Rick Sanchez

"WUBBA LUBBA DUB DUB!"

- One of Rick's catchphrases.

"I'M PICKLE RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIICK!"

- Rick after being transformed into a pickle.

Rick Sanchez (known as Earth Rick C-137 to other Ricks) is one of two titular protagonists and the overarching main antagonist of the cartoon series . He is the grandfather of Morty Smith and Summer Smith, father of Beth Sanchez-Smith and father-in-law of Jerry Smith.

Despite being one of the main protagonists and loving and cherishing his daughter and grandchildren he has a very complex set of morals as he is a complete drunkard and negative influence on the family who also places them in dangerous situations and looks down on them, especially his son-in-law. He is a spoof of "Doc" Emmett Brown.

He is voiced by who also voices his and his grandson's alternate selves and the Earl of Lemongrab.

History
Little has ever been revealed of Rick's early life. Anything really known was that he married and had a daughter named Beth but left sometime after that due to arguments with his wife concerning the safety of his family and his fixation on scientific experiments. At one point he was part of an intergalactic terrorist group with several of his closest friends including Squanchy and Bird Person, fighting to overthrow the Galactic Federation which was totalitarian and oppressive in nature despite its caring and friendly facade; although this wasn't necessarily the motive for rebellion. He was present for the birth of his grandson named Morty.

Eventually Rick came back into the life of his daughter's family. During this time and previously Rick had been prone to repeatedly jumping through spatial and dimensional barriers, traveling to alien worlds or other unusual places in order to collect materials needed for his experiments and gadgets or make money by doing shady business. His two grandchildren Morty and Summer were quickly recruited to help him. Although appalled at first they became partially corrupted by Rick, adopting some of his callous and violent tendencies.

During this period they managed to destroy at least one version of Earth, nearly cause (inter)planetary chaos multiple times, take down groups such as the Federation and Council of Ricks and cause the divorce of Beth and her insecure husband Jerry, who Rick never approved of and normally degraded to which Jerry would blatantly point out his father-in-law's toxic presence.

Because of his dislike for work Rick had no formal occupation. Most of his vehicles and workshops were self-powered and he typically retrieved anything using his portal gun. However, when money was needed Rick would act as a bounty hunter, take advantage of golden opportunities (removing curses from items for a price, patenting the cure for "Space AIDS", etc.) or sell his creations to those willing to buy.

Personality
"Rick's not that complicated, he's just a huge asshole."

- Morty to Bird Person about Rick.

"So why don't you do us both a favor and pull the trigger?!?! Do it!! Do it motherf***er!! Pull the f***ing trigger!!"

- Rick showing his suicidal tendencies.

"Rick's not a villain, but... he shouldn't be your hero. He-he's more like a demon, or a super f***ed-up god."

- Morty to Summer on Rick's true nature.

Rick's inner personality was overall complicated. It is implied he suffers from intense trauma, self-loathing and loneliness he copes with through his abuse of substances and destructive personality. Rick is incredibly sardonic, revolutionary, cold, grumpy, nihilistic, violent, anarchic and blunt and displays narcissism at times in regards to his inventions. These traits are even acuter when intoxicated.

While he cares very little for even himself he does genuinely love most of his family and two closest friends from his rebellion days despite the typical attitude he shows towards them. He very rarely treats anyone with moderate respect or politeness, specializing in belittling others and throwing his unwanted two-cents in. One of the few things that really make Rick lose his temper are the theft of his inventions, having harm come to his family and friends and double-crossing him; strangely enough he rarely holds grudges against anyone for specific actions, even the aforementioned ones.

Rick's moral standing is even more complex. He will not hesitate to steal, kill, destroy, imprison or break any laws to get what he wants although he has no problem staying within legal boundaries if to his benefit. However, Rick does seem to be sickened by unnecessary violence though he will usually not attempt to stop it.

The only moral aspect of Rick's relatable to normal people is that he acknowledged a woman's consent and usually does not resort to double-crossing himself. According to alternate versions from other dimensions Rick actually sits roughly in the middle of all his counterparts in terms of good and evil and is possibly one of the only surviving Ricks that actually cares about his family as people and not just tools.

Rick has a relatively negative and gray view of life and lacked religious tendencies. He does manage to enjoy himself every now and then, particularly with his family and friends.

Powers and Abilities
Despite being only human Earth Rick C-137 is easily one of the most dangerous entities in both the universe and multiverse as he has easily defeated several of the most powerful beings and organizations around, sometimes while completely intoxicated. Although in recent times he's had help and luck Rick survived crazy adventures for decades on end with very few allies and a lot of enemies.

Intellect
Rick is incredibly intelligent and frequently mentioned to be the smartest being in any one universe. He made countless discoveries and invented numerous gadgets and substances. He seemed to specialize in robotics above all else and could easily work through or around most obstacles. Long-term planning, deception and manipulation were effortless tasks for Rick when he saw through a three-layered Zigerion simulation and pretended to fall for it to eliminate his captors and simultaneously destroyed the Council of Ricks, collapsed the Federation and triggered his daughter's divorce in one fell swoop.

Rick was also incredibly clever, adaptable, resourceful and capable of turning even a hopeless situation to his favor with nothing but his wits and some basic materials, his best example being him creating a biomechanical exoskeleton made of hostile rat and cockroach parts while he was nothing but a talking pickle. However, Rick could be surprised, usually when something went way beyond his prior expectations. Rick could also not predict or interpret the actions of his drunken self, alternate versions or other forms and clones.

Physical Fitness
Despite his advanced age and unhealthy habits Rick still retained impressive strength and endurance. Rick was shown to have extensive cybernetic and bionic enhancements; however, Rick had went through and swapped multiple bodies so it was unlikely they were all enhanced. When in bodies not physically aged or entirely flesh-composed Rick displayed near-superhuman levels of strength and agility.

Combat Prowess
Rick appeared to be proficient at hand-to-hand combat and could effectively use just about any melee or projectile weapon he could get his hands on or build. Rick was also a magnificent and excellent trap builder.

Gear
Being a scientist and inventor Rick both made and bought an extensive and vast arsenal of various weapons, gadgets, vehicles and other creations, having something for just about any occasion. However, there were a few things he usually kept with him more often.

Portal Gun
Rick's most infamous and coveted invention, the portal gun created a green portal that could allow him and others to travel instantly to any part of the universe and cross into other dimensions. Because of this Rick was incredibly difficult to capture or track. The gun could also be used as a makeshift weapon if needed. Opening portals inside objects would slice them in half, they could have something come out of them onto pursuers or others could be transported elsewhere. Rick and his counterparts were the only beings who possessed and could make a portal gun.

Spaceship
A ship shaped like a flying saucer, this was the typical form of transportation for Rick in space. The ship was powered by a small universe full of slaves and had numerous weapons, gadgets and a quasi-sentient computer on board; it was implied the ship had enough armaments to wipe out a large human army without trouble. It also had an unnecessarily cruel and brutal security system which used various forms of horrific torture involving both mental and bodily harm.

Blaster
Rick was often seen carrying an alien sidearm of some sort when situations required violence.

Antagonistic Moments

 * Pilot: Rick got drunk and built a neutrino bomb to destroy the world and have "a fresh start"; however, Morty stopped him and Rick claimed it was all a test. He later froze Morty's school bully Frank Palicky which caused him to shatter in front of Summer who had a crush on him. He then had Morty painfully smuggle Mega-Seeds from an alien dimension's planet inside his ; when this failed due to the Federation's Interdimensional Customs attempting to commence a scan with new equipment anyway he had Morty run to a portal machine with him and even shoot several Gromflomites after inadvertently making him think they were literal robots. After buttering up Morty's parents to let him stay Rick claimed to Morty that school was a waste of time and lied about Frank's death to Summer's face. In fact, because he frequently pulled Morty out he spent only seven hours in two months of a semester at school.
 * Anatomy Park: Although he had a good reason to do so Rick likely traumatized millions of Americans, if not half the world by enlarging a dead naked Reuben in space to enlarge a shrunken Morty and Annie; he reshrunk Annie even though Morty had fallen in love with her.
 * M. Night Shaym-Aliens!: He tricked the Zigerions and their leader Prince Nebulon into blowing themselves up with what they believed to be the formula for concentrated following his and Jerry's escape from an overwhelmed holographic simulation. He later threatened Morty in bed with a knife to see if he was still a hologram.
 * Rick Potion #9: Rick told Morty that Jerry and Beth's marriage was hanging by a thread. He had also shown disdain for Jerry because he impregnated her with Summer when the two were in high school. Rick made a huge mistake by giving Morty a serum to make Jessica love him because her flu made the serum spread throughout Morty's school. He tried to fix it using DNA but made things worse and accidentally transformed nearly everyone on Earth into mantis-human hybrids that wanted to mate with and then eat Morty. He used various DNA samples in one final serum to fix things but instead turned nearly everyone on Earth into horrible mutations called Cronenbergs. The mess made was seemingly irreversible so Rick went with Morty to another universe where they both died from an experiment after supposedly finding the real cure; Rick even admitted doing it several times before. Morty was traumatized over this catastrophe while Rick didn't seem to care about him and his grandson digging their own graves.
 * Mortynight Run: He sold an antimatter weapon to Krombopulos Michael and used the alien currency Flurbos to play at the space arcade Blips and Chitz; when Morty prevented Michael from fulfilling his contract by accidentally running him over Rick berated him for "[killing his] best customer" and saving the target in question, a cloud of psychic gas self-named Fart and suggested finishing what the assassin started multiple times. When the ship's mechanic Gearhead notified the authorities Rick clogged his mouth with sticks and shoved his "gearsticles" into his face. He later assisted in destroying their pursuers and referred to Morty's name as a replacement word for "sh**" due to recent events.
 * Something Ricked This Way Comes: Rick started a store called Curse Purge Plus! solely to anger Summer and Lucius Needful and destroy their business. He laughed when Summer stated his actions drove Lucius to attempt suicide and lit his store on fire with people inside when he grew bored of it. After Lucius betrayed Summer and took n33dful.com for himself Rick and Summer worked out while using steroids, became extremely muscular and brutalized Lucius and several other mean-spirited people.
 * Close Rick-Counters of the Rick-Kind: He assaulted several members of the Council of Ricks after being accused of killing other Ricks and kidnapping other Mortys.
 * Ricksy Business: He sent Morty, Abradolf Lincler and Nancy out to get Kalaxian Crystals on an unknown planet knowing the risk of doing so. After Morty and Nancy returned Rick didn't care about how Lincler appeared to have died during the mission since he really wanted to use the crystals as another substance to Morty's confusion and anger. At the end of the episode Rick froze time so Beth and Jerry wouldn't realize the party destroyed the house and he, Morty and Summer proceeded to cause mayhem without consequence.
 * A Rickle in Time: It was established that at some point Rick stole a Time Crystal from the Fourth Dimension which caught the attention of interdimensional law enforcement-officer Shleemypants. He, Summer and Morty later defeated him by creating multiple overlapping fractured timelines to beat him up in and killing his living weapon Chris.
 * Get Schwifty: Although intending to save the world from the Cromulons Rick broke into the Pentagon and turned two federal agents into snakes when they approached him. At the end of the episode he did the same thing to General Nathan and killed him afterwards although the latter was attempting to shoot him, Morty and the President.
 * Auto Erotic Assimilation: After being dumped for good by his hivemind ex-girlfriend Unity following her realization of his true potential for corruption Rick unfroze an infantile alien creature he had kept in the garage and disintegrated it using a death ray before attempting to disintegrate his head although he failed in doing so due to passing out from prior intoxication. He later attempted to confront Unity alongside an oblivious Morty after she barricaded herself in a protected fortress, mostly refusing to leave even after being threatened with destruction.
 * The Ricks Must Be Crazy: Rick built and enslaved an entire miniature universe, or "Microverse" to power his vehicle's battery and set back its technological progression once he discovered the inhabitants had found a way to generate their own electricity through the work of Rick's Microverse contemporary and counterpart Zeep Xanflorp. He then fought Zeep and indiscriminately destroyed an even smaller universe causing the destruction of two separate species. Before doing this he engaged an elaborate defense system protocol on his vehicle called "Keep Summer Safe" that killed, injured and/or traumatized many people including his own granddaughter.
 * Big Trouble in Little Sanchez: After transporting his mind from his Tiny Rick body back into his original body due to the toll inhabiting a younger version of himself took on him Rick decided to abandon his "Operation Phoenix" and brutally murdered his clones with an axe in front of Morty and Summer. Beforehand he killed the newest teacher at Morty's school for being a vampire.
 * Look Who's Purging Now: Rick took enjoyment in murdering numerous Cat People when they tried to attack him, Morty and a Cat Person named Arthricia during a -style event on another world, telling Morty they were justified due to trying to save an innocent girl; he even had his family send over advanced equipment to increase their effectiveness in combat. He and Arthricia also killed the higher-class Cat People for orchestrating the event in the first place and cursed her for shooting him in the liver when she took his vehicle with the intent of eliminating her world's rulers.
 * The Rickshank Rickdemption: Rick intended to take over the Sanchez-Smith family by getting rid of Jerry, hoping Beth would choose to divorce him. Rick did so because he felt betrayed since Jerry tried to turn him in to the Federation so Rick wanted to get rid of both of them. This led to Jerry suffering a low-class single life in a rundown condo. He also virtually eliminated both the Federation and Council of Ricks before indirectly revealing Jerry's betrayal to Beth causing her divorce.
 * Vindicators 3: The Return of Worldender: Rick felt jealous about Morty idolizing the Marvel/DC-style superhero group the Vindicators so he went out for a drink to pull himself together. However, this caused Rick to become so intoxicated resulting in a more sinister version of himself called Drunk Rick; he thus wound up being the main antagonist of the episode alongside Supernova. This led to him setting up a dangerous Jigsaw-esque game he, Morty and the Vindicators ended up in after he succeeded in killing their greatest enemy Worldender and his followers and resulted in the Vindicators except Supernova being destroyed after infighting and personal breakdowns. After Morty solved the puzzles he received another message from Drunk Rick intended for Noob-Noob (who was the only one to laugh at his jokes) rather than Morty much to the latter's outrage; adding insult to injury he forgot all about Noob-Noob and allowed Supernova to escape.
 * Pickle Rick: Rick tried to get out of family therapy by turning himself into the form of a talking pickle he named Pickle Rick and convincing Beth he was trying something new. After getting lost in the local drainage systems he killed multiple sewer rats using a suit he crafted out of rat and cockroach body parts and escaped into an office. He soon engaged in a battle of wits with the agency director of a European terrorist organization, murdering most of his henchmen with improvised weapons and later the director himself with a cache of set explosives after befriending a prisoner named Jaguar.
 * The Whirly Dirly Conspiracy: Rick decided to take Jerry on his next adventure out of pity since Morty was worried he might eventually commit suicide; after realizing Jerry accepted a deal from alien assassins led by Risotto Groupon to have him destroyed on the Whirly Dirly Rick felt betrayed yet again and left Jerry behind to be eaten by an alien snake monster after he and Jerry deactivated and brought down the immortality field surrounding it. When Jerry scolded Rick for stealing the family from him, calling him a "self-righteous piece of sh**" Rick volleyed back letting Jerry know he was "a predator" who used his cowardice and pitiful ways to make others feel sorry for him like when he got Beth pregnant at 17 years of age causing the latter to give up her life goals. Rick decided to rescue Jerry but only because he needed organic bait to have an alien creature take them back to the resort. He later blasted a disgruntled Groupon who had attempted to kill him and spare Jerry, doing it after they were caught up in hallucinations from a spaceship's energy waves which made Groupon question his actions and when Jerry protested Rick told him he had been "talking himself into it."
 * Rick and Morty: Virtual Rick-ality: Rick killed a baby alien.
 * Morty's Mind Blowers: Rick erased Morty's memories of him screwing up so he would continue to appear infallible in Morty's eyes; Morty's discovery of this resulted in a brawl that ended with both their memories wiped clean before Summer managed to restore them. he and Morty later got angry at Summer for supposedly letting them fall asleep during Interdimensional Cable.
 * The Rickchurian Mortydate: He and Morty cut all ties relating to the President to which war was declared on both of them. In the climax he single-handedly killed several government Secret Service agents without even touching them and several more using his gadgets; afterwards he requested a selfie from the President himself and got into a battle after he refused.

Trivia

 * Although his actions affected Earth multiple times he somehow managed to evade authorities or keep them ignorant about his activities. The only authorities that actually tried to grab him by the throat were the Galactic Federation and Council of Ricks.
 * In "The Rickchurian Mortydate" the President explained that the government avoided trying to arrest Rick and Morty because they saved the world on numerous occasions.
 * Unlike the stereotypical genius that hides their intelligence from family members in most fictional works his family was well-aware of his activities and even actively participated in his (mis)adventures, especially his grandchildren.
 * Rick seemed to have developed apathy towards his family members as Beth stated she was one of infinite Beths with infinite fathers in the infinite universes, showing that for Rick the family was replaceable.
 * Rick was obsessed with the Szechuan teriyaki dipping sauce used to promote the original  in 1998.
 * Rick hinted at being autistic as while playing  with Morty he asked if autistic people loved the game and stated that he did.
 * However, this was unlikely and most definitely a stereotype of indie game fans so Rick could've lied.