As I’m sure was the case with pretty much every fan of Rick and Morty, I was surprised when the news came out that Justin Roiland had been released from Adult Swim due to abuse allegations and a trial date that had completely gone under the radar. Since that moment, stories had come out about troubles within the writers’ room as well as various incredibly unsavoury allegations made against Roiland. The show had begun declining in quality post season 4, with season 5 being far and away being the weakest season with some of the weakest episodes of the entire show and season 6 being very good but not quite up to the standard of the first few seasons. This effect was exacerbated due to the loss of Dan Harmon as the showrunner, as the show now had far less involvement from him due to his commitments to various other projects.

Thankfully, this trend seems to be over. I’m happy to report that season 7 of Rick and Morty is back up to the standard that the show was able to hit almost every week with their first four seasons. The first episode, “How Poopy Got His Poop Back”, is one of the show’s weakest episodes to date (as is episode 8, “Rise of the Numbericons: The Movie”) but the season immediately followed this up with the excellent “The Jerrick Trap”. After that, the season (mostly) continues with banger after banger with episode 5 “Unmortricken” being not only a season highlight but a highlight of the entire show. It reminded me somewhat of season 3 episode 7 “The Ricklantis Mixup (which is still arguably the best episode) as they are both heavily narrative-centric episodes that are able to take that lore and create a dark nihilistic story that serves as a backdrop for some genuinely great moments of comedy and some depressingly authentic scenes. 

The biggest question going into the season was how would the voice acting of Rick and Morty actually be. Many seemed believe that Roiland leaving would be the death of the show because many seemed to be under the (false) impression that he was heavily involved in the writing and the voice acting despite the fact that a) Roiland has not written an episode since season 1 (he did contribute writing segments on a handful of the improv episodes, but that hardly counts) and b) everyone and their mum can do an impression of Rick and Morty. I assumed it would be fairly easy to find voice actors to replace him. There are a handful of moments (primarily with the voice actor for Rick) that you can tell that there are different voice actors performing the roles, but generally the new voice actors do a remarkably solid job and seem like they have always been playing the role. Harry Belden especially does a fantastic job as Morty, voicing him in a way that is basically indistinguishable from Roiland’s turn as the character. I also have to give Ian Cardoni credit, as he sounds more or less like Roiland aside from when he has to yell. That being said, you could tell in the later seasons that Roiland was having to strain his voice at times, so I don’t hold anything against Cardoni. The respect I have for these two coming into a show where the fifth episode they ever recorded was one of the biggest the show has ever done and is the culmination to the Rick Prime story that had been built up to for several seasons is indescribable. All the returning cast members do a really good job as well and are as good as they always were. 

As expected, the animation continues to be remarkable and has some of the most kinetic action sequences this show has created to date. But the true standout of this season, the factor that made it both a return to form for the show and my favorite season of 2023, has to be the writing. The show has generally been great at writing its sci-fi concepts, but I’ve always had a real appreciation for the way this show writes dialogue and the way in which it deals with optimistic nihilism. I’ll give you an example.

One of my favourite exchanges between Rick and Morty is in the 4th episode of season 7 “That’s Amorte”. 

Morty: “You did it, didn’t you? You couldn’t change everyone’s taste buds, but you could make it… distasteful. It wasn’t the death, was it?”

Rick: “It was the complexity of life.”

Morty: “God, what was the point?”

Rick: “If you’re asking whether this was a story about right and wrong, the answer is: I don’t care.”

Morty: “So what do we do?”

Rick: “Cells consume, Morty. Life itself is wrong, and that means death is right. But you can’t side with that. So you live, even when it means eating. And Fred here really did it well.”

This season also starts giving us more character development, which was something we’d been gradually seeing more and more of over the course of the show. I’ve always appreciated when this show does this, as animated sitcoms generally revert to the status quo by the end of an episode. We see a strengthening of Rick and Jerry’s relationship in the previously mentioned “The Jerrick Trap” that feels incredibly earned and actually quite nice. But of course, the series has always focused on the relationship between the titular characters, which is where the true growth lies in this season. However, the show does not let the more emotional moments get in the way of the comedy with episode 6, “Rickfending Your Mort”, being a season highlight as a comedic romp showcasing their relationship wonderfully as well as bringing back Morty’s punch cards. 

I wrote a majority of this review as I was watching the season and figured I would have more or less said everything I wanted to before the last couple of episodes had aired. However, the season finale “Fear No Mort” really added a lot to this season and brought some interesting themes and discussions into the season. The episode deals with the fears of Rick and Morty as well as opening up discussions on love, death and happiness in a way that feels simultaneously incredibly depressing, brutally honest, cathartic, and poignant. Overall, if this season is anything to go by, the quality of Rick and Morty will stay up for a long time. So give me that 100 years of Rick and Morty baby!

10/10