Review: Rick and Morty, "Analyze Piss" | Season 6, Episode 8
Death of a Pissmaster
One of my favorite tropes is when a show or movie or whatever takes an absurd character seriously. Not seriously in the “sad cover of an upbeat song for a movie trailer” kind of way; “seriously” in the sense that the an absurd premise is taken to its logical conclusion, as something that could actually exist in the real world with its own history and context and nuance. It’s a way of making funnier jokes and creating this weird sympathetic vibe in the audience; I wrote a piece ages ago about “cynical sincerity” in shows like Rick And Morty and BoJack Horseman, and Pissmaster, the emotional lynchpin of “Analyze Piss,” is about as pure example as you can get. Because, you see, he’s a failure, a divorced dad trying desperate to make a name for himself, to prove that his whole life wasn’t just some big mistake, to make his daughter proud. He also wears a suit that lets him wield the power of piss to achieve his goals. Is it his own piss? The question never comes up. Or ma…