Taking on Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones, “Claw and Hoarder: Special Ricktim’s Morty” is a fun crossover into fantasy sci-fi. It’s one of the classic Rick and Morty adventures where you ask yourself, “What just happened? Did we learn anything?” and the answer is: A dragon soul orgy and no we absolutely didn’t learn anything. So, let’s break down this episode! *Obviously there’s spoilers, duh.*
Synopsis
At the tail-end of an adventure for a ‘purple cube’, Rick and Morty are making a grand escape from some distant planet. On the way home, Morty reminds Rick that he was promised a dragon (to which Rick says, “Pfft. Lame. Dragons suck.”). But after Morty persists, Rick sprays a sleeping agent into the air, but accidentally knocks himself out as well. Their ship crashes in Malta, but we find them in the hospital, totally fine. Beth is there when Rick wakes up, and proceeds to ask “Dad, did you promise Morty a dragon?” and then we cut to credits. Next thing we know, Morty is signing a soul bond from a wizard to own this dragon, Balthromaw. Summer declares it her “first gay wedding”. Much to Balthromaw’s boredom and hassle, he takes Morty flying through the sky. Later on, when Balthromaw is sleeping in his lair below the yard, he snores fire and hits the house; to which Rick says, “That’s the end of the Morty-Gets-A-Dragon-Episode”. Rick tricks the dragon with an AI robot clone, and ultimately gets Balthromaw to swallow a grenade (to which he has the remote control). But after discovering all the cool stuff in Balthromaw’s lair, the two eventually make nice and Balthromaw offers to hang out with Rick. They get drunk and high, and get into some zoo-related debauchery. Morty then summons Balthrowmaw, but he ignores the summons and Rick advises him to do what he does when Morty bothers him, “Send back a random GIF”.
Meanwhile, Jerry has found a talking cat in his room (played by Matthew Broderick). When Jerry asks why the cat can talk, the cat dodges the question. Eventually, the cat convinces Jerry to get them two first-class tickets to Florida. The next we see of them, they’re playing beach volleyball in Florida, having attracted a small crowd. One of the volleyball guys, Jafe (Yes that’s really his name, like Jake but with an F.), suggests that Jerry come to his yacht party later, and bring his talking cat. Moments later, a woman steps in a small pile of poop in the sand, declaring it “looks like someone tried to cover it up with two little kicks”. The talking cat immediately blames Jerry, and they all start heckling him. The cat, later on, goes to the yacht party, but finds that no one really wants to talk to him. After asking too many questions, he gets thrown off the boat and into the water. He swims to shore, only to find Jerry sitting there alone. The two reconcile, at least a little, and the cat asks if Jerry can take him home.
While having a deep chat at the banks of a lake, Balthromaw and Rick get into an intense ‘soul bond’ (which is basically sex). Summer and Morty pull up on them, catching them in the act. Morty rips up his soul bond contract from the wizard, who appears and says, “No refunds!”. But after hearing that Balthromaw soul-bonded with Rick, the wizard whips Balthromaw and takes him through a portal back to his home world. Rick tries to stop them, saying to give Morty back the dragon, but they ultimately have to go into the portal and get Balthromaw. In the magic realm, they find out that all dragons are slaves to the wizard, and meet a small group of dragons in an underground sex cave who’ve escaped the wizard. They have to find Balthromaw before he is put to death, because since they’ve soul-bonded, Rick will die too. Using some magic (which Rick thinks is so tacky), they rescue Balthromaw and retreat to the sex cave. With the help of the other escaped dragons, they perform a ‘soul orgy’ and turn into the ‘All-Slut Phoenix Dragon’. They take down the wizard, and dragons now have their freedom back. Rick opens a portal back home, and jumps through it with Summer and Morty. Balthromaw comes too, asking if he could have one last ‘hand-bond’. To which Morty declines, and Balthromaw is gone. Rick sees his texts from Jerry, and goes to rescue him, eventually getting rid of the talking cat.
Review
This episode had a lot of meta-humor, which is trademark Rick and Morty. It had a healthy amount of fourth-wall breaks, and delivered on what they fans had been begging for over the years; a fantasy, GoT, LotR crossover. This episode peels back another layer of Rick, showing him getting emotionally intimate with someone. It also shows how much he takes Morty for granted (i.e. sending back random GIFs when Morty wants to spend time with him, in order to dodge Morty). We also get a really fun Summer-Morty team-up, and a solo Jerry story (which I never thought I’d say). Not only that, but the Jerry storyline has emotional substance, and shows just how willing Jerry is for acceptance, wherever it might come from.
Score: 7/10
While this was a pretty good episode, it doesn’t stand out as one of the greats of Season 4. They really cram a lot into the half-hour format, and it shows in the speedy pacing. The conclusion of the episode also left a bit to be desired, as it seems nothing was made different and no one’s character shifted due to the preceding events; which seems like what the show runners wanted us to take away. Overall, it’s a super solid episode, just not one that stands out in the collection of gems that is Season 4.
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