Pickle Rick!
For any other television show such an idea would be incredibly stupid, but when it comes to Rick and Morty…well, it’s still stupid. But it’s the really smart kind of stupid that we love. And based on the all new season three trailer that Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland revealed during a live-streaming event Thursday night, Pickle Rick is just the start of the duos’ latest, insane sci-fi adventures.
There is so much going on, but between Seal Team Rick, battles with what appear to be Nega Rick and Mortys, and promises about this year being the darkest yet (that means things are going to get real dark), the season premiere, announced for Sunday, July 30th at 11:30 EST/PST, can’t come soon enough.
In addition to the trailer and giving us the long, long, long awaited start date, Harmon and Roiland were also joined in a free-flowing, vulgarity-filled panel hosted by Brandon Johnson, (voice of math teacher Mr. Goldenfold), as well as storyboard artist Erica Hayes, who did live drawings during the proceedings.
There was a little bit of everything for fans during the live show, which started with the creators answering pre-submitted questions . The biggest takeaways included:
- There was no new episode shown, but they did say that season three will have ten episodes. That means we still have nine brand new ones to come, since the first episode was released on April Fool’s Day.
- Despite rumors, the two creators aren’t fighting (“I love Dan fucking so much, and thats not the alcohol talking.”)
- They actually get along very well (“We hate each other, like most rich guys who help each other make money,” joked Harmon), and have since their friendship started way back in 2006—or 2004 if you believe Roiland.
- They haven’t finished drawing season yet (but it’s almost done!).
- Justin Roiland said that when it comes to Rick and Morty porn, “There’s some really violent ****.” (Uh…we’ll just take his word on that.)
- The show hasn’t been cancelled yet, but there’s no deal for a season four yet, and though their contracts are technically up, they talked about it happening enough that they gave the strong impression they both plan on doing it—but their agents would prefer if they didn’t say that.
Then, while Roiland told a story about how he almost got beat up on his recent trip to Germany (it involved lots of alcohol, a DJ that sounded like a turkey, and a Hostel-like sex club), Harmon started writing a quick original story that they then did a live reading of (sorta like this one?). Really live, as at some points they were reading lines as Harmon was writing them. (We bet we’ll eventually get a slightly more formal form of it, maybe with panel stills?)
They actually incorporated a brand new character into the improvised story, an alien with large pecs that tries to please everyone, a species known as a Covfefe (where’d they get that name I wonder). They made him with the help of the audience, although they had to help the audience a little bit more than they had hoped. (Hey, they get the big bucks for a reason!)
The entire thing was as silly and ridiculous as you’d imagine, akin to the messy, rambling inane commercials from the show that Rick and Morty love watching (i.e. Ants in My Eyes Johnson and Lil’ Bits).
After creating some totally inappropriate cold opens, they finished by answering questions from the audience, which touched upon where the szechuan sauce idea from the season three premiere came from and how close they came to having another Meeseeks episode.
For being an absurd, fun evening, the event was a great insight into how they come up with ideas for the show, how they are then written by Harmon, and how it is all then brought to life by Roiland.
Although, if they can be this funny making an episode in an hour, uh, why did we have to wait a year and a half for season three? Well, now they have no excuse to take that long for season four.
What do you think of the new trailer? What was your favorite thing you learned from the live stream? Let us know in the comments below.
Images: Adult Swim
