Rick & Morty's Future Will Include More Smith Family-Focused Episodes After Season 9's Wild Jerry Story

2 hours ago 7

Jerry smiling and holding someone's hand with a fire raging behind him in Rick and Morty season 9

Published Jun 23, 2026, 12:00 PM EDT

Grant Hermanns is a TV News Editor, Interview Host and Reviewer for ScreenRant, having joined the team in early 2021. He got his start in the industry with Moviepilot, followed by working at ComingSoon.net. When not indulging in his love of film/TV, Grant is making his way through his gaming backlog and exploring the world of Dungeons & Dragons with friends.

Warning: Some SPOILERS lie ahead for Rick and Morty season 9!Chris Parnell's Jerry got to be one of the centers of attention in the latest Rick and Morty season 9 episode, and it's only the start for the Smith family.

Episode 5, entitled "Jer Bud," followed Jerry as he prepares for his first job interview in years, with Space Beth attempting to help him calm down by giving him a parasitic worm that feeds on anxiety. However, in a foolish effort to fully lose his fears, Jerry consumes far too many worms, leading to them taking over his body and going on a series of misadventures after passing his job interview, while Rick, Beth and Space Beth try to find a way to contain them before it's too late.

On the flip side of the episode, Rick and Morty season 9 also finally saw the return of Snowball, the latter's former dog who was sent to his own dimension, where dogs rule the world, after gaining intelligence with one of Rick's devices in season 1. With Morty inadvertently roped into a war between the dogs and the humanoid pets they've created, much of the city is left destroyed, though Rick releases the captured worry worms into the universe, resulting in a more harmonious rebuilding between all involved.

Ahead of the show's premiere, ScreenRant's Grant Hermanns interviewed Dan Harmon, Scott Marder, Harry Belden, Ian Cardoni, Spencer Grammer and Sarah Chalke to discuss Rick and Morty season 9. When turning to the Jerry-focused "Jer Bud," and finding ways to make Parnell's character simultaneously smooth and awkward, Harmon began by explaining that the secret to Jerry is he "is the most relatable" of the sci-fi comedy's roster:

Dan Harmon: We like to judge him, but we are all also very insecure, and therefore we like to judge ourselves. Jerry, in the beginning, was like, "Okay, you have the Michael Scott template." We're talking 10 years ago, that can be expressed through, "Well, he's cringe, because he cares too much. So, he says awkward things, because he's trying to say the right thing." But it's interesting, at the core of it, back then, that's how the modern person felt a lot. I think that's why Michael Scott worked in the American version of The Office. It was like, "Well, that's me, frankly. I'm always putting my foot in my mouth at the office."

With the show now being 10 years into its run — to which Harmon chuckles as he acknowledges that "Jerry's still 35 or whatever" — viewers now "don't worry about accidentally saying the wrong thing" in the real world, given they "care so much about provincial rules." For the co-creator, this has made Parnell's character "something magical" as the show continues its run, particularly in getting to bring in younger writers who "have their own relationship with him," and can therefore "under certain circumstances get to do things they can't do with Rick or Morty or Beth":

Dan Harmon: They start doing these weird exercises with themselves about like, "Well, what if I was the kind of guy that was this or that?" It changes generationally. So, Jerry, because he's a really solid dude, I think that's how we get to do so much with him.

Marder, who is on his fifth straight season as Rick and Morty's showrunner, began by describing it as "a testament to the cast" of Parnell, Grammer and Chalke that they are "so strong that there's just been a natural evolution" in the show's development to "do Beth ones, and Summer ones, and Jerry ones." He further confirmed that the Smith family would get more episodes focused on them rather than just the eponymous duo, expressing that while "you always want a million Rick and Morty ones," the trio of Jerry, Beth and Summer "can carry their own episodes" and give "an even brighter spectrum of a season."

Harmon concluded by sharing that one inspiration for Jerry's journey throughout Rick and Morty is actually that of South Park's Randy Marsh, specifically citing season 9's "The Losing Edge," in which he is "taking his shirt off at a baseball game, because he's drunk, and starts challenging" a fellow game attendee. In watching that episode, the three-time Emmy winner recalled feeling, "Oh s--t, they can do anything with this guy," and wanting to play off of that with his own creations:

Dan Harmon: That's an intention in Jerry's DNA, is to provide that stable place, because it's not just Homer Simpson. It's beyond that, it's the everyman in a more chaotic time.

Rick And Morty Season 9 Is One Of The Group's All-Time Favorites

ScreenRant: As much as I have always loved this show, this might be one of my favorite seasons yet. I just love the absolute hijinks from it. There are also some really great emotional beats for everybody, so kudos to you guys on that. I'd love to hear, first and foremost, what was one of the main goals for you guys going into the writers room this season? Was there a certain character arc that you wanted to focus on? Was it about just finding more fun adventures to send these guys on?

Scott Marder: For me, the goals are always pretty similar, which is to do a season that gives every fan a little bit of everything, but the premiere was one that Harmon was very excited [about]. To try to find a Q-type character that could be this chaos agent for Rick, and I think it might have been Albro [Lundy] that was like, "Evil Morty could be that guy in a perfect situation, because he's kind of holding all the cards. He's in a rarefied air that very few people can push Rick around." So, that kind of led us down a road on a premiere that began giving us an idea of where the season could go. I don't know, the start of every season is always the most fun. It's blue sky. It's when anything can literally be anything. And a lot of these episodes that ended up falling into [season] 9 came out very quickly and very organically. You can tell when an episode is going to be at Rick and Morty, internally, when you could just feel it in the room. You could feel every writer wanting to tag it and write it. That's how strong and infectious the joy is on them. And this one just felt very rich with those, where it's like, "Wow, what a high-class problem that people are going to fight over who gets to write this one." So, that just all happened very organically, very quickly. Yeah, we're very proud of it. We're excited that you guys are responding to it the way we've been responding to it internally. Animation takes so long that we've been sitting on the season for a bit that we're like, "God, we want to get this one out, it's gonna have an impact.

Dan Harmon: Yeah, I want to maximize your time, so I can just defer to Scott on that. His answer is mine, and more in touch with the gears of the show. I do think that was a goal of ours. To Scott's credit, running a room for a complete year, we're getting into this stable mode of the show behind the scenes, and so it's much easier to just say, for instance, "At the top of season 9, let's make this a nice fresh [feeling]. We're not rebooting or re-piloting, but let's make a lily pad here where people can hop on.

ScreenRant: Now, diving into this season in particular, Sarah, if you'd like to start, and then Ian, I'd love to know what your favorite episodes are. Because we still get some of those nice emotional beats, but then we get the wild chaos of going on a vacation that involves some memory loss.

Sarah Chalke: Mine were "Jer Bud" and "Salute Your Morts." I feel like, for me, season 9 might be my favorite season yet. Which is super rare and cool. It's really rare that, as a show continues on in its ninth season, the scripts are so creative. Every time I get a Rick and Morty script, I'm so excited to read it, and then to watch it, because obviously, whatever you picture in your mind when you read "Alien Sentient Cloud Fart Being" is going to be totally different than what these genius animators come up with. So, I feel like this many years in where you're still kind of learning things about your character and their dynamic with the other family members is just super cool.

Ian Cardoni: Yeah, it's hard to pick a favorite. I will say that some of my favorites of all time are within season 9, certainly some favorite moments. Just from a recording aspect, and thinking back to some funny moments in the booth, I think Rick Foo Hustle's got some great moments. Those are days that you're like, "Wow, never thought I'd ever do that, or get to do that as an actor." I also think that both the first and last episodes of season 9 are going to be some of the strongest, and some of my favorites. Strong in, strong out.

Harry Beldoni: I think the finale is going to be my favorite episode. Yeah, yeah.

Spencer Grammer: The vacation episode I really like, and I like the finale too.

Harry Beldoni: "Rick Days Seven Nights"?

Spencer Grammer: Yeah, I like that one. That's how I feel most of my life is. [Laughs] Like, please keep me here for a minute.

ScreenRant: I love that you get the opportunity to have had 10 years with Jerry to then evolve the way you approach that sort of everyman-style comedy, like you were saying. I think it's been great, and I think fans are really going to get a kick out of what they go through this season. I especially loved "Salute Your Morts" with him and Beth going on their journey, that was such a kick.

Scott Marder: That "Salute Your Morts" one was just an exciting sci-fi idea we had, that was like, "Your ultimate paranoia, maybe as an older person, doing drugs, is that I'm gonna smoke a joint and learn that I might be high forever." We just felt like that was such a strong, relatable nightmare that I think a lot of people sometimes feel when they smoke pot, you know, like, "Oh, f--k, what if I never come down? I'm supposed to be an adult, how am I gonna plug back into the world?" [Laughs]

Grammer Would Love To Pull From Her Own Life For New Summer Stories

Rick and Summer high-fiving in Rick and Morty season 8

ScreenRant: One thing I am actually curious about for both of you — Spencer, if you'd like to start, and then Harry — is that you know the first few seasons had a lot of character development, and a lot of individual arcs. There's a joke made this season about, "We've arced past all of you," to be fully confident now, but I'm curious, is there something for each of these characters that you are both still so intrigued to hopefully get to explore in the future?

Spencer Grammer: You know, I've said this before in interviews, but I've not seen Summer really have a relationship. There was Ethan in the beginning, but I wish we could see more of Summer being uncool or cool in school. I did always think of her, when initially auditioned for the role, as somebody who's like, "Okay, but nobody would really remember her in high school, and she'll peak later." That's sort of how I was in high school. I wasn't really popular. People knew who I was. When your parent is famous, they're just always talking about that, so people always remember you. But no one would really remember anything about me specifically, except for that. [Laughs] So, I never felt like I really accomplished much until I was in college and post-college, for me, as a person. So, that's sort of how I feel about Summer. She's not really her own kind of human. So, I'd love to see more of that. At home, she's this crazy [person], capable of everything that Rick can do, and more. So, maybe more Rick-like Summers would be cool.

ScreenRant: I love the sound of that.

Harry Beldoni: It's hard to say, because both of these kids, their lives are anything but normal. They've both been through so much that it is like, yes, sometimes it feels like they've been through everything, but we also know that's not the case. Because with infinite realities in the multiverse, there's always another threshold to cross, always another challenge for them to meet. I think in this season, in particular, Morty will go through a lot of growth and challenges that, whether they're self-imposed, as is often the case with Morty, versus things that are happening to him, I think that we can look forward to seeing that in this season.

ScreenRant: There's certainly some really great moments. I'll just say the tree, in particular, was a really great beat regarding Morty's life lessons.

Harry Beldoni: Oh, so you saw the whole season?

ScreenRant: Oh yeah, I loved it!

Spencer Grammer: I felt the same way. I hadn't seen in any of our seasons before, this sort of point of view of us as human beings, and how we're contributing to the world, and this really interesting idea of what kind of food we eat, kind of consumption we have in the world. Why we're doing it, and questioning whether or not our choices are actually why do we eat the foods that we eat, maybe we could have a better life. To be honest, I'm mostly vegetarian/vegan anyway, so I was like, "These are great." We've done these veggie episodes before, but f--k yeah, let's go! [Laughs] I admire that a show this far into its episodes can kind of, like most things, help us question our choices in our real lives, and help us to see different points of view that we wouldn't ordinarily get the opportunity to. Because it's not really that didactic — they're in a world where the tree has enslaved them. And then I really like the ending of that, that was hilarious too. "Yeah, no, close your eyes!" [Laughs]

Chalke & Cardoni Love Playing Rick And The Beths High On Space Drugs

Jerry taking the worry worms while Space Beth leans back casually, and Beth looks concerned in Rick and Morty season 9

ScreenRant: Sarah, I'll turn back to you, because one of my favorite episodes you mentioned is "Jer Bud," and I just love seeing this weird confidence that Jerry has, but then also seeing you trying to play off of it, and everybody being confused. What was it like getting to hear Chris's voice with that, getting to see this come to life? What do you think was going through Beth's head through all that?

Sarah Chalke: Yeah, it's one of my favorite things to see, like you said, Parnell rock that level of confidence, and this whole side of Jerry that we haven't really seen in that way before. We don't record together, so I didn't get to see all of that until I watched the actual finished product, and I was dying laughing, like laughing out loud watching him. I thought he did such an amazing job. I loved that it was Beth and Space Beth kind of ushering him through that journey. Parnell was so good at such swagger.

ScreenRant: He absolutely killed it, and I did also want to ask, by the way, about "Salute Your Morts." I'd love to know what it was like playing almost an entire episode high, because watching them go through that, and then also the conversation in the car with Space Beth at the very end was just killing me.

Sarah Chalke: Yeah, I love that episode, it was so fun to record. There's always one every season where you're driving there, and you're trying stuff out in your car, and, "What's our way in here, what's the right level?" One season, it was the Night Person, and you're driving to work, and you're like, "[In Night Person voice] We will be like that," and just kind of going, like, "What is the vibe of it going to be?" So, for this one, Scott Marder, who's our showrunner, he's on Zoom, and he's giving us feedback and notes the whole time, so it was kind of finding that level with him. It's like playing drunk, playing high, you are always trying to find a way to ground it, so that it always feels real, and this was definitely a case where I was very excited and happy to be in a four-by-four square-foot booth by myself with nobody that could see. But you always imagine if there was a little invisible camera recording what you look like in the booth, just the freedom that gives you when you're doing animation. Just the way you can close your eyes and move your body and not have any level of self-consciousness about what you're doing. It's just about your voice, and I find in episodes like that it's really helpful and really cool, because it's so freeing, it's so liberating. You can just really try anything. So, yeah, the challenge of that episode was kind of trying to find the right level of being high, and obviously the concept of that, of them going and taking this High Forever drug, was just incredible.

Ian Cardoni: Yeah, you said it. When acting can be that freeing, who needs drugs? Acting, my anti-drug. [Chuckles] Yeah, a lot of fun work to try to portray that level of highness, and it's kind of cool that we get to play with not real substances. They're space drugs, they're not necessarily your typical Earth drugs, so there's no real wrong, and that's kind of freeing. If we're going for a certain line delivery, just kind of play with it, see where it goes, see how weird it can get, see how weird we can stretch. Rick was a fun process, because who's to say that's not a version that is created by this. So, it's a fun and happy challenge as an actor to explore that.

Be sure to dive into our other Rick and Morty season 9-related coverage with: