If you’ve ever wondered what Rick and Morty would be like as an anime, wonder no more: For your socially distanced viewing pleasure, the Adult Swim show has released a brand-new short film transposing the titular duo to feudal Japan.
The script is in Japanese as well, written by director Kaichi Sato, with the visuals by Studio DEEN, the folks behind series like Hell Girl, Fruits Basket, and the Junji Ito Collection. And instead of the dulcet, method-acted tones of Justin Roiland, you’ll find Yohei Tadano as Rick WTM-72 and Keisuke Chiba as Shogun Morty.
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In this film, Rick WTM-72 has kidnapped Shogun Morty from a group of Ninja Ricks, who’ve followed the pair through a portal and now intend to murder them in a field beneath a blood moon. There’s a lot of the show’s signature slapstick gore (Rick WTM-72 has no trouble singlehandedly felling his ninja selves, nor does Shogun Morty, who makes inventive use of a wheeled cart with revolving sickles [!?!]), as well as a characteristically trippy second half. Bonus points for the superb voice acting, specifically the delivery of “Such a fool you are to kidnap Shogun Morty, the soul to us Ninja Rick.”
Rick and Morty, which aired the first five episodes of season 4 back in December, is expected to return to Adult Swim with the next five some time later this year.
