Film Theory: Did Rick CLONE Beth - SOLVED! (Rick and Morty)

Hello, Internet! Welcome to film theory the show officially tolerated by Dan Harmon sure Rick and Morty season 3's finale may have Just aired, but today my sights are set on the episode that came before - the ABCs of Beth. Which had one of the most ambiguous endings in the history of the series And had the potential to forever change Everything we thought we knew about a member of the show's main cast now at this point you all know that where there's ambiguity in A show there are theories to be had and I think that I have this one pretty well Solved you can pull the wool over everyone else's eyes there Dan But not this guy after last week's collab were like totally soul bonded now Or at least I like to think so you Understand how serious Krutabulon soul bonding is? The character in question is Beth the unfulfilled mother of the Smith family who gets a chance To revisit Fruppy Land, her imaginary childhood world with the single dumbest name possible You know if you're so great at naming things Why don't you do it from now on? Well there Beth is horrified to learn that Froopyland is now ruled over her childhood friend Tommy who she may or may not have tried to kill out of jealousy as a kid "You wanna see the honey swamp?" "Yes!" "Well I wanna see you dead." "Huh well that's interesting fake news." in order to survive in this fantasy world Tommy has had to resort to an endless cycle of incest and Cannibalism it's basically the most disturbing version of Jumanji ever. "I'm an overweight middle-aged man. Wait a second where's my phone?" Okay second most disturbing version of Jumanji ever. fast-forward to the end of the episode Beth tries to bring Tommy back to reality in order To reunite him with his family and save his father's life his father who happens to be on death row was supposedly guilty for Tommy's disappearance Tommy though refuses to leave his incest Kingdom and Beth has no choice but to gruesomely finish the job that she started back when she was like seven Rick suggests that they solve the dead Tommy problem by Creating a clone of Tommy with the finger that he's so happily donated to Beth during her murderous Rampage thereby acquitting Tommy's father of the child murder charges. They do so in with an innocent man Freed a family reunited and the day saved Beth spirals into some existential angst "Dad I'm out of excuses to not be Who I am so Who am I what do I do?" Rick then drops a bombshell? Saying that the same process that they used to create the clone of Tommy it could also be used to create a clone of Beth Allowing Beth to go off on whatever Soul-searching journeys that she wants while the clone takes care of the kids back at home after Staring at some photos of her family Beth comes to a decision And then the show immediately cuts away without us ever knowing what that decision is the next time that we see her and Rick though They're behaving very differently very affectionate even dropping the dreaded L word. "I love you dad" "Love you, too, sweetie" the episode ends and leaves us with one question are three boobs truly better than two sorry That's the B storyline leaves us with one question Did Beth choose to stay or did she replace herself with a clone it may seem like the creators of the show have made it Impossible for us to know for sure if the show actually gives us all the information that we need to figure it out definitively throughout this episode clocks and references to exact units of time are Everywhere first we get a glimpse of the clock in the execution chamber when Beth and Rick prevent Tommy's father from being lethally injected It reads 1:56 and this gives us our starting point we can assume that shortly after that Rick and Beth start to head home We know that they drive home and don't use the portal gun because we see them actually walk through the front door this also makes Sense since they were transporting Tommy who needed to stay unaware of Rick's crazy Scientific schemes so we know for a fact that they were at the execution chamber around 2:00 p.m. And it would take some time for them to return from the execution site back to their home where Rick eventually makes his cloning But how long would that take well we can calculate the distance between the two locations we know for a fact Thanks to Justin roiland Twitter account that the Smith residence is canonically located in the suburbs outside of Seattle, Washington This is a weird factoid that I never really thought about but makes a lot of sense now that I'm researching it It's not like every city has their own execution chamber just waiting to be used in fact There is only one execution chamber in the entire state of Washington and it's located at the State Penitentiary in Walla, Walla, Washington A four and a half hour drive away from the Seattle area that means that even if Beth were in a rush to get home After the 2:00 p.m.. Execution these soonest that she would be arriving back at the Smith residence would be around 6:30 p.m. mark it down because it's the crucial point in our timeline when they get back to the house Beth indicates that she's Exhausted and ready to call it a day It's only After this point that Rick gives best the talk and reveals that he has the ability to replace her with a clone we know from Earlier in the episode with Tommy that the process of growing a clone takes around three hours also worth pointing out It's an oddly suspicious detail for the writers to include their rights almost like they wanted us to know this information For some reason anyway regardless this means that the absolute Soonest that Rick could possibly have a clone ready to replace her with would be around 9:30 p.m. provided everything goes perfectly But waits freeze frame the clip of the kids coming home at the end of the episode look out the window It's broad daylight does that look like 9:30 p.m. Anywhere in the world to you even at Seattle's northern latitude? Which does give it longer days during the summer. The longest day of the year has it sunset at around nine o'clock p.m. Even then the longest day of Seattle's year by 9:45, it would already be dark outside Which means that the final scene we see of the Smith family has to happen at around 8:30 p.m. At the latest it's certainly enough time for best to get back from the Washington State Penitentiary But definitely not enough time for Rick to have created a clone to replace her in that final scene Ergo the Beth that we see in this final scene must be the real deal She is a hundred percent authentic Beth Smith it turns out she decided to stay at home and be a mother to her children rather than head out on some whacky Fantastical soul-searching adventure the adventure she chose for herself in that moment was motherhood Okay, so now let's deal with some challenges that I'm sure I'm gonna hear in the comments first Maybe all this is happening on a separate day But we can prove for a fact that it's not at the beginning of the episode we hear that the kids are late for their Custody weekend with Jerry aren't you guys supposed to be at your father's for custody weekend? And we hear on the TV that the execution is happening quote tomorrow So we know that the episode is starting on a Saturday and execution is happening on a Sunday We see Saturday night midway through the episode so we know that everything around the clones is happening on Sunday the day of Tommy's father's Execution we also know that the kids are headed back home Sunday evening and not Monday morning because the pizza place Renaldo's is closed because it's too late I think Renaldo's is closed and lastly we know that this show doesn't cheat time dimension-hopping yes But messing around with time is a big no-no on Rick and Morty just take it from my buddy dan time travel is a real Shark jumper Plus Rick even reminds us at the end of the episode that there are no time-travel shenanigans to be had by the way that wasn't Time-travel which means that all evidence considered we can definitively say that Beth is real It was like the show's creators were drawing our attention to these details To ask us to solve the mystery on our own Just like I'm drawing your attention to the subscribe button right now so that you can solve the mystery of Subscribing on your own that way you can be notified of more Rick and Morty theories in the future click it and while you're down There next to the comments. Let me know in three seconds Whether you think at the end of the episode was Beth real, or was she a clone just one worth real or clone Here's how many of you I was able to convince now I know that some fans have been picking apart that scene trying to figure out whether the Beth we see at the end is a Clone based on her behavior debating about whether she's acting more affectionate than the real Beth would, but in this episode We don't need to psychoanalyze anyone to come up with the truth the solution was right there waiting to come out It was all just a matter of time, but hey that's just a theory a film theory and cut and by the way special Thanks to Reddit user deaths coming 23 who got me to look into this theory on the game theorist subreddit You're a suggestion to look at the clocks was awesome and also just as a reminder I don't talk about it all that much But if you guys have a theory request or just a theory of your own the best way for me to see it is actually On the game theorist or film theorist subreddit. Yes some loyal theorists actually created one for film theory too I'm trolling around there pretty frequently to see what you guys are excited to see covered And if you have any great theory starters of your own so check them out if you haven't and hey if you missed my collaboration with Rick and Morty creator himself Dan Harmon picking apart the science of pickle Rick well that video link is on your left to the right is something that YouTube has Algorithmically determined that you'll want to watch next let's see how good of a job. It does. See you next week for something That's a little bit more emotive

Channel: The Film Theorists

Views: 8,548,604

Rating: 4.7341976 out of 5

Keywords: Rick and morty, beth clone, pickle rick, rick and morty season 3, rick and morty theory, beth, rick and morty season 3 episode 2, rick and morty season 3 episode 4, rick and morty season 3 episode 5, rick and morty season 3 finale, rick and morty finale, rick, morty, journal 3, pickle, rick and morty film theory, film theory, matpat, film theorists, pickle rick rat, film theory rick and morty, rick and morty gravity falls crossover, dan harmon, clone, clones

Id: iK7lICvUhCI

Length: 8min 39sec (519 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 02 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/KidLight]

I'm pretty sure the show ended on a Monday. Jerry did grab Morty and Summer out of school.

Also Rick did mention something about daylight savings at the end so some of those analog clocks might of been behind because no one changed them, not sure if that changes anything but maybe its something to look into?

[u/tothrax]

At 4:24, you can see a clock through the orange liquid in the machine, it says 2:00. This is a pretty important detail. since if Beth was cloned, then it would have ended around 5, at which time, it would still be daylight.

[u/CloudDatFoxxo]

Okay, I got Reddit just for this junk... So... Here's a fun thought... Beth and Jerry were acting so lovingly to each other because this could be the last time they see eachother. Meanwhile in the garage, Beth's clone is still being developed... That's why shes so calm at the end of Episode 9, but THEN starts to panic in episode 10! It's because she IS the clone for episode 10, the real Beth is gone, doing whatever she wants. This adds alot more theorizing to be done, and it would DEFINITELY fit into the time schedule.

[u/sdrft1]

One thing I noticed is he assumed the weekend was Saturday to Sunday. This is wrong in the sense that custody weekends run Friday to Sunday in most cases. If this were the case that means Rick would have had plenty of time to clone beth. This is one thing overlooked that could easily crumble this theroy. Edit: some weekend can even include an overnighter meaning that it could have even been Thursday to Sunday. Source child of divorced parents

[u/Peppsy]

You assumed the execution was at 2pm but it could have just as easily been 2am. Executions are regularly held between midnight and 3am

[u/Silverseren]

Yeah, he's completely wrong.

Rick and Beth NEVER went to Walla Walla penitentiary with Tommy. They dropped Tommy off at his parents' house in the suburbs (which is likely nearby to the Sanchez house, since the two of them played as children) and then ran away after ringing the doorbell.

Meaning they got home not long after, likely at 10 or 9 in the morning, considering that it would have taken the parents, as you said, 4 hours to get to Walla Walla and the 2 PM sentencing.

So there was PLENTY of time for Rick to clone Beth. Even if they had their talk around 2 PM as the clock in the house indicates.

[u/cool_beanarie]

What about the fact that the kids went to school before coming home for the final scene? Wouldn't that imply that the final scene is happening on Monday not Sunday?

[u/foxboyking]

I really like the idea, but there's one thing that breaks this theory for me. If you pause at 4:25 you can clearly see a clock behind the clone tank. And it's pointing at 2 pm. This reality might just have more execution chambers.

Though, it's still impressive how well everything else would have fit together.

[u/Deathscoming23]

So cool that I was mentioned in an episode! While I went about it a different way then you it is awesome. Now I looked through here and I think I got somewhat an explanation to the school issue, who ever said it was a Saturday? The execution on T.V. said tomorrow, so what if the Kids leave on Sunday? Too me this makes the most sense story wise as well as looking Jerry and kids plot line in your version of events, Jerry would drop the kids off, not tell his alien girlfriend any time on Sunday and tell her Monday in which the hunt begins, plus we don't see the kids hang with Jerry any more, so your telling me outside of Beth and rick's story line we skip Sunday entirely with the kids? Unlikely in my opinion. So this means the Execution happened on Monday