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I Am Mewtiful in Every Single Way
Writer:
Ryan North
Artist:
Erica Henderson
Dream Comics Artist: Zac Gorman
Trading Card Artist: Michael Cho
Color Artist: Rico Renzi
Letterer:
Travis Lanham
Cover Artist: Erica Henderson
Cover Price:
$3.99
On Sale Date: December 14, 2016
**NON SPOILERS AND SCORE AT THE
BOTTOM**
In the grand tradition of that “Pizza Dog” issue of Hawkeye and, uh, that gut-wrenching
issue of Afterlife With Archie told
through Hot Dog’s point-of-view, Marvel brings you the issue of the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl told
through Mew the cat’s point of view! Though since there’s already a squirrel
practically co-starring in this book, it’s not really that much of a
revelation. I mean, we’re already aware that squirrels live rich and complex
lives. But we don’t know much about Nancy Whitehead’s cat Mew’s life, until now! So read in if you want to
know the secret lives of cats! I hear there are nine of them.
Cats are real dicks. I have a cat, and I love her and
she is affectionate and I reap all of the benefits of having a Good Cat, but
even a Good Cat is a dick sometimes. Randomly meowing, clawing at furniture,
biting my wife’s leg; these are the transgressions committed by my feline. And
this pales in comparison to cats that routinely chew on wires, or spray their
pungent scent everywhere, or leave perflectly-placed turds in your shoes. It’s
just part of their nature, I suppose, to be dicks sometimes. So we see Mew
being a dick, pushing a box of tissues off a high shelf and onto sleeping
Nancy’s head. Nancy isn’t too fussed about it, and it was time to wake up
anyway because we see through dialogue that Taskmaster has invaded, and it’s
presumably up to Squirrel Girl and, by extension, her friend Nancy to save the
day! And probably drive her to the location. That isn’t Mew’s concern, however,
she just stretches out on the kitchen counter and idly knocks a bottle of olive
oil onto the floor as the rent-paying humans hurry out the door. This leads to
a sequence of events that conclude in Mew holding vigil over a mousehole, and
then falling into a deep sleep.
There’s these one-page strips, a bunch of them here
and some more later on when Mew falls asleep again, titled Mew’s Dream Comics. These are drawn by Zac Gorman in an Underground
Comix style, visually very different from Erica Henderson’s clean, sparse
lines. And I thought they were cool, but I don’t feel the need to convey them
panel-by-panel because the general idea is that Mew is snoozing for a while. If
you want to see some of the wacky adventures Mew gets up to during her cat
naps, you’ll have to read the issue. Eventually, Mew wakes up and peeks into
the mouse hole just as Taskmaster comes bursting through the wall! Squirrel Girl
jumps in and negotiates with him, but we see this happening in the background
because Mew uses this as an opportunity to lazily escape the apartment. She
passes by Nancy on the front stoop, frantically calling Tony, and strolls away
with a light cat sigh.
Mew makes it over to Washington Square Park, and
befriends a hungry dog by giving it a slice of discarded pizza—with an anchovy
on it! This is like Kanye West giving up publicity to someone more deserving.
While cat and dog bond, the very fight against Taskmaster that Mew was trying
to avoid has found its way over to the park, only now it includes the Avengers!
At least, I think this is the Avengers. One of the Avenger teams, I mean.
Spider-Man is there, and the new awesome Hulk is there, the black Captain
America…I don’t read these titles, so I’m not exactly sure. But I do get the
point, that Taskmaster is still in conflict mode and now other superheroes have
joined the fight. After scoping the situation for a while, Mew comes up with a
way she and the dog can catch Taskmaster, which is, in itself, pretty
unbelievable but it will do. Mew returns home to find Doreen and Nancy
celebrating, but Mew just cuddles up with mouse whose hole she held vigil over
and goes to sleep.
This is a cute issue. But that’s all it is. The
secret lives of cats are, factually speaking, pretty dull. And mixing in this
Taskmaster battle into the background didn’t really work because it never felt
like a real threat. Also, Mew and the dog catch Taskmaster in this really ludicrous
way, which I guess is the “genius” of it, but it seemed a bit beyond the pale.
All that being said, I love cats (dicks that they are) and I did enjoy an issue
about the “other” animal in this series that doesn’t get as much shine as
Tippy-Toe (though Howard the Duck did try to steal her during their crossover...).
I also liked the dream sequences, it’s a good gimmick and I enjoyed the silly comic
strips by themselves. So I’m going to say…meh, could be worse. If you’ve been
reading the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl regularly
or you’re an unabashed “cat person,” then you’ll enjoy it.
Bits and Pieces:
Turns out that the day in the life of a house cat is pretty boring, even despite the introduction of superheroes and villains from the Marvel Universe. This issue is a cute little diversion from, uh, the usual pretty cute stuff that happens in this title, and isn't more than some fan service. But there's nothing wrong with servicing fans every now and again. We are, at least as pertaining to fans of this comic book, pretty nice people.
7/10
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