Rick and Morty finally returned for Season 8 earlier this year, and now it’s the perfect time to look back and rank all of its episodes from worst to best. Rick and Morty had quite a few shake ups behind the scenes leading to Season 7 of the animated series back in 2023, and the Adult Swim franchise then took an extra year of development time before returning for 2025. But this ended up being for the best as Rick and Morty Season 8 was a return to form in many ways as the animated series spent its episodes establishing a new status quo.
As Rick and Morty Season 8 prepares for its official streaming launch in the coming days, it’s now the best time to go back and look at just how this season actually performed. With ten episodes telling their own episodic stories, there are many that did very well among the pack with only a few that didn’t hit as high of marks as the others. Read on for our picks of the Rick and Morty Season 8 episodes from worst to best, and let us know all of your favorites in the comments.
#10 – Morty Daddy
Rick and Morty Season 8 had a few notable returns from characters that fans weren’t expecting to see again, but the penultimate episode of the season brings back Morty’s estranged son, Morty Jr. It’s the first episode that fleshes out more of that father and son dynamic that was only jokingly established back in the first episode, but it just wasn’t fun considering that Morty Jr. is such a bland character overall. He really only has one joke in that he’s revealed to be increasingly levels of terrible, and Rick and Summer’s side plot with the Precogs just wasn’t enough to lift the whole thing.
#9 – Ricker than Fiction
Although “Ricker Than Fiction” seems like it’s going to be promising as this season’s version of Interdimensional Cable or Morty’s Mindblowers, it soon instead focuses on extended cameos from both James Gunn and Zack Snyder. The episode starts with the interesting tease of Rick and Morty crafting their own blockbuster movie franchise (with many potential variations), but then it spends far too long on these major guest spots. It just takes up so much of the attention that it really stops being funny. Other episodes this season just had a better balance overall.
#8 – The Last Temptation of Jerry
Rick and Morty Season 8 has two major episodes that shine more of a light on Jerry, and the weaker of the two is also unfortunately one of the weaker episodes of the season overall. It might end up being the last holiday special Rick and Morty ever does, but that might be for the best as there’s not a lot of room to explore. Demonstrated by this episode that tries to show a new origin of Easter, Jerry turns into a mutant rabbit that wants to spread its seed and destroy the world. It’s another episode that never quite reaches some of the upper levels that other episodes did this season.
#7 – Summer of All Fears
Rick and Morty Season 8 did get off to a very promising start, however, as Summer and Morty were trapped for years within a device Rick had built after they stole his phone charger. There’s a unique spin put on this idea that has the two of them decide to keep their years’ worth of memories from being trapped, and even has an impact on their current lives. It’s great on the Summer side of things as it revealed just how much like Rick she actually is (and what that means for her relationship with her mother), but the Morty side really only has a single beat to follow before it ends. It’s just not as dynamic as the episodes to come.
#6 – Valkyrick
The second episode of the season ended up being a much better start for the new Rick and Morty season. “Valkyrick” brings back Space Beth for another full adventure, and sees her teaming up with Rick for the first real time since she became a recurring character in the series. This episode not only helps to close out the Galactic Federation stuff from the first half of the series, but sets up Rick and Space Beth for more changes in their relationship that gets paid off in the episodes to come. It really put the work in to changes these characters moving forward.
#5 – Cryo Mort a Rickver
Not every episode of Rick and Morty Season 8 built on the characters, but the best standalone episode was undoubtedly “Cryo Mort a Rickver.” This episode feels the most like a classic era episode from the early seasons as Rick and Morty are thwarted in their initial attempt at robbing a ship before needing to sneak into a society that’s separated by class. Leading to a full revolution and a race for money, it’s just a fun episode that doesn’t have ties to any bigger development. Which means that this is as high on the list it can get, unfortunately.
#4 – The Curicksous Case of Bethjamin Button
Because while Rick and Morty Season 8 did not have any major episodes that set up another multi-seasonal arc for the future, the episodes it did have made sure to make some major developments for the characters and their personalities. This season was especially focused on Rick and Beth, and one of the coolest examples had both Beths turning back into their child selves and having a very emotional resolution with their father (while kicking his very old behind). It was a finale that perfectly blended its comedy with that hard hitting emotion. It also helped that the second half of the episode had a Danny DeVito voiced scientist unleashing an army of giant headed celebrity clones.
#3 – Hot Rick
Rick and Morty Season 8’s finale was another strong example of this too. Picking up from the fact that Rick and Jerry fused their brains last season, this episode offers yet another look into Rick’s past with Diane. But the real focus is once again on how this has had an impact on Beth’s life. It ultimately turns into a life or death battle against Beth to save her brain from being fried, and it gets yet another emotionally hard hitting resolution that lands even better because of all the work done through the season overall. It’s an episode that pays off these character stories, and even more rewarding for fans who had been paying attention.
#2 – Nomortland
One of the biggest surprises of Rick and Morty Season 8, however, was another Jerry focused episode. This episode not only opened up more of the multiverse as it was revealed that Jerrys had been exploiting secret tunnels to travel between worlds, but it also starts to change how Jerry views himself and his place within his family. Because while he often felt ignored (and could literally leave without being noticed), it’s revealed that our Jerry isn’t as invisible as the others. It’s a good moment for the character that’s been earned after all this time, and once again proves that he indeed has a place within the wider family.
#1 – The Rick, The Mort & The Ugly
But the best episode of Rick and Morty Season 8 is “The Rick, The Mort, & The Ugly.” Taking inspiration from one of the series’ best episodes ever, “The Ricklantis Mixup,” this episode revisits the fallout of the Citadel and focuses on the smaller stories of a few different Rick and Morty clones that had been caught in the multiversal crossover. It’s not only an episode that further helps along the wider lore of the franchise, but also allows for more variant Ricks and Mortys to take the spotlight. It’s just a fun self-contained episode that actually has an impact on the overall story, and Boss Hog Rick is probably one of the best Ricks we’ve met in years.
