Rick and Morty showed new footage from Season 3 to a rabid Comic-Con crowd today. Fans of the show rushed to the panel for a chance to sit down with creator Dan Harmon and crew. Many were turned away after seats instantly filled up, and everyone who managed to stay was thrilled to be there. Justin Roiland busted out his Rick and Morty voices left and right, and co-creator Ryan Ridley sat alongside for the whole ride. Chris Parnell, Spencer Grammer, and Sarah Chalke joined the panel as well, and each of them were greeted with roaring cheers as they took the stage.
Season 3 of the show is happening. The Rick and Morty crew are currently developing new episodes, and today fans got to see a glimpse of what’s to come. After massive crowd reactions and huge laughs as the cast and creators riffed and cracked jokes, the first official screening of a Season 3 animatic debuted. Dan Harmon, Justin Roiland, and Ryan Ridley set up the premise as everyone in the room locked in. Each of them took turns giving context to the clip and the laughter and cheers were uproarious.
Rick turns himself into a pickle. That’s as much as we know from what was said in front of the crowd. After our favorite mad scientist grandpa becomes an actual pickle, apparently a series of unfortunate events leads him to wind up in the sewers. Rick is completely immobile except for his tongue, and the animated storyboards that show his face on the gherkin are hilarious and absurd. Pickle Rick then finds a way to mobilize himself using cockroach parts before fighting a hoard of vicious sewer rats.
If this all sounds completely absurd and off the rails, it’s because it totally is. The premise for this episode came from a road trip where the creators asked themselves, “What if we did this?” As you would imagine, they did it. The hilarity of the clip got the entire crowd fired up, but the kicker came when Pickle Rick attaches rat parts to his pickle body and becomes a lethal killing machine. The scene plays out like the hallway scene from Oldboy meets The Raid and it is glorious. The dispatching of the attacking rat horde is inventive and hilariously excessive, and it will definitely be worth waiting for when Season 3 finally arrives on Adult Swim.
The creators and cast fielded plenty of questions throughout the panel and kept things light and fun through the whole thing. Fans got to ask about everything from fringe side projects to how Justin Roiland took the Interdimensional Cable 2 episode completely off the rails during production. Dan Harmon mentioned that Bryan Cranston threw his hat into the ring for the voice of Jerry, and Chris Parnell cracked jokes about how he would like Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson to play the role in a live-action version. There was plenty of fun to be had by all, and fans wrapped the room right as soon as the floor opened up for the audience Q&A.
Justin Roiland talked about the new Rick and Morty Simulator and talked at length about how much he loved VR. He also answered a fan by saying that everything in Pocket Mortys is canon which got a great reaction from the crowd. Questions about why Rick is so terrified of the planet where everything is a cob were asked, and a cosplayer dressed as Mr. Poopybutthole asked got a huge laugh by asking Sarah Chalke, “Beth, why did you shoot me.” It was a blast for everyone involved and thanks to one savvy fan we can now say that Interdimensional Cable 3 may actually happen. At least we know that more is on the way, but until then we’ll just have to play with our plumbuses.
