Rick and Morty season 4 new episodes: How and when to watch

While Rick and Morty has been on hiatus, the actual world has gone almost as nuts as the surreal world of the Adult Swim animated show itself. If only somebody had a Meeseeks in our world, and could ask the little request-fulfilling blue dudes  to cure coronavirus. But it always helps to have something to look forward to in tough times, and at least we can count off the days on a calendar (remember calendars? that big empty thing that used to be full?) until Rick and Morty returns on Sunday, May 3. Here’s what to know.

When and where to watch?

Rick and Morty will return to Comedy Central’s Adult Swim at 11:30 p.m. PT on May 3. Call this a midseason break: Five episodes of season 4 have already aired, with five unseen shows yet to come. 

Don’t have Comedy Central? Rick and Morty episodes also stream on Hulu + Live TV. And when HBO Max arrives in May, Rick and Morty will be on there as well. 

We have the rights to stream past seasons of Rick and Morty in our streaming library. We should see S4 join our streaming library some time after the season finishes airing on TV. If you’d like to stream S4 as it airs, you can do so with Hulu + Live TV: https://t.co/xiny322tcE!

— Hulu Support (@hulu_support) November 20, 2019

How to catch up

Sure, you could just tune in on May 3 knowing nothing but the two main characters’ names, but where’s the fun in that? You need to take your time and enjoy the back catalog of craziness, starting with the 2013 pilot. Old episodes are available for streaming on Hulu, or you can buy whole seasons or individual episodes on Amazon Prime or YouTube, or whole seasons on DVD, if that’s your thing. Want a freebie or two? Adult Swim has a free stream of Rick and Morty episodes, shown one at a time, but you can’t choose the one that’s on.

What happened in the first half of the season

Five episodes of season 4 have already aired, and they were pretty much standalone shows, meaning they’re fun to watch, but don’t necessarily move the show forward in any lasting way. (Which, with a show like this, is just fine. This isn’t X-Files.)

In the first episode, Edge of Tomorty: Rick Die Rickpeat, Rick introduces Morty to special alien crystals that can show him his death, which is a really bad idea. In the second, The Old Man and the Seat, we learn Rick really, really likes his special toilet. Episode 3, One Crew over the Crewcoo’s Morty, features the return of Mr. Poopybutthole — now a professor — and gets a dig in at streaming service Netflix. 

In the fourth episode, Claw and Hoarder: Special Ricktim’s Morty, Morty gets a dragon, which is exactly as much of a bad idea as you might think. And the fifth episode, Rattlestar Ricklactica, features a world of time-traveling space snakes. (And there’s snake jazz, which Summer digs.)

What we know about the new episodes

The show’s official Twitter account revealed the episode titles. The May 3 return is titled Never Ricking Morty; the May 10 episode is Promortyus; the May 17 episode is The Vat of Acid Episode (gee, wonder what that’s about?); the May 24 show is Childrick of Mort; and the May 31 season finale is called Star Mort Rickturn of the Jerri.

Fans can read whatever they want into the titles, but Promortyus sure seems like an Alien homage in some way, with the title nodding to the 2012 movie Prometheus. And oh yeah, that season finale looks like a Star Wars-themed show. No surprise on either of those. The show put out a trailer for the second half of season 5 that includes plenty of face-hugging aliens, and Morty’s sister Summer in a lightsaber battle.

And on March 28, the show released a five-plus minute short film, Samurai & Shogun. It’s inspired by a classic manga called Lone Wolf and Cub, which also inspired the Bob’s Burgers episode Hawk and Chick, as well as the second episode of Disney Plus show The Mandalorian.