Recap / Rick and Morty S2 E1: "A Rickle in Time"

Season 2, Episode 1:

A Rickle In Time

3D glasses not required.

Written by: Matt Roller
Directed by: Wes Archer

"Our time is fractured. You two somehow created a feedback look of uncertainty that split our reality into two equally possible impossibilities. W-we're exactly like a man capable of sustaining a platonic friendship with an attractive female co-worker. We're entirely hypothetical."

— Rick Sanchez

Original air date: 7/26/2015

Having restarted time, Rick, Morty and Summer are in a quantum-uncertain state of existence. An argument leads to the creation of two alternate timelines, which need to be stitched back together fast if they are to escape quantum collapse. In the subplot, Beth and Jerry go out for ice cream and accidentally hit a deer. Beth tries her best to save the deer despite opposition from a hunter that claims to have shot the deer before they hit it thus claiming ownership of the deer and the lack of support from her husband.

---

This episode contains examples of:

• As You Know: Morty tells Summer that he knows how to vacuum his parents because he's been doing it for six months.
• Beat Them at Their Own Game: A minor example but it's one of the few instances where someone knows more than Rick and not only talks down to him but also has a solution to the problem that he made. After fracturing time twice, a fourth-dimensional being shows up to fix things. Not only does he have a way to fix the time breaks that is simple and straightforward, he even calls Rick a dumb-ass for the obvious paradox of Rick's attempted solution. If the alien wasn't part of the Time Police and hadn't tried to bring Rick, Summer, and Morty in, the episode would have ended after about 5 minutes.
  Fourth-Dimensional Being: Hey! Damn it! Where you trying to use this to...Aww see, you broke time and you thought you could stick it back together with this? How you think you gonna move time while ya standin' in it, ya dumb-ass three-dimensional monkey-ass dummies.
• Blast Out: When the two timelines are no longer in sync, both Ricks come to the assumption that the other is no longer trying to recombine the timelines and is now trying to kill off everyone in the alternate timeline to fix the situation. This causes both of them to affix the time crystal to a gun and a cross-temporal gunfight ensues.
• Brick Joke: The episode opens showing Mr. Benson about to fall off his house's roof. Later, just after restarting time, Morty asks if anyone remembered to put a mattress under him. They didn't. The end of the episode does reveal that he survived though.
• Description Cut: Rick makes the (fairly understandable) assumption that Beth and Jerry are in the middle of a "pointless grounded story about their shitty marriage." Cut to Jerry and Beth in their car enjoying their ice cream and getting along well.
• Deus ex Machina: The missing collar that suddenly comes floating towards Rick. Looks pretty much like divine intervention.
• Do Unto Others Before They Do Unto Us: Both Ricks are very quick to assume the other is out to kill them when their plan to merge fails.
• Face Death with Dignity: Rick, but only if there's no chance of getting out of it.
  Rick: I'm okay with this. Be good, Morty. Be better than me. [sees the remaining collar in the void] Shit, the other collar! I'm not okay with this! I am not okay with this!
• Fantastic Firearms: The time cop Shleemypants wields a living, slug-like gun named Chris that can revert a target into a fetus with a single shot. When Rick destroys it, Shleemypants complains "You killed my gun!".
• Heroic Sacrifice: Tumbling through the quantum void, Rick gives Morty his waveform collar. He's saved, though, when he gets the remaining collar.
• Historical In-Joke:
  • Angry over the beatdown, the testicle monster and his buddy search the timeline for Rick, but they find Albert Einstein thinking it's him. They clobber him, warning him not to mess with time. When they're gone, Einstein vows to he will mess with time and creates the important equation of E = mc².
  • A second variation that involves the future rather than the past (these are fourth-dimensional beings so past, present, and future are all happening at the same time from their perspective) when one of the alien time cops call for backup from another.
  Time Cop: No... No mother f...Earth dude. Yeah, with the dinosaurs. Yeah... No, if you get to the dolphin people, you've gone too far.
• Hypocritical Humor: Every Rick berates the others for resorting to violence, even though they are doing more or less the same thing.
  Rick: (pew pew) "Is this what you want?!" (pew pew)
• Immediate Self-Contradiction: Rick assures Morty he knows how to be decisive enough to fix the time syncing collars before it's too late. Then he makes an indecisive request for a screwdriver to work with, immediately splitting their timelines further.
• Improperly Paranoid: When their first attempt to merge the timelines fail, the two Ricks immediately comes to the conclusion that it must be due to the other Rick having decided on Cutting the Knot and is plotting to merge the timelines by killing them instead. Their mutual attempts at derailing what they think is an incoming murder attempt from each other only makes things worse.
• Ironic Echo: Summer's "dropping the balls" insult to Morty gets turned back on her.
• Look Behind You: Rick pulls this trick on the four-dimensional alien with a mix of Insane Troll Logic.
  Time Cop: I got ambitions, man. Bringing you guys in is my ticket up.
  Rick: What if I told you there's a huge ticket up right behind you?
  Time Cop: You really think I'm that stupid?
  Rick: Okay, now hear me out on this. You're immortal, right? Which means your life is infinite. Well then that means there's a 100% chance that you will eventually do everything, including turning around to look behind you.
  Time Cop: I cannot argue with that. (turns around)
  (Rick proceeds to attack Time Cop)
• Noodle Incident: Rick says he loses a bet if he dies in a cage.
• Oh, Crap!: After resuming time, somehow Jerry ended up with his shirt backwards; the only fishy clue Beth could have used to punish Rick and the kids. However, Jerry stupidly retorts he likes wearing it like that sometimes.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: As things fall apart, one of the Ricks prays to God for mercy in the afterlife.
• Play-Along Prisoner: Rick breaks out of his cage with ease.
• Prayer Is a Last Resort: When death seems imminent, Rick starts praying to God in at least two timelines. He quickly renounces once he is in the clear.
• Prison Rape: "You know what they do to third-dimensional life forms in time prison? Same thing they do in every other prison, only forever!"
• Product Placement: Spoofed; Beth and Jerry visit Coldstone Creamery and at the end, Jerry resolves their subplot by asking them to help him allow Beth to save a Deer's life.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Rick can prove mathematically that Morty and Summer are idiots and goes on to provide said proof in a lecture.
• Self-Restraint: Rick lets himself out of the cage his grandkids locked him inside.
• Sequel Episode: Takes place six months after "Ricksy Business".
• Serious Business: Beth is intent on saving that deer.
  "I WILL REACH INTO HEAVEN AND YANK YOUR SCREAMING DEER SOUL BACK!"
• The Stinger: The Time Cop and his buddy, when searching through time for Rick, mistake Albert Einstein for him and beat him up, warning him not to mess with time. Einstein defiantly states after they leave that he will mess with time, leading him to come up with E = mc².
• Time Skip: A very creative version as the episode opens six months after "Ricksy Business." That is six months after Rick, Morty, and Summer froze time to repair the house after trashing it.
• The Un-Favourite: Subverted. Both Morty and Summer think they're the unfavourite one to Rick and them arguing about it causes the timeline to split into two, but Rick sets the record straight and tells them they're an equal amount of pain in his ass.
  Both Ricks: So in conclusion, you're both equally mercurial, overly sensitive, clingy, hysterical, bird-brained homunculi. And I honestly can't tell the two of you apart half the time because I don't go by height or age, I go by amount of pain in my ass, which makes you both equal.
• Voicemail Confusion: Rick's own voicemail recording invokes this trope by pretending to be him answering.

---

"I'm okay with this. Be good, Morty. Be better than me."