How Rick and Morty Season 5 Episode 10 Sets Up An Ending For The Entire Show

Rick and Morty season 5 sets up a potential ending for the entire of the show – even if it’s one that is in no way likely to happen soon. The adventures of Rick Sanchez and his grandson Morty Smith tend to avoid having large ongoing plots, with only a few episodes over the course of the show’s five seasons having anything close to a linked narrative. What this does mean, however, is that when such episodes occur, they tend to be even more crucial in terms of what information they do dole out – with Rick and Morty‘s season 5 finale being a prime example of this.

Rick and Morty season 5 episode 10 contains a boatload of revelations that either suggest or outright explain answers to long-held questions that viewers have speculated about for several years. The episode provides some explanations to the previously entirely mysterious plans of Evil Morty, explains why the Citadel of Ricks came into existence, and – perhaps most surprisingly – appears to confirm C-137 Rick’s actual backstory. This finale reveal is important not just in terms of fleshing out one of the titular duo, but also in that it does something previously unthinkable: it gives the show a viable endpoint.

Rick’s backstory montage explains that C-137 Rick created the Citadel after trying to hunt down the version of him that killed his wife and child, quickly growing frustrated with his inability to do so. Rick’s increasingly unhinged behavior is linked to this failure to find the murderer – and the fact the montage ends with his showing up at his current Smith family makes it clear he still hasn’t managed to do so. While making Rick and Morty entirely hinge on Rick going on some Taken-style hunt is a bad idea, from a narrative perspective this unfulfilled goal does set up for a good place to end the show when it’s time, by finally letting Rick confront the man who ruined his life.

Rick and Morty does have countless other potential endings, of course – including the very likely scenario in which Rick simply riffs on the initial closing of the first episode, which called for “one hundred years of Rick and Morty“. But letting Rick have some kind of closure would allow for the overarching plot of the show to have some kind of ending point, as well as providing a logical reason for Rick to have some real character growth and pathos before the series concludes.

Of course, Rick and Morty is far from over, and the basis of the wacky adventure premise means it could well continue for countless years without ever truly growing stale. However, it’s also undeniable that some of the series’ best moments come from the genuinely emotional elements of its major ongoing plots and the development these plots put the characters through, and so it’s not a bad idea for the show to set up an ending that uses this to create a fitting conclusion.

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