The wait between Rick and Morty season 3 and season 4 took somewhere between forever and forever and a half. Or at least that’s what it felt like in the moment. In reality, the delay ended up being just over two full years. That’s a unit of time that “A Song of Ice and Fire”, Venture Bros., and Curb Your Enthusiasm fans like to call a “blink of an eye.”
The good news is that Rick and Morty season 5 is likely to arrive quicker, if not much quicker than season 4 did. There was a rather specific reason for the season 4 delay. Unbeknownst to all, Adult Swim and Rick and Morty co-creators Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland were working on a deal that would keep the pair and the show at the network for a long time. Harmon and Roiland’s animated sci-fi comedy would eventually receive a truly impressive 70 episode order.
The series now has 60 episodes of that order remaining (not to mention any subsequent agreements that should arise) and those episodes should be arriving a little more quickly this time. Or at least that’s what the show’s braintrust believes. In talking to Polygon prior to season 4, Roiland said that, with a deal in hand, production might speed up.
“We want the episodes to stay good, but we do also want to try to turn them around a little quicker now that we have this big order, I think it gives us the ability to be faster. We’re not going to do these long breaks, these chasms in-between seasons anymore. We’re going to schedule vacation time and just keep the machine going. It’s going to be really cool.”
