Adult Swim
The fourth season of Rick and Morty ended with the episode ‘Star Mort: Rickturn of the Jerri’, which is an obvious reference to Return of the Jedi and the frequent annoyed remarks by Rick about a ‘Star Wars’ style adventure he’s forced to be a part of. The episode revolves around the other Beth, the maybe clone or maybe not Beth we saw ask Rick at the end of the third season. That episode ended ambiguously and with a sense that either Beth might be the ‘real’ one, but maybe the idea of living ‘normally’ with a family is just as acceptable as a spacefaring adventurer.
Naturally, this episode doubles down on that theme, once again showing Rick hurting himself by how he hurts others. It’s an idea that the show keeps going back to, but it’s hard to know if this is something the show will stick to with any real change. The show also doubled down on past continuity, with the reappearances of Tammy/Tonya and Bird Person (now Phoenix Person, which feels sort of an obvious title as the phoenix rising from the ashes).
Although the two Beth personas initially clash, by the end they get along completely, more fulfilled together then perhaps they were apart.
On the sidelines, Morty and Summer have their own arc, explicitly called out in a meta way with them fighting and eventually coming together to save the day. The ridiculous invisibility belt, at first used for a series of silly gags (e.g. the delightful stupidity of the cheerleaders saying they needed to show at the same time because of a drought) and then abandoned by the pair as they used a combination of their skills to save Earth.
While Morty kills soldiers off screen, the same bugs he inadvertently shot in the very first episode of the show, showing his own downward spiral — back then he was horrified, now he’s so desensitized and capable of murder we don’t even need to see it. While Summer listens to the hilarious conversation between guards about how the Wrangler NX-5 planet destroying machine will destroy everything other than Wrangler jeans, she cleverly uses Morty’s pair to shut down the whole thing.
Naturally we see a shining moment even for Jerry, who distracts Phoenix Person at a critical moment by using the dead Tammy/Tonya as a puppet, calling back to being explicitly called crazy by Dr. Wong earlier. Although even then, he gets revealed accidentally because it’s still Jerry after all. So too are the great post-credits moments, with him in an invisible garbage truck ‘solving wrongs’ until he can’t figure out how to refuel it. Jerry remains a combination of hapless and surprisingly useful.
The final moments show Rick acknowledging he’s a terrible father, as he also hid the truth of which Beth was a clone from himself. The ultimate truth therefore is the obvious one — both versions of Beth are just as legitimate. We hear the sounds of the original composition ‘Don’t Look Back (feat. Kotomi & Ryan Elder)’ as Rick ponders his most recent worst alienation yet. As the season ends, Rick hasn’t made a serious sacrifice, but had to be saved yet again. He is alone, despite being around his family.
It’s interesting how this season has often punctured Rick’s aura of ‘being right’ — his pattern of damaging other people ultimately hurts him to a level that everyone else in his family feels better off to ignore him. It’s sort of sad, but it’s also something magnified by that sad song — Rick did this to himself.
We know that a fifth season will be released eventually, and I’m hoping the show keeps it going with its embrace of meta narratives and continuity. More of the family outside of just Rick and Morty, that’s often when the show has shined. The season has had a combination of weirdness, genre subversions, and straightforward melancholic action. It was ultimately filled with a lot of strong ones, although I think I put ‘The Old Man and the Seat’ as the best and the dragon episode ‘Claw and Hoarder: Special Ricktim’s Morty’ as the weakest.
Rick and Morty still can manage to create memorable moments as good as anything else out there, but I think what people will remember are memes from the heist episode, which ultimately, was just a funny episode. Sometimes that’s all we’re looking for.
What did you think of the season finale? Sound off in the comments below!
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