It's Officially The Start Of An Era For Rick And Morty

Although Rick and Morty (sort of) had a handful of spinoff shows before President Curtis, the sci-fi comedy franchise has officially entered a new era with the arrival of HBO Max’s hit show. Rick and Morty’s historic success saw the show become Adult Swim’s biggest series ever, earning an unprecedented season 12 renewal from the network before its ninth season had even begun airing.

As such, readers might reasonably assume that, more broadly, the Rick and Morty franchise has benefited, and is subsequently flourishing. Since all nine seasons of Rick and Morty were critical successes, it stands to reason that every spinoff the show spawns should also have also turned to gold. Unfortunately, on the contrary, Rick and Morty’s spinoffs have been a mixed bag, to put it mildly. First, there was The Vindicators, a series of ten extremely brief slice-of-life vignettes released straight to YouTube in 2022.

While occasionally amusing, The Vindicators was mostly nothing, with the entire ten-part superhero satire series running barely as long as a single episode of the original show. Then 2024 saw the arrival of Rick and Morty: The Anime, a disastrously unpopular spinoff that was called a major disappointment and inexplicable failure upon its release. The failure of Rick and Morty: The Anime held up further Rick and Morty spinoffs until HBO Max's President Curtis, a 2026 outing that seems to have finally cracked the code.

HBO Max’s Hit President Curtis Is Rick and Morty’s First Full Spinoff Series

Starring Keith David as the title character, the amoral POTUS who has a longstanding love/hate relationship with Rick, President Curtis sees its eponymous antihero face various supernatural threats and interdimensional aliens on a weekly basis. Series creator Dan Harmon compared the spinoff to the ‘90s classic The X-Files and critics concurred, with its mostly Earth-set adventures and comparatively grounded tone reminding viewers of the iconic paranormal cop show.

Of course, the fact that President Curtis is more grounded in its storytelling than Rick and Morty doesn’t really say much, since the original show didn’t even wait until the end of its pilot episode to leave planet Earth behind. Rest assured, President Curtis is almost as surreal and anarchic as its predecessor, with Community’s Jim Rash playing a half-leprechaun member of the Secret Service, while Brooklyn Nine-Nine’s Stephanie Beatriz plays the president’s cyborg chief of staff.

Still, the very slightly more grounded tone of the show works in President Curtis’s favor, as the series is still bizarre and silly, but Curtis and his minions aren’t quite as overpowered as Rick. Since Rick can easily defeat almost every character in the original show, outside of Evil Morty and Rick Prime, President Curtis represents one of the first times viewers have seen a comparatively normal human character from the franchise tackle its many bizarre threats.

President Curtis’s Success Could Finally Lead To A Rick and Morty Movie

Despite the peripheral projects outlined above, President Curtis is the first proper Rick and Morty spinoff, and the show is now trending on HBO Max US. It is tough to guess what is next for the franchise, but the success of the new series could reignite interest in a potential movie spinoff now that the show has proven its longevity over its 13-year run.

In June 2026, Harmon announced that the Rick and Morty movie is officially in development, with supervising director Jacob Hair attached as director. Not a lot else is known about the feature-length spinoff, and Harmon did tell ScreenRant that the movie’s script was being developed in tandem with the show itself. However, the HBOMax success of President Curtis means that the Rick and Morty franchise is perfectly primed for its first movie in the near future.