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President Curtis & His Team Are Ready for Action in New Key Art Poster

President Curtis and his team look ready to kick some monster butt in a new key art poster for Adult Swim's Rick and Morty spinoff.

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Article Summary

  • Adult Swim drops a new President Curtis key art poster as the Rick and Morty spinoff targets a July 26 debut.
  • Dan Harmon says President Curtis works as a spinoff because his monster-hunting world expands Rick and Morty lore.
  • James Siciliano reveals President Curtis was retooled into a duty-first leader, less approval-driven than before.
  • Harmon confirms Rick and Morty appear in the premiere only, giving President Curtis room to build its own identity.

With less than three weeks to go until the "Rick and Morty" spinoff from EPs Dan Harmon and James Siciliano hits our screens, Adult Swim has released an official key art poster for Keith David-starring President Curtis. Set to launch on July 26th, we're getting a better look at some of what President Andre Curtis (David), Chief of Staff  Banks (Stephanie Beatriz), Special Agent O'Doyle (Jim Rash), and the rest of the team will be getting themselves wrapped up in when the animated series debuts.

President Curtis
Image: Adult Swim

Checking in with Deadline Hollywood for an exclusive interview, Harmon and Siciliano discuss why President Curtis was a good choice for a spinoff, how the character differs from his previous appearance, and (officially confirmed) having Rick and Morty appear in the opener.

Harmon on Spotlighting President Andre Curtis: "It was because that was the character who could have their own self-contained world that wouldn't be redundantly overlapping. You can think of him as like a concentric circle: If we wanted Rick to do an X Files-level mission on Earth, like going to find the Hodag in Rhinelander, Wisconsin or the Loch Ness Monsters, he could do that, but his circle is broader. The comparison I make is it's like 'Doctor Who' and 'The X Files.' Both involve aliens, but you have a different perspective there. It allows the tonality to stay the same, but it's not redundant."

Siciliano & Harmon on How the Character Was "Adjusted" for the Spinoff Series:

Siciliano: "The one thing we 'retconned' and adjusted from the Rick and Morty character when we were building our guy out is that in Rick and Morty, he is very approval-driven and craves that. That was the first thing when talking about this show – it is almost the opposite. We wanted him to not be rolling his eyes at the job as part of his duty to protect people."

Harmon: "You go to TV for a little escapism, and the thing that drives us nuts about politics, whether we accept it or not, is that the numbers wag the dog. What do you have to say to win an election? We thought about it pretty hard, and what we needed to change about this guy is if you gave him a chance to have his numbers go up but in order to do it he had to lie or cheat, he wouldn't. He is only doing the job of president because if he doesn't, someone worse will.

"This is canonical stuff that will only be revealed if the show lives long in the tooth, but we know as writers that his ex-wife, who is not in the picture at the start, was the strategist. He is more like a golden retriever. When he walks into the room people say, 'I want to have a beer with him,' which is what gets you elected, but she was the more politically-motivated one. He is divorced from his Yoda. He is not a fraud like Remington Steele, where it was all sizzle, no steak, but it is not the job he would have chosen. He is a soldier and a vampire slayer, and he was a lonely guy who begrudgingly took on this role of serving hundreds of millions of people."

Siciliano & Harmon on Having Rick and Morty Appear in Series Opener: "It is one and done for this season. We wanted to address the elephant in the room of a spin-off, but we spent a lot of time building his own staff and world, and once you get into watching the goal is you feel it is its own show," Siciliano shared. Harmon added, "We didn't want to do too much out of the gate. We had no problem doing it – there was no impudence there, and it's not like we have to license the rights, so it was a matter of giving it space and letting it have its own identity, so that those paths crossing over will feel meaningful.

In a brief YouTube Shorts clip (which you can check out here), we see the team head to FDR's Fireside Shaft to track a suspect, with President Curtis making it clear they don't have time for sympathetic backstories.

In the clip below, President Curtis is more than impressed with what Banks has to offer. Special Agent O'Doyle? He seems more jealous than impressed:

Also starring Stephanie Beatriz (Brooklyn Nine-Nine) and Jim Rash (Community), the series follows President Andre Curtis (David) and his eccentric staff as they tackle the kind of crises that Rick Sanchez could never be bothered with – from interdimensional diplomacy to paranormal investigations and unexplained phenomena. Harmon and Siciliano also serve as executive producers, alongside Danielle Uhlarik, Monica Mitchell, and Steve Levy.

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Ray FlookAbout Ray Flook

Serving as Television Editor since 2018, Ray began five years earlier as a contributing writer/photographer before being brought onto the core BC team in 2017.
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