Fun
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Curious
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We finally got what fascist Morty always wanted: a classic Rick and Morty adventure. Rick and Morty Season 4, Episode 3 sees Rick face off against one of his biggest pet peeves in the multiverse: confusing and pointless heist plots. And between Elon Tusk’s appearance and David Lynch jokes, “One Crew Over the Crewcoo’s Morty” is one of the silliest episodes around.
Rick and Morty (both voiced by Justin Roiland) find themselves at Hesitcon, a convention completely dedicated to heists and heist movies. As Rick proved in “Vindicators 3,” he hates anything involving teamwork and extra steps. So naturally Rick hates everything about this pastime. But when Rick builds the perfect heist-running robot to prove that heists are dumb, he loses control of it. The only way to stop Heistron from destroying the universe through ill-advised plans is to recruit a perfect team for one big, secretive mission. Basically to pull a heist.
It’s all very meta and delightfully dumb. But hidden within all of those double crossings and terrible one-liners are some great Easter eggs. Wondering what you may have missed in this week’s episode? We have you covered. Here’s your guide to Rick and Morty Season 4, Episode 3. And if that’s not enough secrets for you, here’s your guide to Episode 2 and Episode 1.
Yep, Elon Musk really did voice Elon Tusk.
During Rick’s second heist he has to get another crew together. And there’s only one person who’s random enough for the job: Elon Tusk. Get it? It’s Elon Musk with a pair of tusks.
Minecraft jabs and snide comments aside, Elon Tusk was actually voiced by the real CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, Elon Musk. That means he read a Rick and Morty script that featured Justin Roiland repeatedly insulting him to his face, and Musk still signed on.
Rick isn't a fan of David Lynch.
To fight his own heist robot, Rick decides to create a robot that excels in creating randomness to throw Heistron off it’s game. And according to Rick, Randomtron is based off of three David Lynch movies Rick pretended to like to get his friends to shut up. It’s hard to tell which “hastily contrived bullshit” Rick is drawing from, but those vignettes had a bit of a Mulholland Drive feel.
What’s interesting about this joke is that Rick and Morty co-creator Dan Harmon and Twin Peaks creator David Lynch share a showrunner connection. Both are often listed as examples of how great shows struggle to continue without their showrunners. In Harmon’s case, he was fired from Community after Season 3, which led to the worst season of the series before Harmon was re-hired for Season 5. Conversely Lynch left Twin Peaks to film Wild at Heart, and most critics agree that the series suffered without his hands on direction.
Claudia Black and Pamela Adlon both made appearances this episode.
Elon Musk wasn’t the only celebrity cameo this episode. Rick and Morty alums Pamela Adlon and Claudia Black returned to voice two of the dangerous ladies in this episode’s many, many heists.
After voicing Vermigurber’s child last episode, Adlon returned to voice Angie Flynt, an ex-con with fake hands and a lot of swagger. Also Claudia Black, the voice of Ma-Sha in “Raising Gazorpazorp,” played the archery-loving Ventriloquiver. Adlon is best known for voicing King of the Hill’s Bobby Hill as well as creating, directing, and starring in the critically acclaimed Better Things. Black is best known for her work in the Farscape franchise as well as for voicing Sheryl Goodspeed in Final Space.
Dan Harmon REALLY hates bad heist movies.
Clearly “One Crew Over The Crewcoo’s Morty” is one big middle fingers to heist movies. But it really doesn’t capture just how much co-creator Dan Harmon dislikes the heist genre. Back in 2017 Harmon went on a 12-minute rant about Now You See Me 2 on his podcast Harmontown. If you’re wondering where Rick’s intense hatred of heists comes from, check it out.
Morty's screenplay is worse than you think.
Obviously any screenplay created by Morty would be lacking. But if you actually pause the series to read his script, it’s really, extraordinarily bad. Not only is there a murder fakeout where the killer emerges almost immediately, but a character fakes their death using cake. We don’t know if that’s a Hunger Games or Portal jab, but either way it’s stupid. And Netflix loves it.
