Earlier this month, NBC News revealed that Justin Roiland, best known as the co-creator of Rick and Morty, had been charged with domestic violence, in conjunction with an incident that happened in 2020. Roiland pleaded not guilty at the time, and for the last two-and-a-half years he’s undergone more than a dozen hearings. This had all been kept quiet until NBC broke the news, but Adult Swim, which has long aired his popular animated show, is only now coming around to severing ties with him.
— Rick and Morty (@RickandMorty) January 24, 2023
As per The Hollywood Reporter, on Tuesday Adult Swim announced that they had severed ties with Roiland. That doesn’t mean Rick and Morty is ending. It means Dan Harmon, the show’s co-creator, is now the sole showrunner. It also means the principal duo, both of whom have always been voiced by Roiland, will have to be recast.
Back in 2018, Adult Swim forked over a fortune for a whopping 70 more episodes of Rick and Morty. As of now, the show, which is famously slow to complete episodes, isn’t even at the halfway mark of completing that contract.
The charges against Roiland include one felony count of domestic battery with corporal injury and one felony count of false imprisonment by menace, violence, fraud and/or deceit. The identity of Roiland’s alleged victim has not been made public, though it’s believed it was a girlfriend of his at the time. Roiland was charged in May 2020, arrested, and released that August on a $50,000 bond. He was arraigned in October of that year, during which he pled not guilty. His trial date has yet to be set.
Since then, all while undergoing one hearing after another, Roiland’s career has continued to flourish. His new Hulu show Koala Man bowed this month, while last year he released the video game High on Life. His show Solar Opposites premiered the same month he was charged.
(Via THR)