And the cats shall inherit the stars.
Creative Staff:
Story: Stuart Moore
Art: June Brigman, Roy Richardson
Colors: Veronica Gandini
Letterer: Richard Starkings & Comicraft’s Jimmy Betancourt
What They Say:
When the human race died out, the cats inherited the Earth! Or at least one starship. Now the intrepid Captain Ginger struggles to keep his fellow felines united against a hostile universe. But there’s a rival for Ginger’s authority: his second-in-command, the savage Sergeant Mittens!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The Ahoy Comics line of books has been bringing out some interesting projects but one that I was definitely looking forward to was Captain Ginger. Let’s face it, cats can be interesting (three currently reside with me where I tend to their needs) and a book about them fighting off an alien invasion in the future? That was enough right there. But seeing the creative got me really excited since Stuart Moore definitely knows how to handle a book but getting to see some new June Brigman work? I cut my teeth on her stuff to some degree back in the day with Power Pack so I was super excited to see her in the here and now tackling a ship full of cats. It’s just a great looking project that captures the creatures so well with all their variety that I can’t wait to see more of it in the future.
The idea behind the book is interesting as we get involved eighteen months in since the cats took over this starship to fight against the Lumen. Lead by Captain Ginger as basically elected by the crew, they’re picking up with the Feeders left off what seems like forever ago when cats started to evolve more. The Feeders spread far into the stars with all kinds of ships and outposts all over but they ended up killing themselves off with a plague that did them all in. In the time since, the cats have risen to try and deal with the threat of the Lumens that seek to eliminate them, which has basically had this crew on the run while trying to learn how to survive for quite some time. The book opens to an extended fight that introduces us to a lot of the cats, mostly known by their cute names or personalities as you’d expect, while Ginger does his best to hold it all together.
It’s a fairly busy issue in what it introduces, which is good as there are a lot of pages here to work with, and Moore provides for a lot of back and forth as Ginger works among the crew. But it also provides for some challenges early on that reminded me of a lot of older SF anime in that there’s an event that has the bulk of the crew leaving the ship in order to take up residence on an outpost they come across (it has lots of rats, fresh meat!). There’s division in the ranks to work through, some exploration for Ginger in what it means to be a captain, digging into the past, and even some time with Ginger’s mom. There’s a lot of basic ideas here put into motion with the whole cats running the show concept and it runs at a very fast pace but it also seeds a lot of ideas and potential with what it can be.
In Summary:
Captain Ginger is a lot to take in. I like it but it was also kind of overwhelming with all that it was trying to present to us. The large concept has plenty of room for exploration that can make for some crazy times ahead but it also digs into some decent character material with how cats would resolve it as they struggle between their old lives and their new. Stuart Moore has a lot he wants to accomplish going by how packed this issue is and I hope we get a chance to slow things down just a bit. But I’m really just in love with June Brigman’s artwork as seeing the arc of her career over the years bring new elements into it. The characters look fantastic and I’m interested in all the mechanical design as well where it’s really quite well detailed with some neat elements in how the cats interact with it. It’s a curious book that I hope can really find its potential but it’s definitely something worth checking out just for the surreal and wonderful execution alone.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Ahoy Comics
Release Date: October 17th, 2018
MSRP: $3.99
