Dan Harmon does sit down interview with Hollywood Reporter, discusses his own issues and Justin Roiland

[Jman]

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-features/dan-harmon-interview-rick-morty-community-krapopolis-justin-roiland-1235600699/
 

Quote

Roiland started to pull back during season two. By then, the room was working considerably longer hours, as Harmon obsessed over the show’s quality, and the environment was no longer as much fun. After the season wrapped, Roiland sat down with Harmon and acknowledged just how miserable he’d become working at the show. The implication, according to Harmon, was that it was his fault. “Honestly, I wasn’t sure what he was saying,” recalls Harmon, “other than, maybe, ‘I feel like I’m in your shadow and I wish I wasn’t.’ ” 

Mike Lazzo, who was running Adult Swim out of Atlanta at the time, was aware of the growing tensions insomuch as he’d see signs when he came to visit. “Dan would be in the writers room and Justin would be running radio control cars around the studio,” says Lazzo, who gives Harmon the lion’s share of the credit for Rick and Morty’s success: “It’s so dependent on writing and character, and those are Dan’s strengths. I remember I’d get frustrated waiting on his scripts, but then they’d arrive and they would be masterpieces.”

At some point in season three, Roiland simply stopped showing up. A mediator was ultimately brought in, but the exercise went nowhere. “I always felt like Justin wanted everybody to make him feel more comfortable, and I was just like, ‘Everybody wants to make you comfortable, communicate, tell us how to do that,’ ” says Harmon, who acknowledges: “I was freaking out about the whole thing because I wanted the partnership to function. I wanted him happy because when he’s happy, we have a hit on our hands.” 

As drama waged behind the scenes, the show’s ratings continued to soar. Rick and Morty had quickly become the most viewed comedy among millennials in all of television. It was easily the most watched series in Adult Swim’s history. After season three, the two even managed to put their differences aside long enough to secure an additional 70 episodes, which was more than double the amount that had already aired. “It was like Justin and I were in love again, because we were dealing with the powers that be and talking about how rich we might be if we negotiated together,” says Harmon. But the moment was short-lived. 

The last time he and Roiland spoke was over text in 2019, a conversation that left Harmon in tears. “He said things that he’d never said before about being unhappy, and I remember saying to him the last time we spoke in person, like, ‘I am worried about you, and I don’t know what to do about that except to give you all the string and also just say I’m scared that you’re not going to come back.’ But then this conversation became unprecedentedly confrontational.” Harmon stops himself there. “I think that’s as far as I get to take the story. At that point, we’re no longer both there for it, and it starts to become not only unfair for me to continue but totally uncomfortable because, from there, a friendship goes away, and I still don’t fully understand why.”

 

[MasqueradeOverture]

The timeline does kind of explain the dip in the back half of S4 / almost all of S5. There's a miasma of misery and "do we have to keep doing this?" for a good chunk of those episodes.

Also, Dan Harmon should play Rick Rubin in a movie.

[[classic swim]]

I think the easiest solution would’ve been to just tell your business partner to be a man and to grow the fuck up.

I normally wouldn’t shit on a sense of dire compassion but if you’re 50 years of age then you shouldn’t have a sob story about trying to nurture an emotionally stunted baby.

[Daos]

Wahhh I'm unhappy I need to have 3 ways with underage teens wahhhhh!