"King City" or "I Guess Cats Can Be Cool"

Joe and Earthling

I've never been a cat person. Cats always seemed like jerks to me. I never owned a cat but my Grandma had one and it was just flat out mean. Never let anyone pet it and it would hide most of the day. I always preferred dogs. They love to be pet and want to be around you; but then they slobber. I hate saliva from any animal (humans included).

But what if cats had the potential to be useful?! What if you could inject your cat with a syring of "cat juice" and it could do anything? It could be a parascope, a copy machine, a megaphone, a weapon, or anything else you need to pull of that heist. I would definitely consider adopting a cat.

In the Brandon Graham comic, King City, a cat can do all of those things and more. In this book there is a group of people known as "Cat Masters" who have harnessed the power and abilities of cats. They use them to counteract the powerful enemies of the universe. Awesome.

King City follows Joe who is a Cat Master with his cat "Earthling J.J. Cattingworth the Third." Together Joe and Earthling, (with some cat juice) work as a team to do small jobs as hired thieves. This world is so unique but somehow Brandon Graham keeps it so familiar and accessible. We're not all hired thieves and I'm positive in saying that no one uses their cat as an all-purpose tool. But I'm sure we've been able to relate to Joe in one way or another.

Joe used to live in King City. He had good friends, and a nice girl. But then they broke up and he left. He went to travel around the rest of California with no intent of going back to King City. He finds himself back in King City having to confront all the pain and memories he thought he could forget.


Anna, Joe's ex, gets a lot of time in this series to showing her life after Joe left. Drawing mustaches on billboards.  Not sure why that is her career, but it got a few laughs out of me. Anna's boyfriend, Max, had some intriguing points in this book and one of the more interesting back stories. (Fighting zombies in Korea and getting addicted to a drug that with prolonged use turns you into said drug.)


This series seemed unfocused but at the same time had a clear idea of where it was going and how it was going to end. It seemed unfocused in that it never really focused on a specific character for longer very long. I enjoyed the pacing and split between characters, but would have liked to see more Cat Master-ing.

I don't want to ruin the ending, but I think a lot of people (some other people who talked about this comic actually) won't enjoy the ending. It will feel like the Lost ending, Battlestar Galactica ending, or any other piece of fiction where everything does not get tied up in a nice bow. It is another series where the ending is an ending for this character, not the universe. I am fine with that, and sometimes prefer it.

A very entertaining part of this series were all the random little puns thrown into the background and foreground of the story. If you decide to read this book take your time. It is dense. Just about every billboard or tik tok stand has some little joke or turn of phrase that will get a smile.

This book was a break from everything else I have read lately. It was a nice break from the normal good guy beats up bad guy. The good guys beat up the bad guys, but not Joe isn't that good guy. He's just the guy who does things for the people he cares about. This book was entertaining and gave a lot to the reader, it didn't change my life, but it might change yours.

Cover to the trade collection

I don't own those pictures. (someone should tell me if I need to keep saying this)