Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-24141773-20141031201903/@comment-7117024-20141031225010

I think Mordecai was talking more about Rigby's unlessness just at now, not including outside-of-work things like relationships and events. Still, were Mordecai's comments somewhat inconsiderate? Yes. Was there no truth behind them. Not really.

While Rigby is good at work when he's focused and good at being Mordecai and/or other's support in particular situations, he slacks off a bit more and is lazier than Mordecai. A good chunk of it's because Rigby is more likely to find ways around jobs and rules to avoid them or finish them quickly ("Temp Check", "Paint Job"), he's more impulsive and doesn't think through his actions as well ("Trash Boat", the house short in "TTOTP"), and he just isn't as motivated in some ways (he lets Mordecai fill out his application in "First Day" and he struggles for a while to do his pull-up in "One Pull Up").

Not that Mordecai hasn't easily followed Rigby in a lot of cases, but Mordecai has been shown to know when to be more serious and focused, and in general is more reasonable than Rigby. Mordecai was defiant about his label as a slacker in "Just Set Up the Chairs", while Rigby hasn't really started to complain about the way others view him until later on with episodes like "Rigby in the Sky With Burrito" and "Expert or Liar". Quite a few of the problems where Mordecai and Ribgy make mistakes and attempt to fix them are caused by Rigby. He can prove to be useful when solving the problem, but at the same time, the whole problem could've been avoided if Rigby had been more careful and less determined to get the original job done.

Speaking of those season 5 episodes, the show seems to be pushing Rigby into finding an identity for himself and proving to others that there's more to him than what has come to be considered "classic Rigby". Beforehand, Rigby didn't really care, but now he's come to the point where he's standing up for himself and trying to push his boundaries. The burrito episode, "Expert or Liar", and hopefully this one are going to be really good character growth for Rigby. He can still be our lovable jerk, but he's becoming more energized to start working for his dignity, and maybe in that, he won't need Mordecai anymore to prove that he's not just a useless joke.