While Rick & Morty co-creator – Justin Roiland – occupies himself with his very own Hulu series Solar Opposites, Adult Swim’s other golden boy – Dan Harmon – has teed up the first of many projects in an exclusive content deal with Fox, animated by the latter’s Bento Box Entertainment as opposed to the former’s Star Burn Industries.
For all the Community fans out there waiting on a revival – or the “movie” in #6seasons&amovie – don’t hold your breath. But what you can do is tell your disappointment to suck it because Old Man Harmon looks as if he’ll deliver something in vaguely the same space as Community, exploring the very same making-it-work familial group dynamic.
According to Variety, the untitled series is set in mythical ancient Greece, centred on a “flawed family of humans, gods, and monsters” who attempt to run one of the world’s first cities “without killing each other”. In other words, we may be in for the most Dan Harmon spectacle possible.
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“Leave it to Dan Harmon to turn the mythos of early Greek civilization into a remarkably sharp commentary on today’s politics, celebrity, and pop culture,” says Michael Thorn, President of Entertainment at Fox.
“This project is an incredibly irreverent family comedy as told by one of the town’s most inventive storytellers. We are proud to be partnered with Dan on this series, which strengthens our hold on the animation space and, as we continue to build Fox Entertainment, marks an important first step for us with our first fully-owned scripted property.”
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Harmon appears to be in rare form lately, slowly but surely shedding his reputation as a serial procrastinator. In addition to the forthcoming project with Fox, last year, the man himself stated Rick & Morty season 5 will actually arrive on time – potentially even sooner than anticipated.
“We’re more on schedule than we’ve ever been,” says Harmon, noting the minimal impact of COVID-19 in regards to the production’s digital workflow.
“It kind of makes you have to focus on the whole process when you don’t have this office environment anymore… Everyone has to run this bee colony remotely, so the honey just gets made more consistently. It’s working for us.”
In late July of 2020 during the Comic-Con at Home virtual panels, an early preview of Rick And Morty season 5 was screened to audiences, throwing audiences right back into that signature high-concept chaos. This was also when – to everyone’s surprise – Harmon confirmed that they were “basically done writing”.
Although an exact release date for Rick And Morty season 5 has yet to be announced, without so much as a hint beyond the basic reassurance that it’s “coming soon”, Dan Harmon has previously teased the following:
“There’s an episode in season 5 where Morty has a relationship with another female character that’s not Jessica. It’s just a great little story and my very, very longtime friend and collaborator Rob Schrab wrote it… He’s also a very tender writer – a juvenile John Hughes. He really feels heartache on a level a man his age shouldn’t… my Emmy is going to that one.”
Fox is aiming for a 2022 debut with voice casting currently underway.
