Rick and Morty

What’s it about?

The fractured domestic lives of a nihilistic mad scientist and his anxious grandson are further complicated by their inter-dimensional misadventures

The facts

• Created by Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland
• Starring Justin Roiland (Rick and Morty), Chris Parnell (Jerry), Spencer Grammer (Summer), and Sarah Chalke (Beth)
• English and French languages
• 10 episodes, 21 minutes each (on average)

Why did it get this rating?

This series was self-rated by Neon. You can find out more about self-rating by streaming providers here.

Violence

This show contains violent sequences where countless characters are killed in over the top and excessively bloody ways. It is in the style of a 2D cartoon, which can soften the impact of some of the violence.

A man goes to war, we see his comrades dead on the frontlines with bloody wounds, where he finds out he is in a matrix and cannot die, resulting in various brief scenes of him dying in horrific ways. One brief shot shows him lying in a mass grave on top of hundreds of bloody bodies, and in another he is beaten by three enemies till his blood fills the screen. One man steps of a landmine and blows up, with his detached head and foot shown with flesh hanging from them.

A woman uses a high-tech device to turn invisible and murder three fly-like alien guards, snapping their necks and limbs, which causes blue blood to ooze out.

One man-like alien is impaled through the chest by a large rhino-like horn, but he keeps talking as though he is fine and it occurs in a humorous way.

There is a prison fight where characters punch each other and one man stabs a main character in the side of the stomach twice with a homemade knife, with blood spraying out, but he turns out to be fine.

Adult themes

Two teenagers wake up in medical chairs to find out they were in a 17-year-long simulation created by their grandfather to teach them not to steal his phone charger.

A woman describes something as a “hot curling iron going slowly up your a*shole.”

Cruelty

Numerous Rick doppelgangers raid a town full of Morty doppelgangers, kidnapping them all, keeping them in cages, and using them as scientific guinea pigs.

Offensive language

This film contains the use of offensive language, with words like “f**k,” “b*tches,” and “a*s.”

When content stays with you: 

We all have our boundaries, and it’s completely okay if something you’ve watched is weighing on your mind. If certain content lingers with you, consider having a chat with friends or whānau to debrief about what you’ve just seen. But if you’re still feeling affected, please reach out to any of the following helplines for support.  

• 1737
• Safe to talk
• Lifeline
• Youthline

Further information

• Why are ratings and content warnings important for me and my whānau?
• Brain development – how it works, why it matters