Justin Roiland Breaks Down His Career, from 'Rick and Morty' to 'Adventure Time'

I haven't done this before.

I could learn stuff and this could be really fun,

just, how does Disney make a show,

you know what I mean?

Like what kind of checks and balances

and nets of mediocrity are we gonna be working with here?

I'm Justin Roiland.

And this is the timeline of my career!

[whimsical music]

[alarm beeping]

♪ There's something out in space that could use ♪

♪ Just a little investigation ♪

All right, Most Extraordinary Space Investigations,

that was a Channel 101 show that me, Dan Harmon

and Sevan Najarian put together for fun one night.

We wrote it, or we didn't even write it,

we just kind of outlined it, and then we shot it

in one night, and then Dan took the footage.

And we kind of forgot about it.

And then at the panel meeting, we were watching tapes

and Dan produced it, and he's like, I've got a tape.

And he put it in, and he had edited it

and made it into this ridiculous show

and it was really funny

and it got screened, it got voted back

and we just kept making episodes.

Sarah Silverman joined us, I think on the second

or third episode, as like a regular cast member

of the space investigators.

[laughing] It's so dumb.

We would shoot it in my old apartment in Sherman Oaks

and just like, it was the most lo-fi,

like there was zero production value.

But people liked it.

Anyways, whatever.

It was a lot of fun to make that show

because we weren't allowed to write anything

until we got together the night we were gonna shoot it.

So we would get together,

having no idea what the story was gonna be,

and then we would all sit around

and just kind of smoke weed and, [laughing]

and you know, then we'd just come up with the story

and then just start shooting it all night long.

We'd usually wrap shooting around like four in the morning.

In my apartment.

[laughs] It was like everything was in my apartment

or around my apartment.

It was so funny.

Here goes nothing.

I just wanna let you know, that I don't trust you.

[upbeat music]

Mharti, Mharti we have a problem.

So The Real Animated Adventures of Doc and Mharti

was, I wanted to just do those voices

and kinda screw around, but I also wanted to make something

really shocking and disgusting on purpose.

I had done it before with a thing

called Unbelievable Tales.

I got a huge rush off of being in the audience

and hearing the audience like just scream

and cover their eyes and, I don't know,

there was something really cool about having

that kind of effect on, you know, 400 people in a theater.

It was like, it was just insane

to elicit reactions like that.

And so that was kind of the primary motivation.

And then as I was making it, I kind of found,

I really liked the characters and the voices a lot

and I liked, I just liked, you know,

the talking to myself as those voices

and there was a lot about it that I liked

so I kind of accidentally stumbled upon that

throughout the course of making it.

But the audience definitely freaked the [beep] out,

which was amazing.

But I don't understand how that would work, Doc,

I don't, I don't, I'm confused, I don't--

Mharti, trust me, I built this car with my

own two hands. You just need

to adjust.

I can help you have fun.

I'm a friend you can trust.

Hmm.

[screaming] Leave him alone!

No rhyming.

Acceptable TV, that was a show on VH1 for a minute.

The show was kind of a little microcosm of Channel 101.

So we basically banked a bunch of sketches and animations

and then when the show was live,

the audience would vote on their favorite two shows

through this website that was designed, on Ruby on Rails.

And I remember that being a huge problem

because the website sucked and it was easy to hack

and all this shit.

So the show would air and there would be

five little mini TV shows that were like sketches.

And then people would vote on their favorite two.

We would find out Sunday which shows came back

and then we would get to work and basically start writing

the second episode of whatever shows they'd voted on

and start producing them.

We did a thing called Mr. Sprinkles

for the first episode, it got voted back,

and I had an animation department that I was running

where we were having to animate the second episode

in basically three and 1/2 days.

It was [beep]ing insane 'cause it was on light boards,

you know, classic animation,

painted backgrounds and After Effects.

And then the show kept, the animation kept getting

voted back eight weeks in a row,

and we were [beep]ing dead, the animation department

was just on fumes, 'cause we weren't sleeping.

I remember eight weeks, I was just like,

I can't [beep]ing do this.

And I was also bummed because all these cartoons

we had banked are never gonna air.

Like we had animated I think four different

cool, fun little cartoon TV show ideas

and it was just Mr. Sprinkles the whole time.

The audience really likes this Mr. Sprinkles stuff.

It was good, I like Mr. Sprinkles, it's fun.

Whatever.

I'm fine all day when the sun is out,

but when it rains I scream and shout.

But this isn't about screaming and shouting,

is it Mr. Sprinkles?

♪ Oh I found a perfect roomie ♪

♪ Who could be a perfect buddy ♪

♪ Together we'll make a lovely pair ♪

I took a meeting with Mike Moon at Disney.

Alex Hirsch was there, that was the first time I met Alex.

And then they pitched me this Fish Hooks thing.

And Alex was looking for someone to help him develop it.

It was very different, I was like,

oh, I haven't done this before.

I could learn stuff and this could be really fun,

just how does Disney make a show, you know what I mean?

Like what kind of checks and balances

and nets of mediocrity are we gonna be working with here?

So, and how can I rise to that challenge

and try to help make something that's really good

or as good as it can be?

Okay Bea, then it's a date!

See you tomorrow!

I mean, not a date date, because you know,

why would I want that?

[laughing nervously]

This castle is in

unacceptable condition!

Unacceptable!

Ah, Adventure Time.

Ah, the French wine. [laughing]

Adventure Time was fun, that was Pen Ward.

He was a fan of my podcast, called Grandma's Virginity,

check it out, all the episodes are still online.

And, actually don't check it out, don't even, who cares.

But he came on an episode and then I think,

I feel like on the episode, I was like,

Come on Pen, put me in this show.

I might have been doing that.

And then he ended up like actually offering me a part

and I didn't know what it was gonna be.

And I went and recorded, I went there

and I just started, I just was like, How about this?

And I screamed.

I just did the screamy voice.

And he was like, That'll do.

It was really cool and I did the first episode

and then by the third episode, it was,

there was so much of Lemongrab,

there were a bunch of clones of him

and I was doing all of them and they all screamed.

And I was in the booth for about three hours.

Unacceptable!

Hm, acceptable.

What!?

And after that I went back

to the Rick and Morty writers room

and I remember that we were talking about something

and I tried to do Morty's voice and I couldn't do his voice,

it just wouldn't happen.

And then Tom Kenny told me,

I think I was recording him for an episode, and he was like,

You need to go to this doctor.

I went to see this doctor and he,

he was like, Okay, yeah.

You don't have any vocal nodules

but your vocal cords are super, super swollen.

You need to not talk for like two weeks.

And here's a cortisone shot.

Boom!

Cortisone.

That stuff.

No, it doesn't, it just hurts, I don't know.

I couldn't talk and so I had to download this app,

this text-to-speech app called, like, Talkbot.

It sounds really depressed.

Like everything you type and,

if you type out what you want or what you need to say

and you hit play, and the voice sounds really sad.

And so people thought I was sad the whole time and I wasn't.

We ended up using that voice for the butter robot.

That's literally how I was talking.

If you listen to the butter robot

in that Rick and Morty episode,

that one famous Rick and Morty episode

with the butter robot, you know the one I'm talking about.

What is my purpose?

Pass the butter.

Thank you!

That's literally what I sounded like for two weeks.

All because of Lemongrab.

[screaming]

There's only one way out of here.

Through me!

[dramatic music]

Oh, ugh, sorry.

Come on.

Through me!

Gravity Falls.

I knew Alex.

He was around when we were working on Fish Hooks,

he was literally like down the hall.

And he always had his door closed

and he was developing Gravity Falls in that room.

When they got going with the first season,

he had me come in and do a few different characters.

He knew he wanted me in there somewhere

and so it was just like, coming in and doing a voice

and then it wouldn't stick.

And then I'd come in and I think I did maybe two,

I can't remember what characters.

And then I came in and did Blendin and that one clicked.

It was like, okay, this one feels right.

That was fun.

It was fun to be that character because I knew,

there was a lot of stuff that that character

was involved in, a lot of Easter eggs,

like throughout the course of the season.

So that was really cool to be that character.

Blendin Blenjamin Blandin!

How could you not know my name after you ruin my life?

No you can't.

Jessica doesn't even know I exist.

But, but, but, but forget about that because

you can't blow up the planet--

I get what you're trying to say, Morty.

Listen, I'm not, you don't, you don't gotta worry about me

trying to fool around with Jessica

or mess around with Jessica or anything--

So Rick and Morty.

That was, the genesis of that obviously

was with Doc and Mharti as we discussed earlier,

as you heard me ramble about.

Then I kinda started workshopping those characters,

you know, into stuff that's a bit more legitimate,

not just shock, gross stuff.

And then Harmon called me and said, Hey, Adult Swim

wants an animated show from me.

And at the time he was working on Community.

He's like, Do you have anything?

'Cause you're the, you're the animation guy, I don't,

at the time he was like, I don't know animation.

He knew the characters 'cause I had been doing them

in Channel 101 for years.

He was like, Yes, okay.

I [beep]ing love those characters.

That's the perfect thing that we can work around.

I ended up meeting up with him and we just sat

and developed the show and kind of

built a sturdier, more broad frame around the characters,

which is what became Rick and Morty, the family.

A stable foundation to build absurd craziness on top of.

I didn't realize how valuable that was.

In retrospect it's insanely valuable

and it's like a lesson I learned.

I still think you can make really cool shit

that's just insane, everything's insane

and it doesn't need to be super grounded

and palatable and stuff, but I see the strength

for Rick and Morty and where that takes us.

It doesn't feel like it's just a bunch of nonsense.

It's like, it's very, there's, it's very grounded.

I remember doing the animatic for the pilot

and turning that in, and the network

did not like my voices at all, for Rick and Morty.

They did not.

Lazzo hated it.

I think a lot of people there were like, Uh.

We like this show a lot

but the voices are [beep]ing terrible.

And at the time, Morty was more like, Ah jeez,

ah come on, what's going on man, like [groaning],

like really obnoxious and grating.

So they had a phone call without me.

And Harmon called me afterwards and he's like, Okay.

I'm just gonna rip the Band-Aid off here.

They loved the pilot, they don't like the voices.

I fought for Rick so you're gonna get to do Rick.

But we gotta recast, we have to cast somebody for Morty,

we have to look for somebody.

And I was like, [beep], like that completely

defeats the whole point.

'Cause I really wanted to be able

to bounce back and forth and do these characters

the way I had been doing them.

And a lot of that stuff was me making shit up

and just weird shit will come into my head doing that.

But I was like, Okay, I'm not gonna freak out.

Let's play ball.

We'll audition people.

We auditioned a bunch of people, a bunch of good people.

We picked our favorite three, we submitted them,

Lazzo hated them.

Well, hate is a strong word.

He just was, it didn't work.

He was like, This isn't working.

And I called Lazzo and I just said, Listen.

We'll keep looking.

'Cause he, the note was, he wanted it grounded.

He wanted it a normal voice, not warbly and over-the-top.

This is the conversation that I found out,

oh, that's why they didn't like it.

'Cause I'm doing this crazy version of Morty

and I need to just make him more grounded and normal

and it's really about the acting.

So I had my buddy Bryan Newton

storyboard these little recordings I did.

Like Dan wrote up a couple little sentences of like,

okay, this is the scenario, Rick and Morty are in the car

and Rick's talking about how he's gonna start a new world

but he won't, he's gonna get Jessica

but he's not gonna do anything with her.

And I was like, Just a little blurb.

So I took that as like a, you know, my prompt.

And I just recorded that whole scene.

And I did Morty normal and made Morty pissed.

Like I remember I needed Morty to get mad and I needed Morty

to show some spine in him to fight back.

And I knew that was super important

to selling the character and the voice.

And then I cut the audio and I gave it to Bryan,

who storyboarded it all, and I cut those boards

into an animatic and I sent that to Lazzo

two days before we sent our top three picks

for the Morty voice, and I swear to god

one of those people woulda gotten the part

because they were really good.

Like they were all like, Oh, this is what he wants.

He called me the next morning and he's like,

Okay, you got the part, this is great.

Just, you know, be the best Morty you can be,

or something, I can't remember what he said.

But I was like, Phew, thank god.

And then we ended up taking that animatic that I improv'd

and we put it as the cold open to the pilot.

It's not anything to do with the story you're about to watch

but it's a really great scene that introduces you

to both Rick and Morty in a really interesting, funny way.

Then we went on and we're making episodes to this very day

and they're about to premiere.

What a world with the, in my garbage dungeon.

I was able to finally get a garbage dungeon.

Is it on camera?

Oh yeah.

That's a live feed from the other room back there.

Anyway.

Let's keep going.

What are you crazy?

Just let you ruin the whole world?

All right, all right Morty.

All right, all right, I'll land, I'll land,

I'll land, I'll land the thing, I'll land the thing.

Big tough guy.

[Deep Voice] Merry Christmas, mother--

[deranged squeaking] [man yelling]

[gunshots] [deranged squeaking]

[both screaming]

Krampus was my buddy Michael Dougherty,

making another one of his zany horror movies

that he tends to make, that character.

He was like, Hey, do the voice

of one of these little goblins,

these little cookie gingerbread monster guys.

It was so fun, it was easy.

But yeah, he did it on this giant soundstage.

It didn't even feel like work, like,

it was just like goofing around in this giant soundstage

and it was just me and Michael and the engineer.

It was like super, there wasn't a bunch of people there.

And we just sorta hung out, and then we recorded

and then watched a little bit of the movie.

Not the whole thing, but you know, different scenes.

It was super exciting, I was like really,

I was like, Dude, this movie's awesome.

I'm a big fan of his stuff, he's great.

I wanna see him do more low-budget horror stuff,

and not movies like Godzilla, 'cause it's like,

who wants to direct a $300 million movie,

that sounds like a [beep]ing nightmare.

You know, think of all the cooks in that kitchen.

That does not sound like something

that you'd be able to have much fun doing.

In my humble opinion.

[deranged squeaking] [man groaning]

Murder Powder?

Aw, he wants more Murder Powder?

Who's my little drug addict?

Me.

Aw, sorry, we're all out.

[moaning]

I need that Murder Powder.

Hot Streets was my friend Brian's show.

I helped him sell that show

and I executive produced it for him.

In full disclosure, need to make sure that's clear

for legal reasons.

And I did the voice of Chubbie Webbers.

And Brian was writing lines of dialogue for this character

that didn't speak, so I would see the script

and I'm like, There's all this dialog that I'm not,

you want me to just mumble stuff.

So that was pretty good.

It was in the days before the coronavirus

so it was a good time, you know?

I think we take those times for granted,

or we took them for granted.

You know, now here we are,

quarantined and living in trash dungeons.

But back then it was good.

Times were good, you know?

It's like that Dazed and Confused movie,

you watch that and you're like, Ah, man.

Those were the good old days, you know?

And that's how I feel thinking about my part on Hot Streets.

Huh, Pup Pup?

Yep.

No, okay.

You fix the helicopter.

Murder Powder?

Murder Powder is for doggies who fix helicopters.

[grunting]

Is this about Migo missing the gong?

Stonekeeper, he saw a smallfoot!

He said it might still be out there!

He said it fell from the sky!

Garry, calm down.

You know how you get.

Okay I'll try but I'm just so scared!

Smallfoot was a small experience

because I went in, they offered me the part

and I said, Oh yeah, that's fun.

And I went in and it was like I was there

for maybe an hour tops, maybe less.

'Cause Garry's lines are just a few lines

but they're sprinkled throughout the movie.

He's got a nice runner, you know?

It's pretty good.

The crew there was really great.

I gave 'em 110%, I'm a team player.

And yeah, I just kind of like,

they told me how Garry should be and I did it

exactly as they asked.

And it was really fun.

It was actually really fun.

It was cool to see.

That and Krampus both were really interesting to see

how movies are mixed.

It's extravagant.

It's like a massive theater room.

Wha, wha, wha, what if it is a smallfoot?

Does that mean a stone is wrong?

[all gasping]

[coughing] They are wrong.

Yeah!

It's like people just generally don't like us.

One guy hates you.

Who?

This, some dude Tyler.

I don't even know anyone named Tyler.

[groaning] Feels like I'm covered in bees.

Fuck this Tyler guy.

What did I ever do to him?

We, we could act different, Korvo.

I mean we could make people like us.

And I need to repair this godforsaken ship.

And if people don't like us,

that will make that job so much harder in so many ways.

So to be clear, I don't need to be liked.

It's strictly a work necessity.

Well I need to be liked!

Solar Opposites.

The reason why you've sat through all of this.

You wanna learn more about this brand new thing.

This was a show that, I originally had the idea

for a very different version of it in 2007

on Acceptable TV.

The show was basically two aliens

that were kind of an odd couple

that were stationed on Earth.

It was gonna be live action with like papier-mache heads

and then like CGI mouth and eyes.

And it was gonna look really cool.

We started from there, and then Mike and I were work,

Mike McMahan and I were developing it

in between seasons two and three of Rick and Morty

so a long time ago.

We were having a lot of fun and we started building

a frame around the show that was like,

okay, well let's set it up where their planet got destroyed,

there is no supreme leader that they're reporting back to.

They're on Earth, living amongst humans,

sort of stranded like Gilligan's Island

on this planet with us, with people.

And they have their replicants with them.

But they don't understand human culture

and one of them, Korvo, the one I do the voice of,

is very button-down and like, you know,

doesn't wanna like things and just is just grumpy

and wants to just have things be clean and simple

and structured and really wants to get the [beep]

off Earth 'cause Earth is just not his, it's just not okay.

Terry, the character who's voiced by Thomas Middleditch

who's sort of the Earth-loving, human culture-loving alien.

Terry sort of brings Korvo into the human world.

Korvo begrudgingly finds things he likes

but he's just a grump, you know what I mean?

Real classic case of the odd couple.

Thanks so much, Vanity Fair, for letting me reminisce

about my career that's for sure done.

Because of the coronavirus.

And let's all take a moment to remember the past.

And the good times.

[laughing] I know that's too long.

Okay wait, what do you want me to do again?

Sorry.

Hey, thanks a lot for letting me discuss my career

at length in this echoey room, my trash dungeon room.

Okay, we can start over.

Hey, thanks for letting me discuss my career.

It was a real pleasure for me, whoop diddy doo, huh?

Um.

[laughing]

Hold on.

Hey, thanks for letting me babble on and on about my career.

Thanks a lot.

I wanna thank Barack Obama and Jesus Christ and,

let me start over.

Hey, thanks for letting me babble

about my career for you, huh?

Branity Fair, Vanity Fear, whatever?

What are you guys up to over there, anyways?

Uh, so I'm gonna just hang out here

in my corona trash dungeon.

I'm gonna be playing Minecraft

and I'll see you all after the coronavirus.

And please be safe.

That's too long, that's too long, let me do one more.