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After seven seasons, a couple of video games, a stack of comics, an official D&D tie-in set, and an actual series of events that culminated in people going wild in the real-life physical fast food restaurant McDonald's over revived sauce, the animated series Rick and Morty likely needs no introduction. And season 8, which premieres May 25 on Adult Swim, is more Rick and Morty for better or worse.

That's not to say the new season is in any way bad. Having seen four episodes of Rick and Morty season 8 – "Summer of All Fears," "The Rick, The Mort & The Ugly," "The Last Temptation of Jerry," and "Cryo Mort a Rickver" – the folks making the show are still putting out great work from the writing to the voice actors to the animation. But it also falls into a trap that Rick and Morty's previous success has set for itself.

The show is largely a sci-fi adventure featuring grandpa Rick Sanchez and grandson Morty Smith getting mixed up in all sorts of alien, multidimensional shenanigans that frequently play with and subvert expectations. After years of subverting expectations, however, the new expectation… is that Rick and Morty will subvert expectations. And it does, but that's still technically meeting expectations. It's certainly a pickle, but not quite a Pickle Rick.