Last night, the third episode of the third season of Rick and Morty aired on Adult Swim. There was a lot of hype surrounding this episode, for the main reason of we would get to see a legenedary scientist and noted alcoholic Rick Sanchez become a pickle. However, as is often the case, there was a lot more to this episode than just some briny brilliance. So, because so many of you liked the fact that we reviewed the last episode, I decided once again to wake up early and write a cheeky review of Pickle Rick, and as long as you folks keep reading them, I will keep writing them. Since people pointed this out last time, this review will contain very minor plot spoilers, nothing major, but if you want to go in totally blind, then come back later.

So last episode I took issue with the excessive amount of character development that featured in the episode, I was hoping that with a plot as irreverent as this one, that wouldn’t be an issue, but somehow Dan Harmon surprised me. If you go into this episode expecting it to be totally lighthearted fun and jokes, you’d be wrong. However, it is worlds apart from Rickmancing the Stone in that there is actually a lot of fun to be had with the Pickle Rick plot, and it stands as its own thing, not clouded by the dark and serious plot of the slow breakdown of the Smith family dynamic.

That leads me to the next point, the subplot of the episode. It revolves around Beth, Summer and Morty visiting a family therapist, voiced in wonderful monotony by Susan Sarandon. This subplot feels almost tacked on, despite being objectively as funny as the main plot, it just felt out of place until near the end of the episode. But there was never any shying away from the point of the episode, Rick is a Pickle. And if you were just here for pickle action, you would get it, in swathes.

This episode is gory as hell, and it works. Seeing Pickle Rick slashing through hordes of rats is as utterly gross as it is hilarious, seeing him escape Russian mobsters using the power of elaborate traps that I would call particularly RickEsque (a word I just invented). Overall though, the episode becomes paradoxical. It has the character development that I loathed in Rickmancing the Stone, but it just feels more integrated here, it works better in this sort of comedy.

The last episode it felt like the character development came first, then they tried to write an episode around it, however here, it feels like the humour came first, they wrote this utterly insane plot, then found a way to make an excuse to further the development of the relationships between these characters. Now, ideally this show would have more episodes that are just totally and utterly mad, but if they keep following this path of becoming a dramatic character study, it had better be done more like Pickle Rick, otherwise, this show is heading down the wrong path.

Overall I enjoyed this episode so much more than the last, it felt like it fixed the issues raised by the last episode, despite the impossibilities of such a thing. Overall, despite some flaws, it felt like a solid Rick and Morty episode, and if you just take it as that, not a masterpiece of TV, but a strange animated series that does whatever the hell it wants, then you’ll have a much better time. Don’t lower your expectations, but keep in mind the realities of what you should be expecting.

I hope you enjoyed hearing my thoughts on the show, if you disagree with me, yell at me in the comments below or on Twitter @G33kP0p. Over on our sister site, I wrote an article explaining why I think Rick and Morty essentially dupes its audience with jokes that target millennials and aren’t actually funny, but that’s a topic too… controversial for this site, so you can check it out in all it’s 2000 word glory over here. Thanks again for reading, hopefully, I will review episode 4 next week, but until then keep it G33k!