My Review of Grumpy Cat Vol. 1
I love Grumpy Cat! I mean, seriously, I snerk almost every time a GC meme pops up on my Facebook. I especially love her early in the mornings before I’ve had my second cup of coffee. I feel like she’s a kindred spirit in those early hours before 10 a.m. which is when I start to fully become functional (regardless of the fact that I’ve already been at work for at least two hours before then.)
So when I saw that there was a Grumpy Cat comic available, naturally I thought “I need to check this out.” Of course that thought was promptly followed by “But its probably going to suck. But I’m going to check it out anyways. Because it might not.” Well, for the first few pages, I was amused. Sporadically throughout the text after that, I was amused, but it got old really fast. I guess that goes to prove that snark really is best in small doses. Pity.
The stories were mostly amusing with the superhero one having the most lines that had me snickering. The illustrations were pretty much perfect, with Grumpy Cat’s grump being perfectly done. The stories were simply enough that younger children could theoretically enjoy them, and this was shelved as “Children’s Fiction” on Netgalley, but I think its definitely marketed at adults because I don’t see a lot of kids being able to appreciate the particular humor of Grumpy Cat.
The other thing that, I think, sort of ruined the Grumpy Cat comic for me was the fact that it had been done before. Not only had it been done before, but it had been done much better in the form of everyone’s favorite lasagna-eating fat cat.
I guess in the world of comics, there’s only room for one mouthy, perpetually grumpy cat. Unfortunately for Tardar Sauce (Grumpy Cat’s real name), she is not the one. I will continue to adore her, but I can really only recommend her in meme form.
Click here to find Grumpy Cat Volume 1 now on Amazon.com
Title: Grumpy Cat | Series: Grumpy Cat (Vol 1) | Author(s): Royal McGraw,
Even though I’m not a fan of the comic, I still love Grumpy Cat, so I’m going to recommend these two items instead:
I was really excited about this when I heard about it, but then I thought about all the years I spent reading about Garfield, Odie, Arbuckle, and especially Nermal, I went in with low expectations. As I had thought, it was grumpy cat, but Garfield.
I think there’s still a lot of potential for a Grumpy Cat comic, but the stories have to be a lot better and far more clever to compete, diverge, or both.
I don’t think it really has a chance of successfully making it as a comic. Garfield is too entrenched in the minds of people who are old enough to get the humor. Maybe in several years when the new generation is old enough to ‘get it’. However, I’m totally behind all the merchandise and memes and probably always will be! LOL.
What if they catered less to all audiences and instead went much riskier. For me, that’s part of the charm of the memes. Grumpy Cat won’t save a nuns from a burning building, but subject matter like that would never work in the current form. Also, part of what makes the memes so great is that is facial expressions are amazing. They need an artist that can capture them well, and I don’t think this one does. Maybe none can, and perhaps in that sense, it will never work.
I agree. I’m a sucker for the merch and memes lol So, as long as that shit is around, I’ll be a happy little monkey. 🙂
Hmm, yeah, if they went decidedly darker they might have a chance. I would definitely at least try that out.
I agree on the illustrations. These are ‘cute’ illustrations in this book, but don’t really do justice to the whole “grumpy” thing.
I want the grumpy cat calendar I linked at the bottom of my post. LOL.
haha, me too. “I hate everyone. Twice.”