Rick and Morty continued season six with “JuRicksic Mort” and the return of dinosaurs to Earth. The dinosaurs land on Earth similarly to the aliens in Arrival and immediately display their power. They dismantle Egyptian guns with their minds and meet with world leaders, including The President, voiced by Keith David (The Princess and the Frog, They Live). The dinosaurs are given control of Earth because of their vast superiority and benevolence, and they essentially fix everything on Earth. There is no longer a need for an economy. The only problem comes from people no longer knowing what to do with themselves. The Smith family turns to Jerry, voiced by Chris Parnell (Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, 21 Jump Street), who usually feels completely useless, and he presents them with a copy of a book he wrote.
The President meets with Rick, voiced by the show’s co-creator Justin Roiland (Solar Opposites), who offers Rick the chance to host the Oscars if he can get the dinosaurs to leave Earth. Rick attempts to convince them to visit an alternate reality, but they have already decided on an origin reality policy. They give him a portal gun, but Rick destroys it, much to the dismay of Morty, also voiced by Roiland. At this moment, Rick decides that these dinosaurs must be hiding skeletons in their closet because they are virtue signaling so aggressively. He travels to the previous planetary habitats of these high-tech beings and discovers that they are followed by life-ending meteors everywhere they go.
On Earth, Jerry’s book is made available to everyone, and because of the lack of competition, his name is not printed on the book. Rick interrupts and divulges his findings to everyone. Even the dinosaurs were unaware that there were barely sentient meteors hunting them down. They realize all their work has been for nothing. They don’t want to destroy the meteor through violence and are kicked off Earth consequently.
Rick hosts the Oscars, which had some very topical jokes about everything being scripted but decides to leave when he hears of the dinosaurs’ current plan. They wait on Mars for the meteor to kill them. Rick shows up and plays a game of chicken with them, forcing one of the dinosaurs to destroy the meteor. As a backhanded return of the favor, they fix the rift in the universe created by Evil Morty. Rick complains about how quick a fix it was and how they ruined the potential for arcs and canonic episodes in a moment of amusing self-recognition by the show creators. In the closing moments of “JuRicksic Mort”, Rick shows Morty how he has fixed portal fluid and hilariously tosses him about through different dimensions for his pleasure.
It was refreshing to see Rick battle against someone who was altogether entirely benevolent and simply unaware of a sort of curse. Rick’s understanding that good is nearly always balanced by evil helped him to recognize that there must be something beyond the surface of the super-advanced beings that seemed to make every measurable problem disappear. Portal fluid is fixed, and the rift is closed. It does seem like a relatively quick fix, and even pointing that out for a joke doesn’t excuse it from appearing more makeshift than ever. The intimacy of the previous six episodes will be missed. But with interdimensional travel back, the possibilities for Rick and Morty are once again endless.
Rating 8.5/10