And now for something considerably different, courtesy of IDW and Top Shelf: The Unpetables, a new graphic novel for young folks from Dennis Messner. “Pigmund and Lizárdo are free! They recently “declared independence” from their petting zoo…. and now this pot-bellied pig and iguana are out to See The World. They are The Unpetables — and they’re available for temporary work as ‘freelance pets’. But no matter what gigs the Unpetables may get, they have one very big rule: No More Petting!” You heard it here folks. And, it’s available now in trade paperback from Penguin Random House.

image c. 2024 Top Shelf Productions

Here’s a graphic novel to tug at your heart: Missing You, written by Phellip Willian and illustrated by Melissa Garabeli. “Following the loss of their mother, Thomas and Lara find an injured deer on the side of the road. Deciding to bring it home with them, they name the deer Lion and quickly become best friends. The new woodland creature soon fills their hearts with warmth and fun, easing their mourning. But when Lion grows more and more curious about the forest beyond their house, Thomas and Lara start to wonder if the forest is where Lion truly belongs. Will they be able to say goodbye to their new friend?” You can find out now — in this trade paperback edition from Oni Press.

image c. 2024 Oni Press

And speaking of web-based comics coming to book form… Cat & Cat Adventures is a series written and illustrated by Susie Yi from Orange County, California. (Hi neighbor!) “Cat & Cat comics is a cozy, funny, and relatable comic series about more than just cats. Set in a world where pets and humans co-exist in a symbiotic relationship (much like the world we live in today!), Suzy is a human that can understand the mysterious language of cat-speak! Cat & Cat comics dives into the every day interactions between Suzy and her cats, but also the mysterious and magical scenarios that the cats encounter as well. From pancakes growing fluffier upon command to dogs being summoned out of a magical book, these comics are sure to surprise and pull you in for a sweet treat!” Find it on line, and look for the graphic novel series as well.

image c. 2024 by Susie Yi

Between the time I went to see DC League of Super-Pets and writing this, things got weird at Warner Bros. Two movies that were reportedly near completion were suddenly shelved. Most mainstream movie press outlets covered this as "What does this mean for this group of comic book superhero movies?". Even Flayrah's Newsbyte on the subject only mentioned Batgirl, despite the fact that Scoob! Holiday Haunt, an actual movie featuring anthropomorphic animals, rather than just one superhero in a pseudo-fursuit, was also cancelled.

And that has some bearing on my thoughts on this movie. Warner Animation Group is looking like it could be in trouble. Even though it appears that the studio will survive in some capacity, people are going to lose jobs in this area. So, it doesn't feel like a good time to take a look at their latest output, shrug, and say, "It was okay, I guess?"

DC League of Super-Pets was directed by Jared Stern and Sam Levine, and stars Dwayne Johnson as Krypto, Superman's superpowered pet dog. When the evil guinea pig Lulu (voiced by Kate McKinnon) manages to depower Krypto, he must lead a team of newly-empowered shelter pets in order to rescue his kidnapped master.

It was okay, I guess?

The campaign to legalize ferrets as pets in California (yes that’s a thing) recently let us know about My Name Is Musky, a picture book for young people written by Matty Giuliano and illustrated by Morgan Spicer. It’s rare to find a cute book about pets that actually focuses on ferrets! “Poor Musky! A small white ferret is abandoned and left by the side of the road. Things start to look up, though, when a nice lady named Stephanie shows up and saves the day. It’s off to the cozy, warm animal shelter for this little ferret—but will anyone want to adopt a different kind of furry animal friend?” Check out the official web site too.

image c. 2022 Humane Press

A friend pointed this out to us — and just in time too, as it just hit the shelves! It’s Campaigns & Companions, a new hard-cover book by Andi Ewington,  Rhianna Pratchett, and Alex De Campi, with illustrations by Calum Alexander Watt. “If there are two things all geeks love, it’s roleplaying games, and their pets. So why not fuse the two? It’s time to grab your dice, dust off that character sheet, and let your cat or dog (or guinea pig, or iguana, or budgie) accompany you on an epic adventure! It’ll be great! … unless you have pets like these.” Distributed by Simon & Schuster, it’s available everywhere now.

image c. 2021 Rebellion Publishing

Look, the best joke in the first Secret Life of Pets is that if you do the trendy thing of acronym-ing it's title, it becomes SLoP, which is funny because it's true.

Honestly, I can't even say I remember the first movie very well. I did see it. I mostly recall that I didn't really like it that much. So, as you can probably deduce, I wasn't entirely looking forward to the sequel. The trailers also prominently featured coprophagia, so that wasn't helping anything.

But about those trailers— if you take out the inter-titles and the music, you just watched that scene in the movie. That's exactly how it's cut in the movie. All of the trailers are like that. They're just scenes from the movie. The movie is cut like a trailer.

And the weirdest thing about this movie is that, somehow, despite being just scenes from the movie, this is a case of bad trailers being way worse than the actual movie. This is a very weird movie.

In the days before mobile phones and the Internet, people would have to have conversations with their pets to keep themselves from going insane. That's how it is with the Monroes, a nuclear family with two young children, two careers, and two pets: a cat (Chester) and a dog (Harold).

And every day, when the family members head out of the house, they leave their pets unsupervised to indulge in their vices. Chester reads horror stories; Harold daydreams about food. Life is perfect.

Until the day the Monroes go to a Dracula film, and come home with a little fluffy bundle of a rabbit in a shoebox full of dirt.

The Secret Life of Pets [trailer] is the first of two animated movies released in 2016 from Illumination Studios, most known for its films Despicable Me and Minions.

Compared with their competition at Disney and Pixar, Illumination relies less on strong storytelling and instead leans more heavily towards pure charm to make their movies successful. In the past, they've accomplished this with cute and colourful characters, and a child-friendly sense of humour.

With that history in mind, The Secret Life of Pets continues its studio's charm offensive, compensating well for a bland and forgettable story.

The Secret Life of Pets [trailer] is Illumination Entertainment's latest CG animated film offering, released on July 8, 2016. It's an entertaining comedy that's been doing quite well at the box office. I went to a weekday early evening screening, and the theater was packed with about an equal mix of adults and kids. Everyone seemed to enjoy it!

The story starts in an apartment building in Manhattan. Max (voiced by Louis C.K.) is a terrier who adores his owner, a young woman named Katie. One day she brings home a second dog, a huge, shaggy brown Newfoundland named Duke. Max and Duke don't get along at all. Their conflict results in them getting lost in the city, avoiding animal control officers and a gang of abandoned pets led by an insane white rabbit named Snowball. Meanwhile, the other pets from the apartment building embark on a quest to find them, led by Gidget, a white pomeranian.

Internet-famous vulpine Ron the Fox, well known for the YouTube videos depicting his life, passed away in his sleep on April 6 (video), just ten days before his eighth birthday.

Former owner Albi Azul says he found Ron curled peacefully under his favourite picnic table. Albi had hoped to film an episode commemorating his channel reaching 100,000 subscribers; the award arrived just a few days too late.

News of Ron's death was widely distributed, and inspired art from many furry fans, including crashheart, Muzz, azora and Haru; it also received coverage in the Irish Examiner.

A combination "thank-you" and "memorial" video clip was uploaded on the morning of April 9, but be warned: it is very depressing: Goodbye, silly RonRon, sleep tight.

And we've just become furry Variety.

Illumination Entertainment has released a trailer for The Secret Life of Pets, due summer of 2016, "a comedy about the lives our pets lead after we leave for work or school each day," according to Illumination's own description.

Given how jam-packed 2016 is with fully anthropomorphic animal movies, the fact that this movie only features talking animals makes it feel like almost a footnote (Finding Dory is another 2016 movie with "only" talking animals that would in any other year be the upcoming furry movie, but is also dealt with as an after thought, if at all). That being said, at the very least skip to the pogoing poodle at the end of the trailer.

Update (11/25): A second, Christmas themed trailer highlighting characters has been released.

More from MIPCOM. Aurore Damant is a former Gobelins student (if you don’t know who they are, every animation fan should!) who is now a professional character designer and art director. His latest project is called Zip Zip, produced in France by Go-N Productions. The premise is simple: A group of forest animals see that human civilization is encroaching on their habitat, and they figure if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. And so they conspire to disguise themselves as regular domestic house pets using zip-up costumes. Easy, yes? The show has debuted in France and it’s currently looking for international buyers to distribute it. Mr. Damant has several screen shots up on his blog to see.

image c. 2014 Go-N

Hoping to duplicate the success they found with My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic (admit it, you know it’s true!) IDW now brings us Littlest Pet Shop in full-color comic book form.  Animal-talker Blythe and her multi-species compadres are off on adventures all over Downtown City on their famous polka-dot moped. The series is written by Georgia Ball (My Little Pony) with art by Nico Pena and Antonio Campo (Penguins of Madagascar). The IDW web site has more. There’s also a variant cover version by Katie Cook (My Little Pony).

image c. 2014 IDW Publishing