The title of this article may have surprised many of you. Rick Sanchez goes on bizarre, fantastical, and usually horrifying adventures across infinite dimensions and across the cosmos with his grandson Morty. How can anyone find Rick relatable after a description like that? Well, I can't speak for everyone but when I first watched the series I immediately latched onto Rick because of his emotional struggles that result from his attempts to find some level of meaning in the universe. Rick is the farthest thing from a positive role model when it comes to his attitude and behavior toward those who care for him and the rest of the universe, but his behaviors and motivations (or lack there of) are understandable and allow us to sympathize (to an extent) with his plight.

Rick Sanchez is an intelligent person. Anyone who can create a portal gun that can teleport anyone to an infinite amount of dimensions, not to mention the other devices he has created, is worthy of being called intelligent. His intelligence has allowed him to experience countless cosmic wonders and horrors that normal humans could only imagine. However, this wealth of experience has caused Rick to become emotionally dead inside which led to depression and alcoholism. The countless adventures Rick has gone on have taught him that the universe is so vast and random that nothing that happens in it ultimately matters. From these experiences, Rick developed into a nihilist and emotional cut himself off from his family.

For example, in the episode "Rick Potion #9" Rick and Morty accidentally transform all the humans on Earth into horrendous monsters. Rather than work to solve this problem, Rick simply finds a dimension where they cure the infection but get killed shortly after. This allows Rick and Morty to take the dead Rick and Morty's' place in the new dimension and pretend nothing happened (even though they left their world and the rest of their family behind). While this realization emotionally scars Morty, Rick just gets a beer from the fridge and watches television. Rick is aware of the infinite amount of universes and infinite Ricks. Due to this, Rick does not view most of his loved ones as "special" or meaningful. If you could just replace them with the exact same person from a different dimension at any time would you see them as "special."

While my views are not that extreme, I do see where Rick is coming from. I also try to find meaning and significance in my life, but I ultimately feel like the world is so large and infinite that the lives of humans equate to the same significance that ants do on planet Earth. Various human beings have come and gone throughout time leaving little to no signs of their presence. A meteor could strike this planet at any time and wipe our entire species off of the face of the Earth. This, like the dinosaurs, could lead to the rise of the next dominate species on Earth (my money is on the robots). The world is a vast and constantly expanding place that does not care for the whims and wishes of one species.

I hope I didn't depress all of you with that last statement, but it is how I feel at times. Most times it feels like any attempt to add significance or meaning. Rick attempts to find meaning and importance in his work by doing things that no other human has done before. I have this same mentality when it comes to my writings. Within Rick, we can all see our struggle to make sense of a random and unfeeling universe. All humans try to find happiness and significance in various aspects of our lives (work, family, friends, art, etc.). We may never find the meaning of life in the universe (if there is one), but the struggle to find one gives our lives some-what of a meaning. That may not sound spectacular, but at least it's something.