McDonald's just brought back Szechuan McNugget sauce after a cartoon called for its return
In April, Adult Swim aired the first new episode of "Rick and Morty" since 2015. The episode ended with a plea from mad scientist Rick for McDonald's to bring back its Szechuan McNugget sauce, a plum sauce that was available for a limited time in 1998 to promote the Disney movie "Mulan."
After the episode aired, "Rick and Morty" fans began demanding that McDonald's actually bring back the sauce.
Early Sunday morning, the fast-food chain did just that.
On the same day that the second episode of this season of "Rick and Morty" was set to air, McDonald's delivered a jug of the sauce to Justin Roiland, the co-creator of the show, and announced that the chain would give away three jugs of Szechuan McNugget sauce.
"McDonalds literally sent us a bottle of the Mulan sauce with a Rick & Morty label," the "Rick and Morty" Twitter account posted. "This is insane."
The delivery was packed with "Rick and Morty" in-jokes. A note claimed that the sauce had to be brought through C-1998M, a different dimension where it is always 1998, a time filled with "puka shells, bucket hats and boy bands." ("Rich and Morty" follows a mad scientist and his grandson traveling through various, bizarre dimensions.)
"We finally did it," the note from Chef Mike - an actual McDonald's chef named Mike Haracz - reads. "It took months but we finally brought back some Szechuan Sauce."
McDonald's also gave fans of "Rick and Morty" the chance to win some of the sauce for themselves.
The fast-food chain announced it would give away three jugs of Szechuan Sauce for three people who tweeted about the sauce during the chain's two-hour Periscope - a video that supposedly showed the journey from C-1998M to present day.
The Periscope ended with an instruction: "Pro tip: Always check your DMs." In other words, three people who tweeted about Szechuan Sauce are about to receive a message that they could get the sauce themselves.
The jugs themselves feature more in-jokes for "Rick and Morty" fans.
"DO NOT SERVE to mad scientists traveling with their teenage grandson; potential non-scientist versions of mad scientist from alternate dimensions; and/or Jerry," the label reads.
Chef Mike Haracz seems to be the man behind the return of the sauce. In April, Haracz told Business Insider's Ashley Lutz he'd "see what I can do" about bringing back Szechuan Sauce back.
Apparently, Haracz is a "Rick and Morty" fan himself.
There is no word yet from the creators of "Rick and Morty" on how the sauce actually tastes, and it doesn't seem like McDonald's has any plans to release the sauce to the rest of the US quite yet.
However, McDonald's will be presented with a convenient opportunity to bring back the sauce when a live-action remake of "Mulan" is released in November 2018.
"For now, only a limited amount of Szechuan Sauce got through from the always-1998 dimension," a McDonald's spokesperson said in a statement. "Who knows where space-time will take us because when our customers speak, we listen."