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Fans of geek culture love to see worlds colliding when their favorite genres and/or properties find ways to crossover or reference one another. Well, today we have a bit of a thrill to offer geeks everywhere: Rick and Morty is officially part of Marvel Universe! That confirmation comes with the release of this week's latest X-Men chapter in the "Dawn of X" reboot line, Marauders #6. That book (following Kitty "Katherine" Pryde's team of globe-trotting mutant pirates) comes with a signature Jonathan Hickman-style chart (a staple of the Dawn of X line), and it's within that chart that Rick and Morty is referenced as an active TV program within the Marvel Universe!

Warning: SPOILERS for Marvel's Marauders #6 Follow!

Marauders #6 helps bring the series' first arc around to a close, as Katherine and her Marauder ship crew (Storm, Bishop, Iceman, Pyro, Lockheed the Dragon) try to fight off an ambush by cyborg mutant-hating aristocrat Donald Pierce, and his two enforcers X-Cutioner and Hate-Monger. That pirate battle between vessels on the high sea ends with the Marauder crew winning the day - or so they think.

As it turns out, the entire Pierce ambush was a scheme filled with double and triple-crosses. Sebastian Shaw is revealed to have been the mastermind to orchestrating the conflict, as a way of assassinating Kitty (which he seemingly does); however, Pierce had a scheme of his own. X-Cutioner stabs Pyro with his staff at one point - but it turns out that the staff is actually an injection tool meant to launch a microscopic spy: Yellowjacket. As the issue ends, Yellowjacket is piloting a ship Fantastic Voyage-style through Pyro's body, where he will infiltrate the mutant island nation of Krakoa and gather valuable intel for Hellfire Academy.

Included near the end of Marauders #6 is a chart that acts as Yellowjacket's report from inside Pyro. That's where Rick and Morty gets a chance to shine in the Marvel Universe:

"What the hell kind of warship is this?" Yellowjacket writes, after seeing some of the weird/mundane behavior of the Marauder crew. "Well, Pyro made himself a couple of Long Island iced teas and now he's in the yacht's movie theater watching Rick and Morty."

So there you have it, Rick and Morty are part of the Marvel Unvierse!

Now... you know that when Rick and Morty creators Justin Roiland and Dan Harmon catch wind of this they're going to have some fun with it. In fact, Rick and Morty has definitely mocked the Marvel Universe several times - the most obvious case being season 3's "Vindicators 3" episode, which was a clear and brutal spoof of the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise and model. It remains to be seen if actually being included by Marvel makes Rick and Morty kinder or more savage in its mockery.

Marauders is now sale. Rick and Morty season 4 resumes some time in 2020.