Morty might never be the same again after Rick and Morty's latest episode

While it might seem like a standalone episode, Rick and Morty season 6, episode 2 could have some big implications on the series going forward. The latest outing, 'Rick: A Mort Well Lived', begins after Morty gets trapped in the video game.

Inside the game, titled 'Roy: A Life Well Lived', Morty’s personality has been splintered into five billion NPCs, leading Rick to have to infiltrate the game to try and convince them all to escape with him. If he does this, then he’ll be able to restore Morty in the real world. 

Of course, there’s a catch: he needs all of them, or at least 92 per cent of them, to agree to come with him or the Morty we know and love won’t make it out. Rick’s task doesn’t prove easy when Marta – who has become Morty’s most influential character in the game – realizes Rick doesn’t care about saving all of them. She rebels and starts a holy war that lasts generations, leaving her followers to refuse to follow Rick out of the game.

Eventually, after her granddaughter comes to her saying her generation wants to leave, Marta agrees and sends all of the characters other than herself with Rick. It seems the mission was a success, as Morty is remade with almost his entire personality (provided all those who died were likely replaced with new generations).

However, a dark fan theory has suggested that the transition maybe wasn’t as smooth as we first thought, thanks to Marta's absence. "Earlier in the episode, Rick says it’s fine to leave Marta behind because she’s only 1/5,000,000,000,000th of Morty and therefore a statistically insignificant piece that can be left behind without noticing the difference," one user theorized on Reddit.

"I don’t think this is the case," they continued. "At the beginning of the episode she is very one-dimensional and simple (like all of the other NPCs) but over the course of the episode, she develops into a much more complex character that has a nuanced view of Rick. As the only piece of Morty that Rick was really interacting with, it seems like Marta grew to be a bigger piece of Morty than she originally was."

If this is the case, it’s likely Marta’s absence in Morty’s personality may cause some larger issues for the teenager, including that he might have lost the one part of himself that sees Rick a bit more shrewdly.

Eagle-eyed fans may have noticed that Morty was acting a bit different at the end of the episode too. In the final moments, he tells Rick that he "trusts him implicitly" as Summer wonders if "he’s alright". Rick’s response is somewhat cagey as he lies he got all of the Mortys out – before we find out that Marta is still in the game.

Now Rick and Morty is getting a bit more canon, it seems pretty likely that this storyline could come back later in this season, or even in seasons 7 and 8, which are currently being written. In the meantime, check out our guide to the best Rick and Morty episodes.