He drags Morty near death on an episodic basis, verbally degrading him. Rick rarely faces consequences for his actions. This continues up to where we are now, in Season 4. I was surprised, watching the first season of “Rick and Morty,” to find that Rick physically and/or emotionally abuses Morty in every single episode. The issue lies in how “Rick and Morty” deals - or rather, doesn’t deal - with consequences. Binging the show over quarantine, I instantly saw the issue with its reception - while there’s enough obvious information here to know that Rick is not a role model, there are unfortunately people who will not see that no matter how you spell it out for them.Īnd the show, perhaps unknowingly, allows this fan subset to do just that - place Rick as a role model, identify with him, see him and ergo themselves as gods. At worst, as much as its writers fight against this, its cosmic nihilism glorifies abuse. At best, the show is a profound exploration of what it means to be conscious on this giant orb about which we know nothing.

What draws so many men to it? I love “Rick and Morty.” I can’t lie. Women and nonbinary people like this show too, of course - I’m one of them! But this show does have a male-leaning fan base, and that’s important to analyze. Granted, it’s not just men who devour this show. They should use them to change their philosophical tune. The showrunners, Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland, have 70 episodes left. This type of misogynistic entitlement can have real-world consequences far worse than Reddit trolling - this behavior can become Gamergate, can become the world in which a man prone to tantrums is the president. In “Rick and Morty,” Rick rarely faces consequences for his actions, and his “might makes right” smugness seems to have traveled over to a subset of the show’s fan base - the subset who bullied the show’s female writers and went insane over dipping sauce. When we consider the fan base of this show and its general reception, we can learn something about the modern male fan. Why am I here? Does my life have any meaning? Will I be punished for playing Machiavelli and abusing almost everyone in my life? Out of all of these new cartoons of the 2000s, no show has had quite the interesting impact of “Rick and Morty.” Spawning an intense cult fandom, the show stars a genius male alcoholic as he deals with the big questions of life.

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