>>2513583A quick clarification about Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland, the creators of Rick and Morty. They aren't Jewish.
Roiland was raised Christian and is now an agnostic. His father is Catholic and his mother's family is split between "basic Christian and Mormon". Harmon was raised a Lutheran and claims he became an atheist as a teenager. Although, from this tweet storm [spoiler:lit][/spoiler:lit]
https://twitter.com/danharmon/status/827192118535811072. I suspect he's a quasi-believer.
I had to go look this up because after watching a few episodes of Rick and Morty, the show didn't strike me as Jewish in any way, despite it's casual perversity and brokenness. I don't want to overanalyze this, but the perversity and nihilism of Rick and Morty come from a Christian perspective, not a Jewish one.
Jews are too superstitious to ever really be fully atheist. Because their Tribe has survived for 3,000 years, they'll always believe, as some level or another, that they ARE the magic Chosen People, even if they doubt the existence of God. Thus the Jew can never reach full existential despair. Also, Jewish brokenness is instrumental, in that the Jews weaponize their perversions against their enemies.
But, when Christians think God is dead, nihilism, despair and a profound longing for the missing God are what follows. Rick is a nihilist because he can't find God in his multiverse. His perversity and brokenness are natural consequences of thinking God is dead, and the damage Rick causes is random and indiscriminate. There's no direction to Rick's malice, it's omnidirectional and self-destructive. It's unpleasant to watch, because it's what happens when humans lose God. Even the most technologically capable human, Rick, the man with the god-like powers, still despairs at the lack of meaning that the death of God brings.
This is not Jewish, because a Jew could never really believe God was dead, and that he (the Jew) and his people were not special.
