9 ms·

Justin Roiland dropped from Rick and Morty after domestic abuse charges

30 points by cion 4y ago

Khelavaster 4y ago
It's really because he sent so many chains of creepy, solicitous messages to 15-16 year old fans who flirted with him.
- BulgarianIdiot 4y ago
  We know of zero cases where he actually tried to meet those fans, let alone touch them. Even in the undesirable case he did, 16 is the age of consent in most of the US, which I'm just saying so everyone calibrate their vitriol accordingly. Some things are inappropriate, but not illegal, and therefore don't deserve automatic banishment from society. But here, the feeling I get is that he has alcohol problems, drinks, and tweets really dumb, cringe shit to strangers, thinking he's just hilarious (which he's not). That's his Twitter problem. As for the criminal case against him, the court should decide, not us.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
qikInNdOutReply 4y ago
Why cant normal people not produce something that is entertaining? And why can they not quit ostracizing the freak-show, they produce en mass to entertain them. Why can the social cripples not dance in the limelight and then die out of sight, out of mind? Well, Dan Harmon got a prolonged vacation to and they needed him back, so here we go. The usual "He is checking" in routine, which is actually just some acting coaching, were the maimed learn to keep it in the closet. A interesting discussion about origin, healthy handling of the problems and solving them permanently, is to much to ask.
hobbitstan 4y ago
What happened to ‘innocent until proven guilty’? Are mere allegations enough to lose your job?
- jjulius 4y ago
  >What happened to ‘innocent until proven guilty’? We don't know what internal conversations looked like at Adult Swim. We don't know if, or of not, they are aware of anything else that may have happened that encouraged them to make this decision. I'm not saying anything did - the point is, we don't know their reasoning, but we should assume that the decision wasn't made lightly.
  - hobbitstan 4y ago
    The idea of Adult Swim having a serious conversation makes me LOL
  - notch656c 4y ago
    The accuser is unknown and the accused is a smart guy with counsel. Which means from the employer viewpoint they know some <redacted> person accused him and they get a generic response from the lawyer about not being able to comment about an ongoing case. The chance the employer has credible knowledge of guilt is extremely slim.
    - jjulius 4y ago
      My "We don't know if, or of not, they are aware of anything else," comment clearly suggests that the reasons for terminating him may not be limited to this court case specifically. It's been covered in many articles that this sort of behavior from him has been an open secret for a bit. I don't claim to know whether or not that's true, I'm simply saying that none of us know exactly why AS did this, whether or not it was only about the pending legal case or something more, or anything. All we can do is assume they didn't make the decision lightly. Adult Swim is clearly a lot closer to this situation than any of us in this thread, and to pretend that any of us may know better than them in regards to this is just wild (and, really, you're doing the same thing you say they are - accusing them of something without proof).
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
dTal 4y ago
The key to the success of Rick and Morty is that it's a very subversive show, sometimes to the point of being disturbing. Its embrace of comedic nihilism undermines classic sitcom tropes in much the way The Simpsons did when it was new. I always got the impression that this stemmed in no small part from Justin Roiland. It's not exactly a surprise that someone with so little regard for social convention turned out to have untenable personal attributes, but I wonder if Rick and Morty will continue to have "bite" without him. That said, if it also results in the exorcism of Rick and Morty's more toxic subtexts ("it's fine to be an asshole if you're smart" and "most people are dull and provincial and their concerns deserve ridicule"), it's probably a net win. We shall see.
- shrimp_emoji 4y ago
  >it's a very subversive show Very subversive. We're talking Million Dollar Extreme levels! (Wait, no; then it'd be canceled already.)
  - dTal 4y ago
    I'm not sure if this is meant to be sarcastic (I'm not familiar with Million Dollar Extreme), but in any case I want to draw attention to a particular piece of subversion that encapsulates everything good and bad about Rick and Morty. (Spoilers) In the very first season, there's an episode where Rick reluctantly helps Morty attract his crush with a "love potion". Now this is obviously messed up, but it's a classic trope that pops up in all sorts of mythology. We've all seen it and we know how it goes - generally it blows up in some sort of monkey's paw way and the offenders get some sort of poetic comeuppance, lending the story a satisfying resolution and a clear moral. Rick and Morty goes out of its way to subvert this - it blows up alright, we saw that coming a mile off, but everyone in the world except the protagonists are gruesomely affected. And they don't resolve the problem, they run away. With no negative consequences for them whatsoever. They get to keep living their lives as before, while their original family and everyone else they knew continues to suffer horrifically offscreen. Sitcom does not reset. Morty is traumatized and Rick just shrugs. The end. This is a shocking thing to see on TV. It sends all kinds of terrible messages. And perhaps that's the very reason why it was so captivating, why Rick and Morty felt so fresh. It was making a very clear statement that in the RIck and Morty universe, normal dramatic tropes don't apply. Poetic justice can't be relied upon, just like in real life. Anything can happen.
machina_ex_deus 4y ago
I don't think he's replaceable. It's like house of cards without Kevin Spacey. Actually even worse, one of the best episodes was an episode completely voiced by Justin, of an entire society, and he managed to play so many different personalities of the same character. Never seen this level of voice acting. It was pretty obvious that he's got issues. Had a scene where a writer literally confesses that he has bad tendencies and channels it all into his work (the gazorpazorp episode). It's kind of sad that society and cancel culture don't allow bad people to do good things. If those were workplace allegations you really can't let someone like that work, but that's not the case. I'm all in favor of him both losing most of his money to compensate his victims and continuing to work on Rick and Morty. But society can't handle nuance, and the mob judges people instead of actions. Literally nothing good happened as a result of this cancellation. Just blind mob justice. People aren't black and white, bad people can do some good things and everyone sins. He deserves a punishment fitting his crime, and the purpose of the punishment isn't vengeance. If an action is good there's nothing morally wrong with letting a bad person do it.
- pubby 4y ago
  >I don't think he's replaceable. He hasn't been writing for the show these past few seasons, so his only contribution is his voice. Voices are usually replaceable. > I'm all in favor of him both losing most of his money to compensate his victims and continuing to work on Rick and Morty. But society can't handle nuance, and the mob judges people instead of actions. Literally nothing good happened as a result of this cancellation. Just blind mob justice. The show is still being made. Society hasn't lost anything.
  - dTal 4y ago
    >He hasn't been writing for the show these past few seasons That explains a lot. The shift in tone is very noticeable.
  - machina_ex_deus 4y ago
    It was already getting worse, at this point it's not really going to be Rick and Morty anymore. Ship of Thaddeus except different ship entirely.
dbg31415 4y ago
Well, that's that.
krolden 4y ago
I'll never forgive adult swim for cancelling venture bros.
- dragontamer 4y ago
  I gave Venture Bros a look a while back, and it scratched my pop-culture references + nihilism itch way better than Rick and Morty ever did. I don't know why though. Nothing matters in Rick and Morty because they can always hop to another universe (as that universe's Rick and Morty die) and pick up where they left off. Similarly, Venture Bros nothing matters cause everyone can be cloned and fixed even if they die. But somehow, Venture Bros hits my funny bone way harder.
- more_corn 4y ago
  Go team Venture!
clolege 4y ago
I learned about Flanderization [0] on HN recently and was surprised to read that Rick and Morty is a show that consciously tries to avoid it. Honestly, I think they’ve done a pretty good job and as a result the show still feels fresh and entertaining in the 6th season. But I imagine that’ll be quite a bit harder without Justin. Whatever they were doing they had a formula for making some dang good tv. R&M is far better than any other adult cartoon I’ve seen, to the point that I think it might be one of the best TV shows I’ve ever seen. Here’s to hoping that Justin gets in a better spot, and the next few seasons of R&M don’t pull a Game of Thrones. [0] https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Flanderization https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Flanderization
tomatotomato37 4y ago
Roland was arrested for this in 2020, which should have been obvious to his employers by at least the period of absence from being imprisoned, not including all the other random times off he would have had to take for court dates. Why did they continue working with him for two years after, and why did it also take two years for this to end up in the news?
- BulgarianIdiot 4y ago
  You just get arrested, you lose your businesses, projects and job. Is this the world you live in? Because that's a very harrowing world.
- Forgeties79 4y ago
  Frankly they (probably) had no way of knowing if he didn't want them to. He is (was?) a high level creative. If he goes, "hey guys I can't record Thursday I have something personal I need to take care of," that's probably it. Hell the show's release schedule was absurd until season 5 or so, clearly no one really held them to the fire because they were a huge cash cow.

30 points by cion 4y ago

Khelavaster 4y ago

It's really because he sent so many chains of creepy, solicitous messages to 15-16 year old fans who flirted with him.

BulgarianIdiot 4y ago
We know of zero cases where he actually tried to meet those fans, let alone touch them. Even in the undesirable case he did, 16 is the age of consent in most of the US, which I'm just saying so everyone calibrate their vitriol accordingly. Some things are inappropriate, but not illegal, and therefore don't deserve automatic banishment from society. But here, the feeling I get is that he has alcohol problems, drinks, and tweets really dumb, cringe shit to strangers, thinking he's just hilarious (which he's not). That's his Twitter problem. As for the criminal case against him, the court should decide, not us.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

qikInNdOutReply 4y ago

Why cant normal people not produce something that is entertaining? And why can they not quit ostracizing the freak-show, they produce en mass to entertain them. Why can the social cripples not dance in the limelight and then die out of sight, out of mind? Well, Dan Harmon got a prolonged vacation to and they needed him back, so here we go. The usual "He is checking" in routine, which is actually just some acting coaching, were the maimed learn to keep it in the closet. A interesting discussion about origin, healthy handling of the problems and solving them permanently, is to much to ask.

hobbitstan 4y ago

What happened to ‘innocent until proven guilty’? Are mere allegations enough to lose your job?

jjulius 4y ago
>What happened to ‘innocent until proven guilty’? We don't know what internal conversations looked like at Adult Swim. We don't know if, or of not, they are aware of anything else that may have happened that encouraged them to make this decision. I'm not saying anything did - the point is, we don't know their reasoning, but we should assume that the decision wasn't made lightly.
- hobbitstan 4y ago
  The idea of Adult Swim having a serious conversation makes me LOL
- notch656c 4y ago
  The accuser is unknown and the accused is a smart guy with counsel. Which means from the employer viewpoint they know some <redacted> person accused him and they get a generic response from the lawyer about not being able to comment about an ongoing case. The chance the employer has credible knowledge of guilt is extremely slim.
  - jjulius 4y ago
    My "We don't know if, or of not, they are aware of anything else," comment clearly suggests that the reasons for terminating him may not be limited to this court case specifically. It's been covered in many articles that this sort of behavior from him has been an open secret for a bit. I don't claim to know whether or not that's true, I'm simply saying that none of us know exactly why AS did this, whether or not it was only about the pending legal case or something more, or anything. All we can do is assume they didn't make the decision lightly. Adult Swim is clearly a lot closer to this situation than any of us in this thread, and to pretend that any of us may know better than them in regards to this is just wild (and, really, you're doing the same thing you say they are - accusing them of something without proof).
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]

dTal 4y ago

The key to the success of Rick and Morty is that it's a very subversive show, sometimes to the point of being disturbing. Its embrace of comedic nihilism undermines classic sitcom tropes in much the way The Simpsons did when it was new. I always got the impression that this stemmed in no small part from Justin Roiland. It's not exactly a surprise that someone with so little regard for social convention turned out to have untenable personal attributes, but I wonder if Rick and Morty will continue to have "bite" without him. That said, if it also results in the exorcism of Rick and Morty's more toxic subtexts ("it's fine to be an asshole if you're smart" and "most people are dull and provincial and their concerns deserve ridicule"), it's probably a net win. We shall see.

shrimp_emoji 4y ago
>it's a very subversive show Very subversive. We're talking Million Dollar Extreme levels! (Wait, no; then it'd be canceled already.)
- dTal 4y ago
  I'm not sure if this is meant to be sarcastic (I'm not familiar with Million Dollar Extreme), but in any case I want to draw attention to a particular piece of subversion that encapsulates everything good and bad about Rick and Morty. (Spoilers) In the very first season, there's an episode where Rick reluctantly helps Morty attract his crush with a "love potion". Now this is obviously messed up, but it's a classic trope that pops up in all sorts of mythology. We've all seen it and we know how it goes - generally it blows up in some sort of monkey's paw way and the offenders get some sort of poetic comeuppance, lending the story a satisfying resolution and a clear moral. Rick and Morty goes out of its way to subvert this - it blows up alright, we saw that coming a mile off, but everyone in the world except the protagonists are gruesomely affected. And they don't resolve the problem, they run away. With no negative consequences for them whatsoever. They get to keep living their lives as before, while their original family and everyone else they knew continues to suffer horrifically offscreen. Sitcom does not reset. Morty is traumatized and Rick just shrugs. The end. This is a shocking thing to see on TV. It sends all kinds of terrible messages. And perhaps that's the very reason why it was so captivating, why Rick and Morty felt so fresh. It was making a very clear statement that in the RIck and Morty universe, normal dramatic tropes don't apply. Poetic justice can't be relied upon, just like in real life. Anything can happen.

machina_ex_deus 4y ago

I don't think he's replaceable. It's like house of cards without Kevin Spacey. Actually even worse, one of the best episodes was an episode completely voiced by Justin, of an entire society, and he managed to play so many different personalities of the same character. Never seen this level of voice acting. It was pretty obvious that he's got issues. Had a scene where a writer literally confesses that he has bad tendencies and channels it all into his work (the gazorpazorp episode). It's kind of sad that society and cancel culture don't allow bad people to do good things. If those were workplace allegations you really can't let someone like that work, but that's not the case. I'm all in favor of him both losing most of his money to compensate his victims and continuing to work on Rick and Morty. But society can't handle nuance, and the mob judges people instead of actions. Literally nothing good happened as a result of this cancellation. Just blind mob justice. People aren't black and white, bad people can do some good things and everyone sins. He deserves a punishment fitting his crime, and the purpose of the punishment isn't vengeance. If an action is good there's nothing morally wrong with letting a bad person do it.

pubby 4y ago
>I don't think he's replaceable. He hasn't been writing for the show these past few seasons, so his only contribution is his voice. Voices are usually replaceable. > I'm all in favor of him both losing most of his money to compensate his victims and continuing to work on Rick and Morty. But society can't handle nuance, and the mob judges people instead of actions. Literally nothing good happened as a result of this cancellation. Just blind mob justice. The show is still being made. Society hasn't lost anything.
- dTal 4y ago
  >He hasn't been writing for the show these past few seasons That explains a lot. The shift in tone is very noticeable.
- machina_ex_deus 4y ago
  It was already getting worse, at this point it's not really going to be Rick and Morty anymore. Ship of Thaddeus except different ship entirely.

dbg31415 4y ago

Well, that's that.

krolden 4y ago

I'll never forgive adult swim for cancelling venture bros.

dragontamer 4y ago
I gave Venture Bros a look a while back, and it scratched my pop-culture references + nihilism itch way better than Rick and Morty ever did. I don't know why though. Nothing matters in Rick and Morty because they can always hop to another universe (as that universe's Rick and Morty die) and pick up where they left off. Similarly, Venture Bros nothing matters cause everyone can be cloned and fixed even if they die. But somehow, Venture Bros hits my funny bone way harder.
more_corn 4y ago
Go team Venture!

clolege 4y ago

I learned about Flanderization [0] on HN recently and was surprised to read that Rick and Morty is a show that consciously tries to avoid it. Honestly, I think they’ve done a pretty good job and as a result the show still feels fresh and entertaining in the 6th season. But I imagine that’ll be quite a bit harder without Justin. Whatever they were doing they had a formula for making some dang good tv. R&M is far better than any other adult cartoon I’ve seen, to the point that I think it might be one of the best TV shows I’ve ever seen. Here’s to hoping that Justin gets in a better spot, and the next few seasons of R&M don’t pull a Game of Thrones. [0] https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Flanderization https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Flanderization

tomatotomato37 4y ago

Roland was arrested for this in 2020, which should have been obvious to his employers by at least the period of absence from being imprisoned, not including all the other random times off he would have had to take for court dates. Why did they continue working with him for two years after, and why did it also take two years for this to end up in the news?

BulgarianIdiot 4y ago
You just get arrested, you lose your businesses, projects and job. Is this the world you live in? Because that's a very harrowing world.
Forgeties79 4y ago
Frankly they (probably) had no way of knowing if he didn't want them to. He is (was?) a high level creative. If he goes, "hey guys I can't record Thursday I have something personal I need to take care of," that's probably it. Hell the show's release schedule was absurd until season 5 or so, clearly no one really held them to the fire because they were a huge cash cow.