Adult Swim’s quick jab at Game Of Thrones following Sunday’s finale likely would’ve went unnoticed had it followed any of the other shows on the network schedule. But whoever controls the classic bumpers that they’ve been using for a decade decided to stick it after the latest episode of Rick And Morty, meaning people noticed. That also means they went to social media and the snowball started to grow, with many thinking Justin Roiland, Dan Harmon, or someone else on the show was connected to it.
That was not the case and the show’s official Twitter sent out a message denying any involvement — but also asking for the thinkpieces to end — followed by a message from Justin Roiland that said the same. Both were simple responses to the bumper, leaving Dan Harmon the only one missing due to his self-imposed Twitter hiatus. Luckily, it doesn’t seem like he’s left Instagram behind and he provided his own take on the situation. Not constrained by the 140 characters, he lets a note roll out that seems to carry a little more anger at the situation.
Harmon refers to the joke as “tragically tacky,” but he wanted to wait until he had a very good response before actually throwing it out to the world. Then after some thinking, that went out the window and the Community creator let off some steam:
“I keep thinking I should say something but I keep waiting for the time I’d need to write something worth saying because rule number one in talking shit is you better talk way better than the shit you’re talking about but then I remember the truly frustrating thing about that card is that it breaks that rule, being a lazy, craftless jab at the WRITING on my favorite show that some pointlessly jaded teenage intern in Atlanta just left like a fart in my show’s space so why wait for the muse to strike before disavowing them”
The whole message is sorta like a pendulum swinging back and forth, delightfully indecisive and a worthy response to a situation like this. It all goes back to the idea that you don’t want to be perceived to be taking a dump on something unless you’re actually taking a dump on them. Adult Swim dropping that at the end of Rick And Morty kinda leaves the show in an unfair position that likely wasn’t intentional, but is also troublesome. In the end Harmon opts to pull it all back and just leave it at a simple response:
“Hey man, wasn’t me, I just work on Rick And Morty and love the Thrones, sorry if that anonymous unearned snark bummed you out but I’m the one that has to spend the next TV Guide Showrunner’s Dinner checking his vodka for Essence of Nightshade”
That’s actually worse than dragons swooping in to burn Atlanta to the ground. That’s not going to be fun, but getting poisoned when you least expect it has a more personal sting to it.
