‘Rick and Morty’: Dan Harmon Isn’t Ruling Out Longer Seasons or a ‘Game of Thrones’ Homage
Zack Sharf
“Rick and Morty” finishes its acclaimed third season this Sunday, and if you feel like it was only yesterday the show was returning for a new batch of episodes after a two-year hiatus, you’re certainly not alone. The first three seasons of the Adult Swim favorite have all maxed out at 10 episodes, which is hardly ever enough. Just when you’re obsessed with the show all over again, you find out there’s only one episode left and you’re forced to say goodbye.
Fortunately, co-creator Dan Harmon isn’t ruling out a future where “Rick and Morty” seasons run longer than the traditional 10 episodes. Harmon and Justin Roiland originally planned to extend Season 3 to include more episodes, but their obsessive nature led to such a delay in production that they ended up going with the standard 10 so the series could return to Adult Swim after such a long break. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Harmon explains that a 14-episode season is definitely a possibility if he’s willing to learn from his production mistakes.
“I’m still learning how to do the show efficiently while catering to the perfectionist in all of us,” Harmon said. “I would like to think I’ve learned enough from my mistakes in season 3 that we could definitely do 14 now, but then I have to say, ‘Yeah but you’re the guy who says we can do 14 who turned out to be wrong so we’re not listening to you now.'”
Harmon has gone on record saying he’d like for “Rick and Morty” to continue for a long time, and so he’s already looking towards Season 4. Will next season finally be the 14-episode season fans have been waiting for? Harmon isn’t confirming or denying, but he is going to start with the usual 10 first and then see if he’s got more episodes in him.
“The nice healthy way to approach this is I want to prove it with the first 10 of season 4 — prove it to ourselves, to production, to the network — that it’s so easy that we’ll earn additional episodes,” he said. “Because I never got this far [working on NBC’s] ‘Community.’ I fell apart in season 3 of ‘Community’ and got fired in season 4. Now I’m about to do season 4 of ‘Rick and Morty’ and want to prove that I’ve grown.”
Entertainment Weekly also asked Harmon about the show’s possible future with “Game of Thrones.” “Thrones” showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss are outspoken “Rick and Morty,” and Harmon is just as obsessed with “Game of Thrones.” Benioff and Weiss directed an episode of their other favorite show, “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia,” so would Harmon be open to working with them on a “Rick and Morty” episode? The answer is “yes,” which means two massive fandoms could collide in the future.
“It would be fun,” Harmon says about the possibility. “What leaps to mind is doing another Citadel episode or some dimension where there are factions of people that pays homage to that [‘Game of Thrones’] style in 22 minutes while getting laughs — ‘what we truly love about serialized epic dramas spanning multiple continents.’ It would be cool to work with those guys, I love those guys, they’ve been so cool to our show in every interview, and I’ve been watching their show obsessively for seven years.”
The “Rick and Morty” Season 3 finale airs this Sunday at 11:30pm ET on Adult Swim. Let’s hope we don’t have to wait another two years for Season 4.
