Home from the outer reaches of the galaxy for Thanksgiving dinner, Space Beth’s presence at the Smith house complicates things as she and Beth discover the carnal pleasures of alone time. As word of their exploration of self-love spreads, Morty and Summer drown their emotions in video games. Holiday family dinners reach new levels of awkwardness in this week’s episode of Rick and Morty, “Bethic Twinstinct.”
For starters, I want to mention how great it was to have a more grounded story this week. It all takes place within the Smith household and is focused on a family dilemma. The story has a nice pace to it; not too slow, but also not as fast and fractured as the last two episodes have been.
The story itself is the most interesting far this season. The dynamic between Beth and Space Beth jumps forward several light years here. In “Solaricks,” they compete over Summer’s interest, but the episode didn’t have time to fully explore that dynamic given everything else going on. The concept of falling in love with a clone of yourself is much spicer. The way their relationship grew this episode was both kind of sweet yet incredibly weird, and the reactions of Beth’s family members became funnier and funnier.
“Bethic Twinstinct” is a tightly focused episode of Rick and Morty
There isn’t much of a secondary story this week, which I appreciated. The most we get are snippets of the various video games that Morty and Summer play. That includes some wonderful “interdimensional cable”-esque jokes. These cutaway jokes were funny, clever, and didn’t overstay their welcome before we returned to the meat of the story.
The conflict reaches its peak when Jerry finds out about Beth’s affair with Beth. However, instead of killing himself (as he promised during his Thanksgiving toast), the situation wraps itself up nicely (and hilariously) when Jerry, Beth, and Space Beth invent a first-of-its-kind fetish. Meanwhile, Rick, Morty, and Summer silently eat Thanksgiving leftovers.
What a great episode. A tinge of romance, a bowl of cringe, an assortment of gaming humor. Oh, and the post-credit gag was the Jerry on top (and maybe the bottom).
Grade: B+
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