‘Rick And Morty’ Season 3 Spoilers: A New Smith Family Member On Totalitarian Earth

The Rickstaverse, a Rick and Morty Instagram thingamajig, has been expanded, revealing the new normal on Earth in advance of the Rick and Morty Season 3 release date.

At the end of Rick and Morty Season 2 Earth was inducted into the Galactic Federation. Our remote planet would no longer serve as a hiding place for the interstellar war criminal Rick Sanchez, who turned himself in for his numerous crimes against the Federation government. While there seem to be definite upsides to Federation membership, including the universal employment that salvaged Jerry’s self-esteem, the presence of armed Gromflomites points to its more totalitarian tendencies. Will Rick and Morty Season 3 premiere on a world transformed into a utopia by alien trade and policies or a totalitarian nightmare where humans are reduced to peasants on their own planet? According to the expanded Rickstaverse, a collection of interactive information about the new Earth normal, all signs point to dystopia.

The first thing to notice is just how quickly alien civilizations integrated themselves to Earth society. There’s an incredible pluralism apparent in everything from the town streets to the locker rooms of Morty’s Harry Herpson HIgh School. There are even alien buildings popping up. But a more sinister side quickly becomes evident: Gromflomite snipers top every building.

Here’s some other stuff we noticed:

• Jessica is dating an alien.
• Mr. Needful is teaming up with the Gromflomite Prison General.
• Worship of Shrimply Pibbles has overtaken Christianity.
• Beth is finally a real doctor, treating various alien species at St. Equus, but doesn’t seem to be coping well with Rick leaving the family.
• Mr. Goldenfold’s missing!

All of this is of dubious canonicity. But even if most of these specifics points may not be true to actual Rick and Morty Season 3 episodes, the Rickstaverse expansion probably gives us a good sense of the new normal going into the Season 3 premiere.

But for actual spoilers, the best place to visit in the Rickstaverse is probably the Smith family home.

There’s a lot to learn in here about how Rick and Morty’s primary cast is reacting to Rick’s imprisonment. Jerry, wearing his work uniform even at home, seems most happy with the new normal. We don’t know exactly what his job is, but wouldn’t it just be so perfectly Jerry for him to prop up the fascist Gromflomite government on Earth like a Vichy coward?

Summer seems mostly herself (the Rickstaverse captions are written in her voice), but she’s having to deal with the new Smith family member: a robot named C.O.N.R.o.Y. Is he a servant or just a nuisance?

While TV has definitely gotten better (you don’t even need to worry about the AUX input), food has gotten worse. Everything seems to be in pill form.

Morty’s mom Beth seems the worst off. Not only is she still drinking, but it looks like she’s moved on to alien drugs. She definitely takes after her father, Rick.

What about Morty? All we see of him in the Rickstaverse is the back of his head, watching TV, but Summer is worried about him:

“TBH, I'm kind of worried about Morty. For someone that spent so much time with Grandpa Rick he's been taking this whole thing really well. A little too well. You'd think he'd use this as an opportunity to grow the f up and start a plan to get Rick back, but he's just sort of withdrawn from everything.”

So that’s the new normal on Earth entering Rick and Morty Season 3. While Season 2 was already breaking down the divide between galactic and domestic narratives in individual Rick and Morty episodes, Season 3 looks like a complete destruction of that barrier. Now Earth is just as sci-fi as Rick and Morty’s adventures in space.

There’s not yet a premiere date for Rick and Morty Season 3, but it’s got to be coming soon… we hope.