There’s a hopeful, almost comforting tone to “President Curtis,” the latest spinoff set in the “Rick and Morty” universe. That may be odd to hear about a show that features the president of the United States fighting werewolves and telling a child he keeps it “wrapped and strapped.”
That’s because “President Curtis” lacks the nihilistic streak that’s central to the DNA of “Rick and Morty.” Instead of following a man so brilliant and powerful that nothing matters, the series from co-creators Dan Harmon and James Siciliano zooms in on Keith David’s wonderfully voiced President Curtis, a global leader responsible for all the low-level sci-fi nonsense that Rick doesn’t care about all while caring about his approval ratings along the way.
“Culturally, I think the question ‘Why should the protagonist care?’ was a question that had a lot more appeal 10 to 15 years ago. So it actually is an advantage in the current marketplace of viewers’ experience to start with the question ‘Of course, the protagonist cares. What do we do about things?’” Harmon told TheWrap. “There’s a greater tradition of that in TV storytelling anyway. Plus, ‘Why does the president have to care about this?’ is not the question anyone wants to start with right now.”
Siciliano, who has worked on “Rick and Morty” since 2019, finds the more grounded stakes of “President Curtis “refreshing.” He’s written behind such beloved episodes as the Citadel-focused “The Rick, The Mort & The Ugly” and “Rattlestar Ricklactica,” which introduced the world to snake jazz. Both he and Harmon are intimately aware of how daunting it can be to write for a show where literally anything in the multiverse is possible.
“There was an experiment that we embarked on as early as Episode 2 of Season 1, which was ‘What if the fear of jumping a shark did not wag the dog or mix the metaphor?’” Harmon half joked, referring to the fact that “Rick and Morty” has always been unafraid to answer mysteries or resolve story arcs that would last multiple seasons on other shows. “That was a smart move because then your show would always have to be about character and not plot. If Rick can do anything and if life and death don’t matter that much, then the show is going to have to continue to be about whether or not someone’s jealous or feeling betrayed or angry.”
“Stakes for Rick are not always the easiest thing to come up with,” Siciliano told TheWrap. “‘Rick and Morty’ starts from a place of ‘What if nothing mattered?’ as a question. With the presidential role, so much matters. Everything matters to Curtis because if it didn’t, then he wouldn’t be good at his job. He’s a guy that truly believes that, as a soldier and a vampire hunter, it’s his job to keep people safe.”
President Curtis has been part of “Rick and Morty” since Season 2. The “Rick and Morty” team always loved writing stories that featured the president, particularly because Keith David does such a good job elevating the petty, overly cocky world leader into someone you want to root for. But this spinoff series has been in the works for five years, according to Siciliano. The idea came about after “Rick & Morty’s Thanksploitation Spectacular,” which was written by Siciliano and directed by Douglas Einar Olsen, an episode that follows yet another battle between Rick and President Curtis after Rick turns himself into a turkey in an attempt to get a presidential pardon.
“It’s also [the episode] where we started to explore more of ‘The X-Files.’ We got a little bit more dialed in on Spider FDR and and that element of the world, National Treasure and all that stuff,” Siciliano said. “We can expand this world out beyond ‘Rick and Morty,’ and it won’t really overlap a lot with the ‘Rick and Morty’ world.”
“[This show] has boundaries like death mattering and time and space being things that need to be traversed with effort. I think that’ll be a good thing for the time being because it doesn’t limit the show in terms of amount of content,” Harmon said. “If you zoom in on something smaller, you just increase the resolution. There’s still so much story to take place there.”
“President Curtis” premieres on Adult Swim July 26 at 11:30 p.m. ET/PT. New episodes will premiere on Adult Swim on Sundays and be available to stream the following day on HBO Max.
