Rick Sanchez x Pearl

About

Rick Sanchez x Pearl refers to the shipping of Rick and Morty character Rick Sanchez and Steven Universe character Pearl within DeviantArt fan art and fan fiction that often touches on Rule 34 signifiers. In 2022, the unlikely (yet likely to some) love-struck pairing trended in memes across Tumblr and Instagram and even earned both ironic and earnest fancam edits on TikTok. The trend started with artist Nilseycreator in late 2020, spreading over the following years.

Origin

On October 7th, 2020, DeviantArt^[1] artist Nilseypro123 uploaded an artwork titled, "Rick and Pearl adventure's," that officially started their foray into portraying the two cartoon characters as lovers in a parallel universe. Over the course of two years, the post received over 720 views and 12 favorites (shown below). Nilseypro123 additionally posted the drawing to their Instagram^[2] account (@nilseyart) on October 7th, 2020, earning seven likes in the same time period.

Spread

Nilseyart123 became the main source for Rick Sanchez x Pearl fan art going into 2021, continually uploading art to DeviantArt, Instagram, Tumblr and Twitter. Other characters started to be introduced into the canon, such as Ricky Junior, the son of Rick and Pearl. For instance, on August 21st, 2021, nilseycreator posted to Tumblr^[3] a drawing of "Rick and Ricky Junior giving Pearl a surprise," gaining 20 notes in two years (shown below).

On August 28th, 2021, Tumblr^[4][5] user iggykoopa666 posted two screenshots of Nilseycreator's Rick Sanchez x Pearl ships, including the aforementioned "Ricky Junior" drawing. Tumblr user iggykoopa666 (previously known as rockbusted) captioned them, "literally this person is so powerful," gaining roughly 23,600 notes in 14 months (shown below, left). Iggykoopa666 then posted a screenshot of their Tumblr post to Twitter^[6] on August 28th, 2021, gaining roughly 50,800 likes in the same time period (shown below, right).

Nilseycreator's work continued getting reposted to Twitter thereafter by creators who found the shipping humorous. For instance, on August 29th, 2021, Twitter^[7] user PlutoIsNotReal tweeted the "Ricky Junior" drawing, gaining roughly 21,000 likes in 14 months (shown below, left). Meanwhile, others on DeviantArt and elsewhere started adding their own art to the shipping trend. For instance, on September 13th, 2021, DeviantArt^[8] user g4lleon posted their own Rick Sanchez x Pearl fan art, gaining roughly 10,000 views and over 85 favorites in 11 months (shown below, right).

Going into 2022, Rick Sanchez x Pearl shipping spread to fancam edits on TikTok. For instance, on October 12th, 2022, TikToker^[9] abrell_animates posted a fancam of the duo, gaining roughly 12,100 plays and 1,900 likes in six days (shown below, left). On October 15th, 2021, TikToker^[10] uploaded another edit, gaining roughly 21,800 plays and 3,700 likes in three days (shown below, right).

On October 17th, 2022, Instagram^[11] user nonbinary.tomboy posted a carousel post with multiple shipping edits created by Nilseycreator, earning roughly 6,500 likes in one day.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References