The Absolute Worst Thing Morty Has Ever Done On Rick And Morty
The raging alcoholic, super-genius, and borderline sociopath Rick Sanchez has done a heck of a lot of truly awful things during the run of the Adult Swim animated series Rick and Morty, and near the beginning of that run, we would continuously wonder how and why his grandson Morty Smith — wide-eyed innocent that he was — would keep getting sucked into Rick's insane "adventures." Morty seemed to serve as Rick's mirror image, a grounded, fundamentally moral person who only made Rick look more amoral and self-serving by comparison — but as the series went on, we came to learn that their relationship was a bit more complicated than that.
One could make the case that Rick has been a corrupting influence on Morty, but there's at least an equally strong case to be made that Morty is more like Rick than he (or we) would ever like to think. Sure, like all kids, Morty has made some stupid, unthinking mistakes in pursuit of his own satisfaction which have had horrifying consequences — but more than that, he's been shown to have a hell of a vindictive streak, not to mention a tendency toward the selfishness that seems to run in his family. In a few key instances, that selfishness has been let totally off the leash — and the results have been enough to make even Rick question the wisdom of crossing his young grandson.
Rick might have the lion's share of the smarts in the duo, but that could be said for Rick and literally anyone else — and while you'd pretty much have to be insane to willingly tangle with the Smartest Man in the Universe, we submit that the same is true of his stuttering, unassuming sidekick. These are the worst things Morty has ever done on Rick and Morty.
Morty used a love potion on his crush, with disastrous results
The events of the season 1 Rick and Morty episode "Rick Potion #9" begin with an extremely questionable moral decision made by Morty, and to say that they spiral out of control from there would be a hilarious understatement. Morty pesters Rick into creating a potion which will cause his crush, Jessica, to fall hopelessly in love with him; he administers said potion at the annual Flu Season Dance, and boy, does it ever work. Of course, Rick fails to warn Morty that the potion is capable of piggybacking on the flu virus — and when the entire school, and then the entire town, becomes enamored of Morty, Rick is forced to take drastic action.
As wanton Morty-Love spreads across the entire world (only family members are left unaffected), Rick synthesizes an antidote which is made from the DNA of Praying Mantises, which kill their mates. Of course, this only has the effect of mutating the entire populace into horrifying bug monsters, and Rick's second attempt at an antidote — a ridiculous mishmash of the DNA of various animals, people, and dinosaurs — further mutates everyone into grotesque abominations which he and Morty promptly dub "Cronenbergs."
Admitting that he's maneuvered himself into an impossible spot, Rick breaks out an emergency solution: he and Morty simply abandon their home dimension, relocating to a different one in which the native version of the pair are killed in a lab accident and taking their place. The profoundly messed-up situation appears to break something in Morty, who really should have known better than to attempt to science somebody into falling in love with him.
Morty tried to kill Rick out of pure anger
Rick's machinations can often push Morty right to the freakin' brink; the guy is always four or five steps ahead of everyone else in the room, including his young companion, and we can only imagine how frustrating that must get. In a few instances, though, that frustration has boiled right the heck over for Morty, and never quite so dramatically as in the third season opener "The Rickshank Rickdemption."
During the execution of Rick's incredibly complex plan to stick it to the Galactic Federation, he ends up wiping out the vast majority of the interdimensional Council of Ricks — but the final alternate Rick (distinguished by his weird, pointy, obviously evil hair) gets the drop on Rick and Morty by holding Summer hostage. Rick expresses his willingness — his apparent eagerness, really — to resolve the situation by simply allowing alternate Rick to kill Summer, thereby removing his bargaining chip... but Morty intervenes, holding his Rick at gunpoint (with a gun Rick had previously given him, telling him he'd need it later) in an attempt to somehow save his sister.
When Rick hurls insults at Morty, implying that he's too dim to understand the ramifications of the situation (and Summer and alternate Rick follow suit), Morty freaks out and shoots his Rick in the head, apparently killing him ("who's stupid now, b*tch?" Morty blurts out). Alternate Rick lets down his guard long enough for Rick — who is decidedly not dead — to dispatch him, and Rick subsequently points out the note taped to Morty's gun: "FAKE GUN, SHOOT ME IN STANDOFF." Morty's nervous chuckle tells us all we need to know: there's no way he saw that note.
Morty just straight-up murdered a bunch of innocents
In the penultimate episode of Rick and Morty's second season, "Look Who's Purging Now," the pair find themselves on an alien planet which is gearing up for its annual Purge (you know, like in the movies). Rick is totally down to stick around for awhile, but Morty, not so much; unfortunately, they're given no choice when a seemingly innocent girl (whom Morty insists they help) steals their spaceship.
Eventually, the pair convince the owner of a nearby lighthouse to let them set up a beacon which will allow them to receive a pair of powered combat suits (which Summer launches from the living room of the Smiths' home) on the condition that Morty allow the guy to read him his screenplay. The lighthouse owner doesn't take Morty's gentle criticism well, and when Morty finally breaks down and admits he hated the damn screenplay, lighthouse guy insists that the duo leave — and attempts to deactivate their beacon.
This causes Morty to snap. He pushes the guy down the stairs, killing him and shocking the hell out of Rick — but that's just the beginning. When the powered suits arrive, Morty takes to his a little too enthusiastically, and by the episode's final moments, he's straight-up just going bananas on anyone and everyone in his vicinity, whether they present a threat or not.
As the episode wraps up and Morty comes down from his rage high, Rick comforts him by saying that the candy bars they'd acquired earlier contained "Purgenol," a compound he says was responsible for putting Morty in a purgin' state of mind. But the episode's last shot shows us the wrapper of the candy bar Morty had eaten, which reads, "Now Purgenol free!" Nope, Morty wasn't under the influence of anything; he went totally psycho all on his own.
Morty handed Summer's boyfriend a fate worse than death
Despite their often antagonistic relationship, Morty has been shown on several occasions to be quite protective of Summer. In the fifth episode of season 3, "The Whirly Dirly Conspiracy," Rick goes on a rare adventure with Jerry at Morty's insistence; Morty, keen to take a break from Rick's craziness, stays behind at home.
While Rick and Jerry get tangled up in a plot to kill Rick at a resort where nobody can die, Summer — whose boyfriend Ethan has just broken up with her in favor of a slightly more, er, well-endowed girl — turns to her grandfather's tech for a solution after Beth fails to give her the affirmation she desperately needs. Rather than having the desired effect of enlarging her breasts, though, Rick's Morphizer-XE simply blows Summer up to giant-size; Beth, who refuses Morty's pleas to call Rick for help, attempts to reverse the effect by setting the machine to "reverse." This, of course, simply turns Summer inside-out.
Eventually, Beth uses the machine on herself in order to make peace with the giant, inside-out Summer, who has tracked down Ethan and his new girlfriend to a campground. Summer, touched by Beth's gesture, is content to leave Ethan alone — but Morty is most certainly not.
"You made my sister cry, Ethan," Morty tells the kid. "You messed with her body image." Ethan attempts to explain, but Morty cuts him off: "Shh, shh... careful, Ethan. Your s'more is burning," he says, ominously patting the Morphizer. The episode's post-credits sequence reveals that it was no idle threat; Morty used the device to turn Ethan into a hideously misshapen monster, an act of retaliation which may have been just a bit disproportionate to Ethan's offense.
Morty just straight-up murdered a bunch of innocents... again
In the season 4 opener "Edge of Tomorty: Rick Die Rickpeat," Morty's crush on Jessica once again endangers all of humanity. When he and Rick come into possession of some "death crystals," which allow for them to see the many possible ways in which they might eventually die, Morty discovers one possibility that he becomes obsessed with ensuring will come to pass: he sees himself dying peacefully in bed with Jessica by his side, holding his hand.
His efforts to make sure that this outcome is realized, of course, quickly get out of hand as Morty follows the guidance of the crystal. What begins as a confrontation with a school bully ends with Morty gaining access to Rick's arsenal and using it to just open up a can of whoopass on all who oppose him, including the police and military — all in pursuit of that blissful end-of-life vision.
Eventually captured and put on trial for his rampage, Morty is able to weasel out of any punishment by quoting the last words of the judge's dying husband, causing the judge to commit suicide after setting him free. After all of that death and destruction, the episode's post-credits scene reveals that Morty's vision was supremely misleading: Jessica intends to become a hospice worker, and it was in this capacity that Morty saw her comforting him in his final moments.
For such a seemingly good kid, it sure doesn't seem to take much to prompt Morty to mass murder. Mess with his sister or give him the mere possibility of a hook-up with Jessica, and he'll kill, maim, and Cronenberg with reckless abandon; remember that the next time he passes judgment on Rick for, oh, destroying some stupid dimension or another.