‘Rick and Morty’ Season 3: 2017 Release Date, Political Correctness, And The Latest Rumors

Rick and Morty is one of the most surprising hits of the last two years. Premiering on Adult Swim back in December 2013, the quirky, improv-filled, sci-fi animated comedy series quickly gained a massive following. Over the course of its last two seasons, the series has managed to gain rave reviews from both casual viewers and critics alike, earning, among others, a 100 percent rating on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes. As much as the last season left fans with a cliffhanger, though, the question on most fans’ mind is the final release date of Rick and Morty Season 3.

The release date of the series’ third season has been the subject of numerous rumors and speculations since the year started. This was due to the very words of Dan Harmon, one of the animated black comedy’s creators, back in January. During a panel at Magic City Comic-Con, Harmon gave the series’ fans two notable tidbits of information. One, the producers of the show are aiming for a late 2016 release date and two, Rick and Morty Season 3 would be longer than the last two seasons, running for 14 episodes instead of the usual ten.

Harmon’s announcement has unsurprisingly set the Rick and Morty community on fire, with numerous fans speculating that the series would indeed start airing before 2017 hits. This, however, was largely in conflict with the very first teaser for Rick and Morty Season 3’s release date. During the post-credits scene of the Season 2’s last episode, one of the series’ characters, Mr. Poopy Butthole, broke the fourth wall and encouraged fans to tune in “a year and a half longer” in order to find out what happens next in the story. Considering that Rick and Morty Season 2 ended its run on October 2015, the post-credits Season 3 teaser appeared to point to a March 2017 release date.

Though no official word has been released, speculations are high that most of the writing for Season 3 has already been finished. Last September 28 alone, a number of Rick and Morty writers confirmed that the third season’s episodes have already been done and are pending review by the series’ animation studio. If these rumors do prove true, then it would not be very long before Rick and Morty Season 3 makes its highly-anticipated comeback to Adult Swim.

However, a certain announcement by Harmon has managed to get avid fans of the series quite apprehensive. In an interview with Den of Geek, Dan Harmon stated that the series’ writing room has become a lot more diverse after professional female writers noted that there were very few women working on the critically-acclaimed animated sitcom.

“We hired a bunch of new writers. There was a craving for a gender balance in the writers’ room that we had never had, but I’m also very proud of the fact that we didn’t compromise ourselves following that craving. We just looked harder and I don’t know if it was coincidence or because the show was popping up on the radar of a lot of great female writers noticing, ‘Well, they don’t have any women writers in there. I’m gonna submit something.’ It was probably a combination of all those factors.”

best part of rick and morty pic.twitter.com/ziMY99KABM

— nK (@NoahKimmelLive) November 30, 2016

While the gender of the new writers is most definitely a non-issue, the producers’ decision to hire more female writers partly due to pressure has managed to trigger a lot of concern from fans. Many who voiced their concerns stated that the pressure for diversity could lead towards pressure for the animated series to become politically correct. Rick and Morty has so far not cared much about political correctness and other societal conventions. In fact, numerous fans have noted that this very thing is what made the last two seasons nothing short of brilliant.

Considering how hands-on Dan Harmon and Justin Rolland are with their little sci-fi black comedy masterpiece, however, the chances of the series bucking under pressure and becoming a shadow of itself due to political correctness are rather slim. After all, Rick and Morty became a surprise hit for a very good reason. With the release date of the series most likely set for March 2017, fans of the show might not need to wait very long to see the acclaimed sitcom back on TV. If the last two seasons were any indication, the long wait for Rick and Morty Season 3 would most likely be worth it.

[Featured Image by Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images]