Meeseeks and Destroy

Plot

After a traumatic adventure, Morty wants to quit all future escapades. Morty strikes a bet with Rick to lead his own adventure, agreeing to cease complaining if he fails. When the rest of the Smith family asks Rick for solutions to several mundane problems, he gives the family the Meeseeks Box, a gadget capable of summoning helpful beings named Mr. Meeseeks. These creatures exist only to execute the first order they are given; once it is completed, they vanish. Rick warns the family to keep their tasks simple.

When Rick and Morty leave, Beth asks her Meeseeks to help her become a more complete woman, while Summer wants hers to make her more popular at school. Jerry, thinking Beth and Summer's requests too challenging, asks his Meeseeks to help him take two strokes off his golf game. Summer's and Beth's Meeseeks complete their tasks quickly, but Jerry struggles to improve at golf despite the coaching from his Meeseeks. Since a Meeseeks cannot die until it completes its task, it summons another Meeseeks to help. Soon Jerry is surrounded by many Meeseeks, all desperate to help Jerry improve, because existence is painful to a Meeseeks. Jerry and Beth, exasperated, go to dinner together.

After they leave, all the Meeseeks blame each other for their predicament and argue over the correct solution, concluding that the only way to fulfill their mission is to take all the strokes off Jerry's golf game by killing him. A horde of armed Meeseeks descends upon the restaurant. Jerry and Beth escape into the restaurant's freezer, and the Meeseeks take hostages to coerce Jerry to come out. Jerry almost gives in, but Beth encourages him to try his golf swing one last time. Jerry uses a severed piece of shelving and a tomato to prove that his swing has improved, and the delighted Meeseeks all cease to exist.

Morty and Rick arrive in a stereotypical fantasy world to begin their adventure. They stop at a poor village that requests the help of two heroes to steal a giant's treasure in order to raise money. Morty and Rick climb up a giant beanstalk to the giants' world, but an accident sees them arrested for murdering a giant. They are tried in a Giant's Court, but are acquitted through a technicality.

The heroes stop at a tavern for a drink, where Morty confronts Rick over his constant negativity before heading to the bathroom. There, he meets Mr. Jellybean, an at first friendly character who restrains Morty when he attempts to leave and tries to rape him. Morty fends him off but is shaken. Meanwhile, Rick is beginning to enjoy himself; he wins several hands of cards, collecting a sizable amount of money. Morty begs Rick to go home, and admits to losing the bet. Rick keeps Morty's spirits up by offering to give his card winnings to the poor villagers, and Morty accepts. The villagers then ask Rick and Morty to meet their king, a still-battered Mr. Jellybean. Morty quickly convinces Rick to open a portal to leave. Before the portal closes, Rick shoots through it with a laser gun, killing Jellybean.

In a post-credits scene, two of the villagers find a box of incriminating photographs in King Jellybean's lockbox, but they burn it to keep the king's legacy untainted.

Development

Justin Roiland claimed the idea for the episode occurred when he started screaming "I'm Mister Meeseeks" and the concept evolved from there.

Reception

Zach Handlen of The A.V. Club rated the episode A-, quoting that it "[may have had] the most weirdly upbeat ending of the show so far". David Roa from Dead Screen gave the episode 9.1 out of 10, noting its great story and re-watchability. Junkie Monkey's gave it a mixed review, stating that although it wasn't the best episode of the season, it was far from the worst. Den of Geek gave the episode a 5/5 rating, reviewer Joe Matar said that the episode was a good challenge of the concept of adventure.