Rick And Morty Season 7 Raises An Ongoing Series Question: Can Rick Actually Die?
There are a lot of elements that make "Rick and Morty" unique from the average animated sitcom, but a big one is just how common it is for us to watch its titular characters die. Sure, shows like "The Simpsons" have no trouble murdering its characters in its non-canon anthology episodes, but "Rick and Morty" will casually have Rick get his head crushed with a rock in the middle of the season 4 premiere. Rick was fine then, of course — his consciousness was uploaded into another Rick's vat in an alternate universe — but the sight of our main character dying so brutally is still shocking.
Beyond how often we've seen our main characters die, this show's multiverse premise means we've also seen near-identical versions of them die a millions times already. Most of the Citadel-centric episodes have forced us to watch all sorts of horrific deaths for other Ricks and Mortys, especially in season 5's "Mortyplicity," which made us watch as every single member of the Smith family realized they were clones, had an existential crisis, and got themselves murdered.
As season 1 made clear, the show isn't shy about killing off its original cast either. "Rick Potion #9" ended with Rick and Morty abandoning the rest of the family in a Cronenberg-infested reality. In one quick swoop, the show forced viewers to accept that the Beth, Summer, and Jerry we'd know throughout the rest of the show aren't the ones we spent the first six episodes with. The original Rick and Morty, meanwhile, have stayed around this whole time. They've both effectively died at multiple points, sure, but they're still the same Rick and Morty we started off with.
However, the latest episode of "Rick and Morty" season 7 has us wondering whether the lack of genuine threat to the duo is starting to become a problem rather than a feature.
Rick's many reincarnations
The latest episode of the seventh season, "Mort: Ragnorick," kills off its main C-137 characters more than perhaps any other episode of the show. In an episode where Rick and trying to harness the infinite energy of Valhalla for his own use, not only does Rick get mangled by Bigfoot, but we also have to watch in horror as poor 14-year-old Morty is casually crushed to death as well. Then we watch as both Morty and Rick and incinerated by the evil Pope (long story there) at least a dozen times. It's a somewhat jarring experience, because unlike most episodes, this is our Rick and Morty who's getting killed here, not some clone or alternate version of them.
Yet as the episode draws a lot of its humor from, none of this actually matters. Every time they die, Rick and Morty just go to Valhalla, teleport their consciousnesses back to the vats in Rick's garage, and continue like normal. Sure, by the end of the episode Rick has to close down the device that makes this possible in order to defeat the Pope, but there's little indication that he can't pull the same trick again sometime down the line. And even if he can't, there's also the Operation Phoenix protocol that we got to see in detail in the season 4 premiere. Even if our Rick dies and doesn't go to heaven, his consciousness can still easily be transferred over to a vat in his garage, or at least the garage of a nearby reality.
"Mort: Ragnorick" has only reinforced something that's been true on this show for at least three seasons: Rick Sanchez cannot die. Or rather: He can die, but it will always be undone immediately afterward with zero repercussions.
Why it's an issue
For the most part this isn't a huge deal. After all, on a meta level, we've already known that the show's never going to permanently kill off our titular characters, but it's still hard not to feel like this undercuts the stakes a little. The recent season 7 episode where Rick fought to the death against Rick Prime was genuinely stressful, but it would've been a lot less stressful if this week's episode had aired first. Why would we worry for Rick's safety here when we know that heaven canonically exists, and that Rick's smart enough to build his way back to the land of the living? The next time Rick's life is in danger, why should we even care?
This ties back to another common fan complaint about the show: Rick is basically a god now. In season 1, he was a drunken, foul-mouthed Doc Brown homage who seemed to stumble his way through every situation. Back then, fans really did get the impression that death was a genuine possibility behind Rick and Morty's adventures; more importantly, we believed that Rick could fail. Even if he didn't die, it felt like he could still lose.
Today, that sense of risk just isn't there anymore. Rick and even Morty to some extet will always walk into a room with complete and total confidence, a confidence that is typically treated as completely earned by the narrative. This Rick truly is a god who walks untouchable amongst a world of disposable mortals, and this is especially true now that his biggest enemy has recently been defeated. Making Rick and Morty so powerful definitely raises some fun thematic questions the show's clearly interested in exploring, but aw, geez, it would be nice if the sense of genuine stakes could return.