We’re only three episodes into the third season of Rick and Morty, but the viral material and cult-level in-jokes are already piling up. Not only do we have our new modern mascot of inner turmoil, Pickle Rick, but the show is driving McDonald’s to revisit their long-discontinued Szechuan sauce. In a move of blatant food-based cultural appropriation, the generically “Chinese” sauce was released in 1998 to promote Mulan, then discontinued and forgotten by pretty much everyone except Rick & Morty co-creator Justin Roiland.
In the first episode of the new season–mild spoilers–Rick is able to order the sauce through a brain-link simulation. He tells Morty that getting that sauce is what drives everything he does, that it’s his “series arc,” and he’ll get it “if it takes nine seasons.” After the episode aired early on April 1st, fans became equally obsessed with the sauce. And McDonald’s is milking the hype. A few weeks ago, they tweeted out this picture, while insisting they weren’t planning to bring back the sauce.
https://twitter.com/McDonalds/status/891657097825460224
They also sent one of those bottles to Roiland.
Holy shit. pic.twitter.com/vNEIfHTmNU
— Justin Roiland (@JustinRoiland) July 30, 2017
According to that note, someone named Chef Mike managed to bring the sauce back from another dimension. “We’ll spare you the physics,” it reads, “but turns out, Dimension C-1998M is a dimension where it’s always 1998. 1998 every day. No smartphones, no social media. It’s a weird, scary place. But they’ve got Szechuan Sauce on the regular menu.”
“We wish we could’ve brought more sauce though, but we couldn’t risk keeping the a portal like that open. Think about it, if you knew in 1998 that McDonald’s would have All Day Breakfast in 2017, would you really want to stay in 1998? Of course not. If we left the portal open, we’d have puka shells, bucket hats and boy bands as far as the eye could see. It’s too risky, even for sauce as delicious as this.”
Chef Mike says “a few lucky fans will also get to experience the glory.”
One fan, writer Robert Workman, just sold his bottle and Dimension C-1998M case on eBay for–brace yourself–$15,350.
The auction brought in 111 bids. Even record producer/DJ DeadMau5 was trying to get the sauce.
am i really in the middle of a bidding war over a 64oz bottle of Szechuan Sauce? yes. i am.
— Goat lord (@deadmau5) August 6, 2017
Of course, you can’t do anything on the internet without people telling you you’re a bad fan and should therefore die.
https://twitter.com/TheDCD/status/894290221444907008
But honestly, can any reasonable person fault him for selling a condiment? The idea behind the auction was to be able to help himself while also helping others. He promised to donate at least 20% of the proceeds to charity.
https://twitter.com/TheDCD/status/895133298879590400
We definitely respect his terms.
https://twitter.com/TheDCD/status/893963619779530756
If you really want some of that Szechuan sauce, one of the other winners, David Wasman, is selling his bottle and case, and also donating to charity, though he couldn’t resist taking half of the sauce for himself.
https://twitter.com/therealduckie/status/895774447856230401
FYI, it’s also been said that you can approximate the Szechuan by mixing McDonald’s sweet & sour sauce with their barbecue. You know, if you don’t have thousands of dollars to blow on dipping sauces.
(image: Adult Swim)
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