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Spoiler warning! This article contains plot details about an upcoming series. |
| “ | Hi, Summer. You probably won't remember making this, but I just wanted to say I love you. And you should love yourself. The first thing your peers will try to take from you is your adult empathy. It's your greatest gift and the one thing that they-- |
"Summer of All Fears" is the first episode of the eighth season of Rick and Morty. It is the 72nd episode of the series overall. It premiered on May 25, 2025. It was written by Jess Lacher[3] and directed by Fill Marc Sagadraca[4]. This episode is rated TV-14-LV.
Synopsis[]
To punish Morty and Summer, Rick puts them in a simulation. However their experience inside the simulation leads to real life repercussions.
Plot[]
The Episode begins with a grown up Summer, as a business woman, and grown up Morty, as an off the grid ex-soldier, making chargers obsolete in a world obsessed with chargers. It's revealed this was to escape a Matrix Rick put them in to punish them for not returning his phone charger. Rick plans to erase their memories of the in-Matrix 17 years of experience but the kids decide against it. A now mature Summer and Beth begin to connect over a glass of wine. Beth starts appreciating this new Summer. They go out on a ladies day out. Summer and Beth go to the barber and get new looks. Summer lets her hair get cut short just like how she looked in the Matrix. Due to Summer's overconfidence and criticism, Beth begins to get irritated by her.
Meanwhile, Morty on the other hand has PTSD from his Matrix experiences. Rick catches Morty working on Rick's death race car. A shattered beer bottle triggers Morty's PTSD. A flashback to the moment Summer and Morty first arrived in the Matrix. Summer runs away while Morty gets arrested for theft (of not a phone charger this time). Morty gets send to Chargeria State Prison. Morty survives a brawl, he picks up a couple of skills and gets a tattoo of a charger. Morty is allowed to leave the prison early for good behavior. Unable to get a job due to his prison experience and "stealing of charger", Morty decides to join the firefighters after meeting CJ at a bar. After extinguishing a burning outlet (and many more, we assume), Morty, CJ and the other firefighters witness a broadcast of a terrorist on TV beheading a charger. Filled with anger, Morty and his crew decide to join the military to fight the war against the terrorists. We return from the flashback to current Morty. Rick and Morty work further on the death race car.
In the evening, after returning from the shopping trip, Beth borrows Rick's charger, triggering Morty's PTSD. The flashback now shows Morty in the warzone. While his fellow soldiers die in gruesome ways, Morty is unable to die. The flashback ends. Morty doesn't care anymore and says nothing matters out here. Beth, annoyed at another one of Summer's critical comments, tries to erase Summer's memories. While Beth chases her daughter down to Santa Fe, Morty puts Rick in a Matrix. Giving him a taste of his own medicine. To escape this Matrix, Rick builds a Matrix (modeled after the one from the 1999 movie of the same name) inside the Matrix. Rick discovers Morty has stolen his death race car. while Morty is driving the death race car towards a power grid called Power Plant Valley, Beth tracks Summer down at Zenta Fe, a pottery - meditation spot in Santa Fe. Summer and Beth reconcile. After seeing a TV broadcast on her phone, Summer runs back home to stop Morty's rampage. Another flashback is shown where Morty is holding a dying CJ. CJ calls him his brother he never had before. In rage, Morty breaks into the bunker and kills the terrorist Osama Bin Chargin. Morty succesfully breaks into the Power Plant.
If he succesfully takes down the powergrid, All electricity and chargers will be taken down but also North America will be unhabitable. Summer arrives and reveals to Morty that she planned the entire war Morty partook for lithium. They reconcile and Morty stands down. A comment by one of the scientists makes Summer and Morty think they were stuck in another Matrix, which isn't the case. After severely beating up the guy to the point his nose is broken, Rick arrives and stops the two. Suddenly a pillar near the power grid breaks off and causes a nuclear meltdown. Rick takes care of the issue before another Chernobyl could happen. After getting the tattoo that he and CJ shared, Morty and Summer let their memories get erased by Rick. The moment after waking up, Morty already begins to question the tattoo, failing to remember the significance. While in bed, Summer watches a video message of her former mature self. She ignores this and calls Tricia instead.
In the post credit scene, Beth returns to the Zenta Fe spot from earlier in the episode. During a meditation session, she discovers that the lost women that run the place are vampires. She fights her way out by pushing one of them into the sun. She belittles them for setting up base in a sunny area like Santa Fe.
Characters[]
Major characters[]
Minor characters[]
- 8-Ball
- Chop Block
- Marmaduke
- Osama Been Chargin
- Guard #2
- Grace Smith
- Sharon Lewis
- Principal Vagina
- Shonda
- Vampires
- Bully (cameo)
- Nancy (cameo)
- Samantha (cameo)
- Jerry Smith (mentioned)
- Tricia Lange (mentioned)
Deaths[]
- CJ
- 8-Ball
- Chop Block
- Marmaduke
- Osama Been Chargin
- Vampire
- Chargeria actor
- Chargeria director and film crew
- Multiple Chargeria prisoners
- Multiple Chargeria terrorists
- Multiple guards
- Multiple Chargeria soldiers
Locations[]
- Parmesan Dimension
- Smith Residence
- Harry Herpson High School
- Power Plant Valley
- Santa Fe
- Zenta-Fe
- Tattoo Parlor
- Matrix Simulator
- Chargeria
- Chargeria Fire Department
- Chargeria State Prison
- Chargeria Armed Forces Recruitment Station
- Chargentia (mentioned)
- Phoneippines (mentioned)
- Chargeria
Episode notes[]
Trivia[]
- This episode was previewed early with the following episode "Valkyrick" at the Stuttgart International Festival of Animated Film in Germany and Departure Festival + Conference in Toronto.[5][6]
- This is the eighth episode (after "Auto Erotic Assimilation", "Interdimensional Cable 2: Tempting Fate", "The Rickshank Rickdemption", "The Ricklantis Mixup", "Never Ricking Morty", "Ricktional Mortpoon's Rickmas Mortcation" and "Unmortricken") that has the intro shortened to the title only.
- In celebration of Season 8, Pocket Mortys' weekly updates coincided with new episodes, including new avatars and Mortys for players to collect. With the release of this episode came Tech CEO Summer as an avatar, along with Simulated Morty and Welding Fear Morty to catch.
- This is the second episode of the series to include Summer's name in the title (after "Wet Kuat Amortican Summer") and the first episode to use only Summer's name.
- Jerry does not appear in this episode, besides a sketch of him (and Beth) in Summer's office within the cold open.
Series continuity[]
- The mind blowing technology first seen in "Morty's Mind Blowers" makes a return.
- Rick says "Wubba Lubba dub-dub!" before escaping the Matrix, which he last said his catchphrase in "Rickmurai Jack".
- Later in the episode, Summer goes to Santa Fe and wears a turquoise necklace, referencing how she mentioned wanting to move to the southwest and "do something with turquoise" in "Rixty Minutes".
- Beth fights the workers of Zenta Fe who are revealed to be vampires as vampires have previously been shown to exist on Earth in "Big Trouble in Little Sanchez" and "Mort: Ragnarick".
Cultural references[]
- The episode's title is a reference to the novel and 2002 film, The Sum of All Fears.
- Rick punishes Morty and Summer for stealing his phone charger by placing them in The Matrix, referencing the film franchise of the same name. It is referenced throughout the entire episode.
- When Morty traps Rick, Rick recreates a replica of The Matrix from the films to escape by building mechanical pods and trapping its inhabitants in them.
- In her office, Summer has framed photos of her on magazine covers parodying Better Homes, The New Yorker, and Rolling Stone.
- Morty's post-military life as a hermit with a remote cabin and two dogs references Bob Lee Swagger's post-military life in the film, Shooter.
- Morty modifies one of Rick's tanks which Rick refers to as his Death Race car, referencing the 2008 film, Death Race 2000. He later references the film after finding out that Morty left with the car and hopes the situation is Death Race-related.
- Morty mentions how he and CJ used Nokia 3.5s to build the Reg-Rahc.
- Osama Been Chargin is a parody of terrorist Osama bin Laden.
- CJ's full name is revealed to be Christopher James Motorola, with his last name referencing the telecommunications company, Motorola.
- After the central chamber breaks in the Power Plant Valley, a panicked researcher mentions the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.
- Zen's place called “Zenta Fe” is a play on words between Zen and Santa Fe (a reference to the city in New Mexico).
- When Summer says the phrase “I visited Chargentina and the Phonenippines” it is a play on words referring to Argentina (South American country) with mobile chargers and the Philippines (Southeast Asian country) with phone.
- Morty's prison jumpsuit says "USB-C", an USB connector used for varying models for Digital audio, video, data and power (i.e. a charger)
Transcript[]
View a full transcript of this episode here.
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