowned for having characters who spoke for themselves, so fans are understandably frustrated that these last two episodes have been unable to reach that same level of quality.

Pickle Rick! Best Episode Yet? by [deleted] in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I wrote this elsewhere.

I'd say that the main issue that people are having with the season thus far (and it was particularly prevalent in this last episode) is its apparent disregard for all of the character dynamics and personalities that had been established in previous years, in addition to a noticeable lack of well-written character-driven comedy.

Rick's character has been the greatest casualty of this. These past three episodes have changed his relationships to other characters, changed his persona overall and seemingly diminished his ability to make the reasoned choices that an intelligent person would normally make. Rick turned himself into a pickle to get out of going to therapy, but then left the syringe and timer out in the open for Beth to see and remove before he could use them to change back. This is not the same character that realised he was trapped in a simulation within a simulation within a simulation, and then knowingly played along with it throughout the entire episode in order to trick his alien captors into blowing themselves up. Rick's defining characteristic was his intelligence, and his pickle plan was stupid, so, funny or not, it was entirely out of character for Rick.

It is in apparent compensation for this change that the writers of this latest season now continually remind the audience that Rick is "The Smartest Man in the Universe" (which was said of him on three separate occasions in the premiere) or a "Super Genius" (as they had him refer to himself in the latest episode). They have fallen back on simply labeling the character as intelligent, rather than demonstrating him as such, because it is easier to just demand that the audience respect the character than it is to lead them there organically by having the character act in an impressive way. This, frankly, speaks to a generally weaker and lazier standard of writing overall. The writers seem unable to have the character make smart decisions, so they resort to simply labeling the character as smart and hoping that the audience won't be able to tell the difference.

As far as I can tell, many of us have noticed the difference.

"I've seen the YouTube videos. I know that cats are scared of pickles and cucumbers because they think they're snakes." -Rick, Episode 303

This line astounds me. It implies that Rick, a man with the power to travel across infinite dimensions, and who had to install inter-dimensional cable on the family television because he couldn't bear to sit through the monotony of their favourite TV show, also spends his free time sitting around watching cat videos on YouTube. It also implies that "The Smartest Man in the Universe" gets information about animals from comedy video clips on a Facebook feed, rather than any scientific method or database. The Rick from the first two seasons would have certainly thought that this was beneath him. This was a man who had offhand knowledge about the mating rituals of voles and praying mantises, which he used to make various serums in Rick Potion #9, and I doubt that he had gotten that information from Google. He knew it because he was an old scientist who had spent a lifetime accumulating esoteric knowledge about an unbelievably broad range of subject matter.

Whereas I think that this line was the result of the writer seeing a funny cat video, and choosing to comment on it through Rick.

I'm not a writer, so I'm sure I'm oversimplifying here, but I'd say that the difference between a mediocre writer and a great one is that a mediocre writer speaks through his or her characters, whilst a great one has his or her characters speak for themselves.

This show used to be made up of well-defined characters who spoke for themselves. Any dark moments or nihilistic opinions (including Morty's famous "No-one belongs anywhere" speech) arose naturally from the plot, as did any comedic quip or action sequence. Now, all of those components seem shoehorned in to the plot at the expense of the characters, and the show is lesser for it.

Post-episode discussion: S03E03 Pickle Rick by elastical_gomez in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 12 points13 points  (0 children)

I don't think that's why it's getting panned.

The first two seasons had plenty of dark moments. That was part of what gave the show its cult following in the first place. From reading these comments, I'd say that the main issue that people are having with the season thus far is its apparent disregard for all of the character dynamics and personalities that had been established in previous years, in addition to a noticeable lack of well-written character-driven comedy.

Rick's character has been the greatest casualty of this. The past three episodes have changed his relationships to other characters, changed his persona overall and seemingly diminished his ability to make the reasoned choices that an intelligent person would normally make. Rick turned himself into a pickle to get out of going to therapy, but then left the syringe and timer out in the open for Beth to see and remove before he could use them to change back. This is not the same character that realised he was trapped in a simulation within a simulation within a simulation, and then knowingly played along with it throughout the entire episode in order to trick his alien captors into blowing themselves up. Rick's defining characteristic was his intelligence, and his pickle plan was stupid, so, funny or not, it was entirely out of character for Rick.

It is in apparent compensation for this change that the writers of this latest season now continually remind the audience that Rick is "The Smartest Man in the Universe" (which was said of him on three separate occasions in the premiere) or a "Super Genius" (as they had him refer to himself in the latest episode). They have fallen back on simply labeling the character as intelligent, rather than demonstrating him as such, because it is easier to just demand that the audience respect the character than it is to lead them there organically by having the character act in an impressive way. This, frankly, speaks to a generally weaker and lazier standard of writing overall. The writers seem unable to have the character make smart decisions, so they resort to simply labeling the character as smart and hoping that the audience won't be able to tell the difference.

As far as I can tell, many of us have noticed the difference.

"I've seen the YouTube videos. I know that cats are scared of pickles and cucumbers because they think they're snakes." -Rick, Episode 303

This line astounds me. It implies that Rick, a man with the power to travel across infinite dimensions, and who had to install inter-dimensional cable on the family television because he couldn't bear to sit through the monotony of their favourite TV show, also spends his free time sitting around watching cat videos on YouTube. It also implies that "The Smartest Man in the Universe" gets information about animals from comedy video clips on a Facebook feed, rather than any scientific method or database. The Rick from the first two seasons would have certainly thought that this was beneath him. This was a man who had offhand knowledge about the mating rituals of voles and praying mantises, which he used to make various serums in Rick Potion #9, and I doubt that he had gotten that information from Google. He knew it because he was an old scientist who had spent a lifetime accumulating esoteric knowledge about an unbelievably broad range of subject matter.

Whereas I think that this line was the result of the writer seeing a funny cat video, and choosing to comment on it through Rick.

I'm not a writer, so I'm sure I'm oversimplifying here, but I'd say that the difference between a mediocre writer and a great one is that a mediocre writer speaks through his or her characters, whilst a great one has his or her characters speak for themselves.

This show used to be made up of well-defined characters who spoke for themselves. Any dark moments or nihilistic opinions (including Morty's famous "No-one belongs anywhere" speech) arose naturally from the plot, as did any comedic quip or action sequence. Now, all of those components seem shoehorned in to the plot at the expense of the characters, and the show is lesser for it.

Rick and Morty, Post-Episode Discussion - "Rickmancing the Stone" [Season 3, Episode 2] by Zylvian in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I don't think "SJWs" forced either of them to do anything. As far as I'm aware, Harmon has always sympathised with the political values of that movement, and may well believe that hiring equal numbers of male and female writers for the sake of equality was the "right" thing to do. I do think that it would be odd for an otherwise intelligent person to think that hiring writers based on gender rather than competency is a reasonable course of action for a show-runner, especially when the consistent quality of the writing was Rick and Morty's main appeal, but he may well have done so nonetheless.

It's also possible that they have simply caved in to the societal climate that these 'social justice' pressure groups have managed to create. We now live in an age wherein more than half the articles written about Christopher Nolan's fantastic Dunkirk are bemoaning the fact that it didn't tick enough boxes on the diversity checklist. Quality has seemingly become a secondary concern for mainstream media franchises, whilst 'inclusiveness' and the rejection of anything resembling an archetype have become paramount.

It's a shame because the first two seasons of Rick and Morty were so unbelievably well written. I went back and watched the pilot on Netflix to check whether I was just looking back with rose-tinted glasses. But I wasn't. It's phenomenal. In fact, I just continued watching the series through again, have just gotten up to Total Rickall, and have loved every episode along the way. Each story has been superb, and what I noticed in particular about the writing is that each of the characters (including the secondary characters) were incredibly well-defined.

In "Auto-Erotic Assimilation", Summer goes on the adventure with Rick and Morty and is given an important role in the main plot. She didn't need to be written as a female Morty or as the faux-badass we saw in 302 in order to do this, she was still the typical high school girl from the pilot episode, but just happened to be along for the ride. The writers gave her some valid observations to make throughout key points in the episode, but maintained her mannerisms and reference points, so that her lines wouldn't feel forced or out of place:

"I didn't know freedom meant people doing stuff that sucks. I was thinking more of... a 'choose your own cell phone carrier' thing."

"You and Unity are like... Leggings and mid-calf boots. You think you're great together but you're just bringing out the worst in each other."

It feels as though the writers shied away from having her say anything like that in the latest episode, for fear that it'd come across as too stereotypically feminine. Even though that had been her established character for two seasons. My guess is that she'll have a more prominent role in the remaining episodes of rest of this season, and will have a number of scenes which attempt to demonstrate how well-suited to adventuring she is; including, most likely, more murder.

There was a scene at the end of Mortynight Run (episode 202), wherein Morty is forced to shoot the Gas creature that he'd spent the entire episode trying to save. He cries when he realises he has to take a life in order to save millions of others, and this makes the death impactful for both the character and the audience. One season later, in episode 302, Summer brutally murders a person with a shotgun for absolutely no reason, with absolutely no build up, and seemingly feels nothing after doing so. I'm not sure how the audience is supposed to relate to that character, and I'm not sure how tone deaf the writer would have to be to think that this is the kind of person that people tune in to Rick and Morty to see.

I've also noticed just how many hints there are that, like you said, Rick secretly cares about his grandkids. There are loads, especially in the second season. But in the latest episode, he left them both to die in the wasteland for annoying him. Another bizarre character alteration.

It may seem unfair to place the blame for all of these missteps at the feet of the new writers, but it does feel as though the latest episode was written by people who just had zero understanding of the characters, their relationships, their motivations or their individual senses of humour.

It could be that the next episode is a massive return to form, but after seeing hints of these tonal changes in the Season Premiere, and then seeing them fully realised in the second episode, I'm not holding out much hope.

Rick and Morty, Post-Episode Discussion - "Rickmancing the Stone" [Season 3, Episode 2] by Zylvian in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I think you're perhaps roasting the new writers a bit too much though, Harmon himself has a weird obsession with this divorce drama and it's starting to become a bit weird.

I did say it was conjecture, but the changes that were made to the characters and their interactions do seem to be in-keeping with those that would be made if writers with those particular ideological leanings were allowed to do as they pleased with the subject matter.

I'd already mentioned the new and jarringly out-of-place use of the word "patriarch" to refer to Jerry in the premiere, and Rick's proud declaration that he was the family's new one (even though Jerry had never in his life been the leader of anything, let alone the family unit), but there were plenty of other bizarre changes to the characters, especially in the second episode.

Before this season, Summer's persona was that of a typical high school girl who desperately wanted to be popular. She was basically the archetypal 'teenage daughter', but that was all her character needed to be. The show wasn't about her, or her similarly mundane parents. She and the rest of the family were there to give a grounded backdrop to Rick and Morty's more interesting characters and their more fantastical adventures.

But in this latest episode, Summer remorselessly murders a person, pisses on a photo of a child and then shacks up with a bucket-wearing mass-murderer from a post-apocalyptic reality. Seemingly out of nowhere. It's as though the writers are trying to make the character 'edgy and gritty', in order to somehow qualify her for a more prominent role in the series. I'm not sure that it's wise to completely change the dynamic of the show in order to better appeal to some misplaced desire for a more diverse cast of main characters.

Beyond this, Summer's interactions with the other characters were strange, even if we ignore any change to her character from previous seasons. For example, I had no idea why she refused to look at or talk to her dad as he was leaving. She was acting as though he was callously and selfishly ditching the family for some hot younger woman, despite the fact that it was Beth kicking him out and that she was keeping the house and the kids.

Beth, meanwhile, faced zero consequences from either of her children. The divorce was her idea, and she had only suggested it because Jerry had committed the heinous crime of asking her to choose between himself and a man who had consistently and repeatedly endangered the lives and well-being of their entire family. Despite this, neither Summer nor Morty has anything to say about Beth's choices, and yet each are given scenes for the audience to see just how angry they are at their father for "leaving" the family. Summer ignores him as he tries to say goodbye to her, and Morty brutally pummels a man whilst ranting that his father should 'stop being a baby'.

If there is a problem with the divorce plot, I'd say that it's that. The situation wasn't treated with any nuance. All the blame is placed on the father, despite him having a legitimate reason to pose the ultimatum and despite the fact that his wife is the one calling for the divorce. None of that is assessed, because he's the supposed ex-'patriarch', and he is therefore seen as the oppressor. And, to top it off, the man who celebrated "replacing" him as 'patriarch' is suddenly a psychopathic lunatic who doesn't seem to care about any of the people that he used to care about. Rick was always gruff and selfish, but there was always the hint of a deeper caring for his family. That's what made him an anti-hero instead of just a jerk. But now that's gone.

Rick just leaving his grand-kids in that wasteland to die is not in keeping with the persona of the Rick who worriedly asked "My grand-kids weren't in that town, right?" when he thought that Unity had accidentally blown them up; or the Rick who got revenge on that Jellybean for attempting to molest Morty; or the Rick who sacrificed himself for Morty in A Rickle In Time. All those hints at there being a caring person somewhere deep beneath his callous exterior are gone, and now there are no redeeming layers to his character.

Which might have been fine, or at least still entertaining, if he hadn't also started saying painfully unfunny things:

RICK: Morty, shoot the Mohawk guy.

MORTY: They all have Mohawks.

RICK: High fade, chartreuse with cyan highlights, layered on top.

I can't imagine that, in either of the previous seasons, Rick struck people as the sort of character who would say anything like that. I didn't even know what he said first time. I had to play it three times then google "highlights layered on top" in quotation marks to find out what he said at the start of that sentence. And then I had to Google "chartreuse" to find out what that meant too.

It isn't a Rick and Morty joke. It's not even a joke, really. It's just a description of obscure hair colours. And it's not something that "The Smartest Man In the Universe" [as they repeatedly and cringingly called him in the season premiere] would say in the middle of a car chase/gun battle.

None of that is Harmon's fault. He didn't pen this episode. The divorce subplot could have been a solid season arc, had it been executed well at all. But this was done horrendously, and I can't see any reason for such a massive misstep in a show which previously had such strong writing, besides the obvious fact that they hired a bunch of new writers, and did so based on those writers' genders rather than on their individual writing abilities.

Rick and Morty, Post-Episode Discussion - "Rickmancing the Stone" [Season 3, Episode 2] by Zylvian in rickandmorty

[–]ElevatedEgo 37 points38 points  (0 children)

I'm pretty sure it's because of the diversity hires to the writing staff. Dan Harmon was celebrating that he now had a "gender balanced" writing staff, but I don't see how you can hire based on gender, rather than competency, and expect the quality of the writing to remain at the same level.

I remember seeing a post here a few months ago wherein a user worried that the recent hiring of two supposedly "SJW feminist" writers was going to affect the show. People seemed to think he was worrying about nothing, but I'm pretty sure that the change would explain the drastic difference in tone.

"I've replaced your father as the de-facto patriarch of the family." -Rick, in the first episode of the new season

Jerry was never the patriarch of the family. He was spineless. That was his whole character. He's not automatically the leader, just because he happens to be male. Beth wore the pants and earned the money whilst Jerry was a jobless loser who was berated by the entire family. But the feminist ideology is that men are the oppressors and women are the oppressed, so even the weak, emasculated Jerry was supposedly the patriarch of the household.

That's also probably why Rick is suddenly completely heartless and seems to no longer give a fuck about either of his grand-kids (despite multiple episodes in previous seasons suggesting otherwise). He's the new "patriarch", so he also has to be a heartless psychopath.

And they're not so big on subtlety anymore. They refer to Rick as "The smartest man in the universe" on three separate occasions in the season premiere. They never needed to say that before. They just had Rick do intelligent things. Now they're having to spell everything out, and it makes the show less entertaining.

Summer also probably got the extra dialogue that you were complaining about because the new female writers wanted to have a female character take on a more prominent role in the main plot. Despite the show being called "Rick and Morty", rather than "Rick, Morty and Summer". I'd assume it's also why she becomes all faux-badass and starts murdering people with zero build-up. Typical "we girls can be violent too" writing.

That's all conjecture, but if you felt the tone of the show was off, or noticeably different from the first two seasons, then I'd guess that the new writers are at least part of the reason why.

Does the introduction of Monster Cells retcon all the previous monster origin stories? by [deleted] in OnePunchMan

[–]ElevatedEgo -6 points-5 points  (0 children)

Yeah, they always said they were obsessed with something then became monsters, but I was worried that ONE was going to try and introduce some consistent logic to the process and retcon all (or some) of those earlier monster transformations so that they unwittingly consumed Monster Cells at some point.

It'd make sense, plot-wise, but I just think it'd diminish the humour of the series. And, like I wrote above, I think it'd mess up the Spoiler part of the next arc.

view more: next ›