fA quick warning for today's video — Rick and Morty gets dark.
Alright, so let's talk about Rick and Morty.
I love this cartoon, it is wildly popular and
one of the super interesting aspects of the show
is that its title character, Rick Sanchez, is beloved by fans
despite being an apathetic horribly flawed criminal.
Oh, man. You know, I-I-I don't want to shoot nobody.
They're just robots, Morty. It's okay to shoot them; they're robots.
[Screams in pain]
Glenn's bleeding to death. Someone call his wife and children.
They're not robots, Rick.
It's a figure of speech, Morty. They're bureaucrats. I don't respect them.
Yet the majority of viewers root for him more than any other character.
Today, we're going to go over why exactly that is using some of my favorite clips from the show
and also a few things you can apply to your own life to be as magnetic and well-respected as Rick
without all the terrible stuff mixed in.
Before we get into why we ultimately love Rick, let's do a quick rundown of just a few of his more obvious flaws.
He berates anyone and everyone around him.
He is selfish to the point where he will trick people into life-threatening situations
just to get him drugs and he will even create an entire universe
of life forms just to enslave them into powering his car battery.
Did you create my universe? Is my universe a miniverse?
Microverse.
So he made a universe and that guy's from that universe
and that guy created a universe and that's the universe where I was born?
Old lady science. You know, she's-she's a real... you gotta hang on tight, you know,
because she-she-she box pretty hard. Ooh, boy... wha? Oh my god, no!
So why do people love him enough to want to wear him, quote him, and even be him?
And what can we learn from that that applies to our real non-cartoon world?
The most obvious reason we respect Rick is because we admire his abilities.
Well, let me check my list of powers and weaknesses —
ability to do anything but only whenever I want. Yeah, it sounds like a job for me.
It's not so different from the same way we idolized athletes
for being really, really good at putting a ball into a certain-sized net.
It's human nature to appreciate excellence in almost anything.
Sometimes, that alone is enough for us to forgive someone for being an a**.
But Rick pairs his excellence with another incorrigible trait — he makes us laugh.
I just wanted to say goodbye to the kids.
Cool, just stay in the driveway. The killbots are live and I took you off the whitelist.
We all have that friend that gets away with saying things that
no one else could get away with simply because he or she makes us laugh.
You can even see it in flirting.
When a guy says something that, with the wrong delivery, should result him getting slapped, he instead gets a laugh.
You're throwing me; I love that you're throwing me.
If you... like I said, a few stiffy but probably, if you sit down on my knee and see if it can't get you pregnant.
[Bursts out laughing]
If you're interested in more examples of that, I'll link to our breakdown of Russell Brand and Craig Ferguson at the end of this video.
Rick Sanchez also has an incredible ability to call it like he sees it
without censoring himself for fear of other people's opinions.
Gary, it's your house. Whatever you say, it is is how it is but I think a blind man can see that Beth is looking for the door.
I barely have a reason to care and even I notice.
Now, definitely don't do it as rudely as Rick but
saying what you believe even when it puts you at risk of
being at odds with someone else is actually something that most people really admire.
It's a signal of strength and confidence
and it lets people know that they can trust you to be honest even when it isn't easy.
I have an anecdote here that is so cliche I almost hesitate to share it but it's too perfect not to.
When I was in school, there was a gorgeous girl named Samantha.
She was super popular and also super rude to a lot of the other women in our school.
One day, she was being a jerk to my friend, Tanya, when my friend, Brandon, finally had had enough.
He stood up and, in front of about 20 people, said something along the lines of,
"Samantha, I don't care how cool you are. Tanya's my friend and I won't let you talk to her like that so just shut up and talk to your own friends.
Samantha could have basically had any guy in school and guess who she wanted more than any of them. Brandon.
Because he was the one person who stood up to her
and told her what he thought without fear of what she might say.
Oh, my god. Morty, you look really nice tonight.
Wow, thanks.
I love you, Morty. I love you so much it burns.
Now our love for Rick goes way beyond this and there's something
that famous psychiatrist Carl Jung called The Shadow that contributes to it.
The Shadow is the dark side of human emotion
that most of us try to repress and deny even exists.
Things like lust, hunger for power, selfishness, greed, envy, anger...
emotions dating back to our animal ancestors that we all have inside of us
and, for the most part, we try to deny.
So what the heck does this have to do with Rick and Morty?
Well, because for the most part, we don't act on them yet they're in there.
There is a perverse joy in watching someone else who does act on them so unabashedly like Rick's.
Yes.
Wait. Wait, stop. Hold it. Not like this.
We need a hang glider and a crotchless Uncle Sam costume
and I want the entire field of your largest stadium covered end to end
with naked redheads and I want the stands packed with every man that remotely resembles my father.
We're bored. Take us back to Rick.
Now's not a good time.
Oh, yeah! I want yoooooooooooooouuu!
Go, Sam, go! Go, Sam, go! Go, Sam, go!
This is an especially good way to work out your Shadow urges because there are no consequences.
Because Ric is a cartoon character, he allows us as viewers to
guiltlessly live through him as he unapologetically pursues his darker impulses.
This is actually super important because we do in fact have these quote-unquote
negative emotions and if you repress them, they just get stronger.
So the best solution is find a healthy outlet for them that doesn't hurt anyone else.
This can be getting your aggression out in the gym, satiating your megalomania with a video game
or a board game about world domination, BDSM, or watching Rick and Morty.
I also have to mention Rick can be absolutely brutal to his family
but when everything is on the line he does take action to protect them
and this is especially important in your longer term relationships
because your actions start to matter a lot more than your words.
People want to know that they can count on you when the chips are down.
So yes, he's a dick. Even with his own life on the line, he'll take the time to do this —
Morty, sit here. Summer, you sit here.
Now, listen. I know the two of you are very different from each other in a lot of ways but you have to understand.
As far as grandpa's concerned, you're both pieces of s***.
Yeah. I can prove it mathematically.
Actually, l-let me grab my whiteboard. This has been a long time coming anyway.
And yet, minutes later, he'll do this.
Rick!
Morty, where's your collar? I'll fix it.
I dropped it.
What the f***! What have you done to me, Morty?
I'm okay with this. Be good, Morty. Be better than me.
We can all identify with that — with not always liking someone but still loving them
because of who they are even with their flaws and that's also why we love Rick.
We don't love him for his good traits in spite of his flaws;
we love him specifically because he is a mix of virtues and vices.
And the same applies for you. We often think that if we want people to like us, we have to pretend to be perfect.
In reality, being honest about your imperfections and sharing openly about what you're struggling with
can be one of the best ways to connect with other people
because no matter who they are, they're dealing with their own demons too.
And that sums up the main reasons I believe we love Rick Sanchez so much
and thank you so much for watching.
If you like this video, share it because if we get enough views on this,
we're gonna do more videos on Rick & Morty similar to the Game of Thrones series that we did.
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Cheers and hopefully I will see you in the next video.