Rick and Morty started as a TV sitcom parody of Doctor Who and Back to the Future, but has slowly developed its own complex lore. Series co-creator and co-showrunner Dan Harmon is taking the same approach with the spinoff President Curtis. The workplace sitcom’s episodic adventures have pitted President Andre Curtis (Keith David) and his staff against vampires, werewolves, and an ancient witch while also revealing hidden depth to its characters.
Episode 6 reveals Curtis’ secretary, Janice (Alanna Ubach), has a lover in the Hollow Earth, while episode 7 explains how his chief of staff, Rho Banks (Stephanie Beatriz), became a cyborg. Episode 8, “Knox,” delves into the backstory of the half-leprechaun Secret Service agent Francis O’Doyle (Jim Rash), and it gets extremely weird.
This article contains spoilers for President Curtis episode 8.
Harmon wanted President Curtis to be more like The X-Files than Doctor Who, keeping the threats primarily grounded on Earth. He initially considered making O’Doyle an alien, but he and co-creator James Siciliano instead decided to take a sci-fi approach to a mythical creature.
“We treated it almost like Star Trek,” Siciliano told Polygon in a virtual interview. “Leprechauns are an entire race of people like Vulcans.”
Why do leprechauns love gold?
O’Doyle demonstrates some of his odd leprechaun powers throughout the show. He can read auras to detect emotions, eat just about anything, and forge bullets in his stomach. Harmon and Siciliano have spent a lot of time with the other writers discussing how those abilities work.
“Leprechauns predate humans,” Harmon explains. “We don’t know how they ended up being so Irish. We haven’t decided that yet. But they are an ancient hominid species that existed in a volcanic version of Earth. They love gold because their stomachs are capable of smelting metal, and gold is the most malleable. It’s not about greed and wealth, it’s about metallurgy. They consider us lower life forms much like the way Vulcans or elves look at humans.”
When his leprechaun mother, Orla (Grey DeLisle), robs Fort Knox, O’Doyle has to dive deep into leprechaun society to unravel her scheme.
“They’re a decentralized matriarchy, closer to spiders,” Harmon says. “The women run leprechaun mobs. They’re not quite colonies like ants and not quite black widows just eating their mates, but something in between where it’s more like [The Goonies’] Mama Fratelli.”
The episode ends with Orla locked up in America’s paranormal prison in the Bermuda Triangle, but it’s revealed that was actually part of her plan. She just needed access to another inmate she wants to recruit for a bigger job she’s planning. Orla will likely return in season 2, giving the writers another chance to expand the show’s complex mythology.
“On Rick and Morty, a lot of people don’t survive the episode,” Siciliano says. “In this show, a lot of people come around, and they’ll pop back up five episodes later.”
President Curtis airs at 11:30 p.m. ET on Adult Swim and a day later on HBO Max.