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Managing editor & film and television critic with a Bachelor's of Arts in English Literature with a Writing Minor from the University of Guam. Currently in graduate school completing a Master's in English Literature.
“Bear witness” to whatever Biblical thing this is.
The ninth episode of Rick and Morty‘s fourth season — before its season finale — is titled “Childrick of Mort;” it is written by James Siciliano and directed by Kyounghee Lim.
If you haven’t caught up with the show, do so now or read at your own peril. Some spoilers ahead!
This week’s episode of Rick and Morty takes place during Spring Break, and instead of being out spending time with friends, Summer (Spencer Grammer) and Morty Smith (Justin Roiland) are roped into a vacation with their parents Beth (Sarah Chalke) and Jerry (Chris Parnell) until scientist grandfather Rick Sanchez (also Justin Roiland) takes them all to another planet, where he has supposedly sired that planet’s offspring. The family arrives to find that Rick’s children have run amok, so he and his daughter go about to construct a machine that organizes the offspring — their method of creating society. Jerry Smith wounds up in the “Unproductive” category of Rick’s alien children, while his own children Summer and Morty stumble upon a stranded spacecraft.
The episode title pokes fun at director Alfonso Cuarón’s 2006 film Children of Men, which is also based on P.D. James’s 1992 novel The Children of Men. In both versions of the story, a population of the world is met with its decadence, and decades later they realize their one chance and bringing order back to global civilization. In Rick and Morty, the grandfather and his daughter organize the alien kinfolk by whichever traits they exhibit or what workforce they would soon serve: Medic, Interns, Scientist, Laborer, Unproductive, Athletes, Lawyers, etc.
Here, Rick teaches Beth that “the best parent is evolution.” Additionally, he meets a godlike entity that looks like “if Kid Rock fucked Zeus.” The two confront in a battle, where it is revealed that the “god” is the actual father of the planet’s children.
Jerry’s side story with his children revolves around the use of technology and how it impedes individuals from interacting with each other and with their environments. Jerry helps the planet’s children to camp in the outdoors, while Summer and Morty get high by “inhaling brake fluid” and playing at the spacecraft’s steering wheel as if it were a video game. Summer argues that “camping is just being homeless without the change.” The Smith children’s way of recreation is reckless and ends up killing the god.
The episode offers Biblical references such as the big bang that created the world in the Book of Genesis, or the ark that Noah uses later. Jerry compares himself to Moses when he leads the Unproductive children into the Promised Land. In fact, Summer and Morty’s worship of drugs and video games is literally what hurts the god of children, and Children of Men itself is an allusion to the Bible. If the Smiths are figures and characters of the Bible, Rick Sanchez is God and the writer of the book, which he tends to prove time and time again.
“Childrick of Mort” reminds us that we must challenge our belief systems and there isn’t just one way to go about these matters. In the “Planets Only” end-tag, planets in the cosmos are displayed as sexy and alluring as if to make fun of the OnlyFans way of selling a body to others. We can either terraform or colonize these bodies, that is, build something naturally or do so by force and domination. As Rick says, “Crazy things happen when you put in the work.” His fight with the Zeus-looking god is a resemblance to co-creator Dan Harmon’s work on Doctor Strange, the director of whom is a follower of Christianity.
This episode develops Rick and Beth’s father-daughter relationship along with Jerry’s relationship with his own children, although this has worked before. Its writing cites two literary works and two films, becoming its own story.
9/10
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Rick and Morty is available to watch on Cartoon Network’s nighttime program Adult Swim!
Managing editor & film and television critic with a Bachelor's of Arts in English Literature with a Writing Minor from the University of Guam. Currently in graduate school completing a Master's in English Literature.
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