Original trailer for the episode
There once was a man who turned himself into a pickle. It was the funniest shit I've ever seen.
Rick and Morty was a show I really liked once. I maintain that some of those episodes in the first couple seasons are some of the best adult animation I've seen. It's clever, but in a pretty silly way a lot of the time, so you don't really know what to expect. It's just dumb fun. Unfortunately after a few straight seasons that were sub-par, society largely turning against the show, and the voice of both Rick and Morty, Justin Roiland, being found to be an awful human being, it's pretty hard to still watch. However, maybe I get to keep a little irony.
I'm going to say it! When I first saw Pickle Rick, I thought it was hilarious. I might even say it was the funniest shit I've ever seen. I mean, he turned himself into a pickle, for Christ's sake! Okay, yes, I was 17, but hear me out: Pickles are funny!
"To be fair, you have to have a very high IQ to understand Rick and Morty. The humor is extremely subtle, and without a solid grasp of theoretical physics most of the jokes will go over a typical viewer's head. There's also Rick's nihilistic outlook, which is deftly woven into his characterisation - his personal philosophy draws heavily from Narodnaya Volya literature, for instance. The fans understand this stuff; they have the intellectual capacity to truly appreciate the depths of these jokes, to realize that they're not just funny- they say something deep about LIFE. As a consequence people who dislike Rick and Morty truly ARE idiots- of course they wouldn't appreciate, for instance, the humour in Rick's existencial catchphrase "Wubba Lubba Dub Dub," which itself is a cryptic reference to Turgenev's Russian epic Fathers and Sons I'm smirking right now just imagining one of those addlepated simpletons scratching their heads in confusion as Dan Harmon's genius unfolds itself on their television screens. What fools... how I pity them. 😂 And yes by the way, I DO have a Rick and Morty tattoo. And no, you cannot see it. It's for the ladies' eyes only- And even they have to demonstrate that they're within 5 IQ points of my own (preferably lower) beforehand."- some dingus on the internet.
Okay, so it's pretty easy to dismiss this whole show as being stupid after the first time so many people were exposed to it being when the "super-genius" Rick turns himself into a pickle, And it makes it really easy to make fun of this guy's Reddit post which I still see referenced to this day. And seeing fans freak out during the whole Szechuan sauce thing didn't help out either. Society at large was always going to be antagonistic to a show that mainly appealed to nihilist little weirdos who thought they were smart. Let's just say I think that there's a lot of people wrong on both sides of this.
What I like about Pickle Rick and most other Rick and Morty memes is that I'm one of those people who get to see it from both sides. I think Pickle Rick was genuinely funny, but it's also funny in an ironic way because it's so stupid. What's not to love from a former fan's point of view?!
Human Music. I like it!
Rick and Morty has had a lot of great memes. The aforementioned "To be fair" Reddit post, human music, the Plumbus, Get Shwifty, Bird Person. It's all good. And it's all dumb fun and always has been.
But, to be fair, (oh no this is starting out like the copypasta), the "Pickle Rick" episode did win an Emmy for "Outstanding Animated Program". It's not like Rick And Morty is flat out bad like I've seen so many people assume without ever watching it. So I'll stand my ground as a former fan of the show. It was good, it was funny, and maybe you can't appreciate the pure genius of a show with an ongoing character named "Mr. Poopy Butthole".
