Rick and Morty’s season finales have delivered some of the show’s all-time best episodes, but they haven’t all been great. The finale is arguably the most important episode of a season of television. It has to wrap up all the current story arcs (or at least provide some major developments on them) and top everything that came before it. It has to leave the audience satisfied, because it’s the last they’ll see of the show for a while, but it also has to leave them wanting more, so they’ll tune in when the next season premieres.

Throughout its run, some of Rick and Morty’s greatest episodes, while others are just standard installments.

7 Star Mort Rickturn Of The Jerri

After Disney acquired Lucasfilm, it seemed as though the only Star Wars story it could tell was the original film’s tale of destroying the Death Star. The Force Awakens had a Death Star, Rogue One told the origin story of the Death Star, and The Rise of Skywalker had an Imperial Star Destroyer with a Death Star cannon mounted on it. Rick and Morty parodied this trend in season 4, episode 10, “Star Mort Rickturn of the Jerri,” as the Smiths set out to destroy the New and Improved Galactic Federation’s own Death Star.

This episode marked the first official appearance of Space Beth, and the mystery of which Beth is a clone and which is the original became an interesting storyline, but this is still arguably the show’s weakest season finale. By the time Rick and Morty spoofed Star Wars, that joke area was pretty played out. The season 4 finale has one of the show’s most depressing endings, as Rick fails to save Phoenixperson and ends up sad and alone, but at that point, it felt like a retread of all the other episodes that ended with Rick being sad and alone.

6 The Rickchurian Mortydate

After the jaw-dropping cliffhanger that ended the season 2 finale, the season 3 finale — season 3, episode 10, “The Rickchurian Mortydate” — felt underwhelming. It doesn’t change the status quo of the series or radically alter the lives of the characters or set up an exciting new storyline for the future like the season 2 finale did; it’s just a standard standalone episode. It introduced Rick’s long-standing feud with the President, as Rick and Morty are annoyed that the President treats them like Ghostbusters, constantly calling on them to deal with monsters and never showing any gratitude.

Rick and Morty’s President was introduced as a parody of Barack Obama when he first appeared in season 2, episode 5, “Get Schwifty.” But when he reappeared in “The Rickchurian Mortydate,” he was turned into a parody of the new sitting president, Donald Trump. By the time the episode aired in 2017, Trump satire was painfully overdone. Between South Park and Saturday Night Live, every single joke that could possibly be made about Trump’s presidency had already been made. Rick and Morty is usually a biting, incisive comedy, but the political satire in the season 3 finale is extremely mild.

Satirizing Trump’s America should’ve been a great premise for Rick and Morty to tackle. The series has a bleak, nihilistic tone and uses twisted humor and inventive genre storytelling to capture real-world issues. But “The Rickchurian Mortydate” left a lot to be desired. It doesn’t use a clever sci-fi allegory to reflect the polarized U.S. political climate; it just revolves around a President of the United States who does and says whatever he wants without any regard for dignity or diplomacy, which is one-note and gets old quickly.

5 Ricktional Mortpoon's Rickmas Mortcation

After the disappointment of “Star Mort Rickturn of the Jerri,” Rick and Morty delivered its best Star Wars parody in season 6, episode 10, “Ricktional Mortpoon’s Rickmas Mortcation.” Rather than broadly spoofing Star Wars iconography, the season 6 finale focuses on a very specific what-if scenario that no one ever pondered before but now seems like a huge hole in Star Wars lore. Rick finally caves to one of Morty’s long-standing wishes and gives him a lightsaber for Christmas. He has fun for a few minutes, but he promptly drops it through the floor in a perfectly straight line.

Rick and Morty desperately try to intercept the lightsaber before it reaches the Earth’s core. During this adventure, Morty becomes suspicious that Rick is being much nicer and more ive than usual. Then, he’s shocked to discover that Rick replaced himself with a robot after their adventure with the Knights of the Sun so he could focus all his time on hunting Rick Prime. “Ricktional Mortpoon’s Rickmas Mortcation” starts off as a great standalone episode, but it ends with a satisfying expansion on one of the series’ most compelling story arcs.

4 Rickmurai Jack

Rick and Morty committed to the titular duo’s separation in season 5, episode 10, “Rickmurai Jack.” In the penultimate episode of season 5, Rick and Morty ended their partnership. Rick replaced Morty with two crows and took off to enjoy intergalactic adventures with his new sidekicks in a spin-off franchise. However, early on in “Rickmurai Jack,” Rick is disheartened to learn that he’s the crows’ rebound, which leads him back to Morty.

“Rickmurai Jack” answered all the complaints that Rick and Morty wasn’t developing its mythology enough. It fills in the missing pieces of Rick’s backstory in a series of tragic flashbacks, and it brings back Evil Morty — now President Morty — as the big bad of the show. The Citadel is destroyed, the Central Finite Curve is destroyed, and Rick and Morty are stranded in space — it was an awesome finale for a so-so season.

3 Ricksy Business

While Beth and Jerry are away on a Titanic-themed vacation, Rick, Morty, and Summer throw a raging house party in season 1, episode 11, “Ricksy Business.” The best Rick and Morty episodes combine a relatable everyday situation. “Ricksy Business” nails that balance by bringing sci-fi guests like Gearhead and Abradolf Lincler to a typical booze-fueled rager.

Rick and Morty still hadn’t quite found its feet by the end of season 1, but it had established the heartbreaking existential dread that runs beneath the show’s absurdist humor with scenes like Rick and Morty relocating to a new universe and Morty pointing out his own grave to Summer. “Ricksy Business” has a great moment of this when Birdperson reveals that Rick’s seemingly meaningless catchphrase, “Wubba lubba dub-dub,” actually translates to “I am in great pain, please help me.” It introduced the unseen depth to Rick’s character, which would become the dramatic backbone of the series.

2 Fear No Mort

Rick and Morty season 7 was a mixed bag. Ian Cardoni and Harry Belden, the new voice actors brought in to replace disgraced creator Justin Roiland, did a great job with the roles, but the actual writing of the episodes was very hit-and-miss. It had some really terrific episodes, like “That’s Amorte” and “Unmortricken,” but it also has some of the show’s worst episodes, like “Air Force Wong” and “Rise of the Numbericons: The Movie.” Fortunately, the season finale — season 7, episode 10, “Fear No Mort” — is a winner that stands among the show’s best.

The episode sees Rick and Morty facing their deepest, darkest fears in a mysterious hole in the men’s room of a Denny’s. The episode is a real head trip full of mind-boggling twists and turns that keep the audience guessing. It’s as terrifying as it is hilarious, and it’s a deep dive into Morty’s psychology and the toxicity and fragility of his relationship with Rick. Most of Rick and Morty’s season finales end on a depressing note, but season 7’s last episode ends on a heartwarming moment that proves Rick really does care about Morty.

1 The Wedding Squanchers

The final episode of season 2 — season 2, episode 10, “The Wedding Squanchers” — sees the family attending the wedding of Rick’s friend Birdperson and Summer’s friend Tammy, who met at the Smiths’ house party in the season 1 finale. Although he’s dead against the institution of marriage, Rick is forced to attend the wedding to retrieve Jerry, who accidentally got caught in the invitation delivery system. At the wedding, Tammy reveals she’s really a deep-cover intergalactic agent and the wedding is an elaborate sting operation designed to draw Birdperson’s partners-in-crime (namely Rick) to the same location.

Like all the best Rick and Morty episodes, “The Wedding Squanchers” is full of big laughs, but also has an underlying emotional core. The episode has a lot of great jokes at the expense of weddings, but those jokes also have a deeper meaning: Rick uses these anti-marriage one-liners to cover up his deep well of loneliness and despair. As the Smiths flee the wedding, go on the run, and have to find a new planetary home, the season 2 finale also digs into Rick’s strained relationship with Beth, and the psychological damage from his shaky parenting.

With its blend of the everyday mundanity of a wedding and the sci-fi tropes of space cops and interstellar travel, “The Wedding Squanchers” was already one of Rick and Morty’s best episodes. But what makes it the show’s best season finale is its jaw-dropping ending. Like all the best finales, it ends season 2 on a bombshell twist that completely redefines the status quo of the series. The Galactic Federation takes over Earth and Rick turns himself in so his family can go home. Season 3 restored the status quo pretty quickly, but this was a mind-blowing cliffhanger.