Review: Rick and Morty “Ricks Days, Seven Nights”
OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)
Rick, or rather Rick’s forced vacation persona Ted, enjoys his time on a planet oddly similar to Earth, not knowing he is actually a fake identity constructed by Rick to get away from his life for a little bit. But when aspects of Rick’s life start to creep into Ted’s, he takes matters into his own hands to protect what little he knows.
OUR TAKE
Rick and Morty’s ninth season follows up its continuity laden premiere with a pretty novel standalone episode idea that I’m honestly surprised that they hadn’t tried sooner: Rick finding a small hideaway spot to take a vacation from it all, even himself. Based on the preview commercial for this episode and its opening minutes, my assumption was that he simply assumed an identity and used it as cover to blend in with a group of small town yokels who had never heard of him, but I realize now I thought too small. Not only is this a small remote place, it’s a planet far away from Earth that just happened to evolve a very similar culture, and Rick isn’t just assuming an identity, he is literally making an alternate personality named Ted to better enjoy being among regular folks. Sort of like a self-imposed version of that Doctor Who two-parter “Human Nature/Family of Blood” but if the Doctor was fighting himself…which he’s kinda had to do on occasion anyway. One would then wonder how Rick is getting the supposed benefits of this vacation if he is not fully conscious of being there, but I’m not the multiversal super genius. And of course he has planned contingencies in case the mask slips, like his body’s auto defense weapons getting triggered by a convenience store robber, where Ted is given an option by a hologram Rick to just forget what happened and carry on. Unfortunately, Ted seems to have a bit too much Rick in him to let things just lie like that.
What follows is a pretty dramatic inner rebellion as Ted starts having to fight off more of Rick’s auto contingencies, and when his love interest is killed in the ensuing battle (kinda disappointed we are resorting to fridging for the only new female character in this episode but okay), he and his ice fishing buddies decide to take the fight to wherever Rick and/or Ted came from…only for Ted to kinda just slide into being Rick once they get there. It makes sense, considering Ted IS Rick, so being in Rick’s usual environment does seem like it would just lead him to more Rick behavior, but it is no less sad that Ted, who was made to give an aspect of Rick a chance to be unburdened by his other connections, be swallowed by those habits while still technically being Ted. And then, by the end, when he does hit that button to revert back to Rick, the change is almost imperceptible because Ted had pretty much entirely become Rick at that point. I guess it goes to show that despite Rick’s growth and development over the course of the show, there’s still a lot of inherent sadness to this character, which is also part of why this show still has the juice nine seasons in. Also it’s so weird to not have a Pocket Mortys commercial at the end of these. Anyway, on to the next ep!
