Rick & Morty Season 5 Creates A New Pickle Rick

Season 5 has forged plenty of new ground for Adult Swim’s Rick and Morty, and it’s even created a new version of the famous “Pickle Rick.” Episode 6, entitled “Rick & Morty’s Thanksploitation Spectacular,” recently dropped, with one of the most surreal plots yet. The July-premiering Thanksgiving special opens with Rick invoking the U.S. government’s wrath after accidentally harming the Consitution, multiple national monuments, and even awakening an assassin within the Statue of Liberty.

In classic Rick fashion, he crafts a far-fetched scheme where he and Morty turn themselves into turkeys. His idea is to use their time as undercover fowl to underhandedly secure a Thanksgiving pardon from the president. Naturally, things go awry, and this causes the two titular characters to actually team up with the president in order to save the country from the leader’s half-turkey clone and his gobbling army. Even by Rick and Morty standards, season 5, episode 6 is an absolute fever dream of absurd fun and another high-quality mini-misadventure.

But an additional component of what makes “Rick & Morty’s Thanksploitation Spectacular” so intriguingly entertaining is that it harkens back to season 3, episode 3, “Pickle Rick.” The 2017 installment has become a fan favorite, following Rick’s adventures after turning himself into — of all things — a pickle in order to get out of family therapy. Transforming himself into the random food item is certainly on-par with the ridiculousness of taking on a turkey form; they’re both some of his most interesting transformations yet. And just as he had to fight sewer rats in “Pickle Rick,” he, Morty, and the president take on their own animal foes in episode 6.

In addition to those parallels with “Pickle Rick,” Rick and Morty‘s turkey shenanigans are yet another example of how far Rick is willing to go in order to avoid his problems in lieu of dealing with them. He’s a professional at recklessly creating his own misery as a byproduct of pursuing a life of mad science-infused adventure. And though it’s proven harmful for him and his family, owning that and aiming to fix some of the damage would, at least, make things a little better. But, instead, Rick will always take any possible avenue to avoid the issues he’s had a role in or sneakily try to clean them up using convoluted schemes that only further complicate things. In “Pickle Rick,” he didn’t want to work on repairing his strained familial relationships in therapy, so he turned himself into a talking pickle. In “Rick & Morty’s Thanksploitation Spectacular,” Rick transforms himself into a turkey as a way to avoid repercussions for his accidental, yet very serious, federal crimes.

Additionally, Rick and the president have a history in Rick and Morty that neither of them appear able to acknowledge or deal with. Surely, Rick could work out some kind of deal with the government — perhaps using his scientific skills and knowledge to serve the country and repay some of his debt. But Rick always takes the route that seems easier, in the sense that it doesn’t directly deal with what’s gone wrong. Instead, he always prefers — whether consciously or unconsciously (most likely the latter) — a path that seems less time-consuming, vulnerable, or boring. Unfortunately for him and his family, the route that seems simpler at the beginning of a Rick and Morty episode usually makes things ten times more complicated and stressful in the long run.

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Lindsey DeRoche
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Lindsey DeRoche is a TV and movie features writer for Screen Rant. She received a BA in English, with a concentration in writing, from Plymouth State University in 2018. She’s had a passion for reading, writing, TV, and movies since her early years.

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