Felix escapes from the explosion at Kitty’s house, but all her old friends now think he is responsible for her death. Can he make it to Paris unscathed? Find out in Cat Fight #2 from IDW Publishing!
CAT FIGHT #2
Writer: Andrew Wheeler
Artist: Ilias Kyriazis
Colorist: Dennis Yatras
Letterer: Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou
Editor: Heather Antos
Publisher: IDW Publishing
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: July 12, 2023
Previously in Cat Fight: Felix Lamarr, a cat burglar, steals the Red Rosette, a striking red diamond. He needs money quickly to settle a debt. He goes to a party where he meets with Tabitha, the buyer for the diamond. He also spots Claude, his grandmother’s majordomo, in the crowd and makes a quick escape to avoid him. As he does so, he gets a call from Schrodinger, who claims to have paid Felix’s debt. He also wants him on a crew targeting his grandmother. While he is distracted, Claude incapacitates him and drags him back to his grandmother, Kitty, who was a brilliant cat burglar in her day. She tells Felix that Schrodinger is trying to recruit her old compatriots, and she is his target. Schrodinger uses Felix’s phone to track him, finds Kitty, and bombs her house.
ON THE RUN WITH BIG PROBLEMS
Cat Fight #2 opens with Felix at the train station in Rome. He lifts a pair of luxury Rome-to-Paris train tickets from a couple and calls Tabitha and leaves her a message to tell her that not only did Schrodinger get to Kitty, but he is also setting Felix up to take the blame. Felix hopes to hide out at Kitty’s house in Paris, if he can remember the address, but right now none of the people he knows are answering his calls.
Boarding time for the train arrives, and Felix steps onto the Prussian Express. He sits down to a solo tea, trying to remember the address. A waiter hands him a tablet on which he receives a call from Luciana Nero, of the Nero family. She confirms that Schrodinger bought his debt, and that the Nero family will no longer help him out. When he tries to ask her as a friend – which he really isn’t anyway – she flat out tells him that everyone not only knew Kitty, but they also really liked her. And they do not like him. Not only is there a bounty on his head, but everyone knows he asked her to meet him on the Prussian Express.
As if on cue, he is garroted. He grabs a jar of marmalade from the table and hits his assailant while telling him that he does not want to fight. There has been a mistake. A woman as blonde as his attacker shows up and kicks him in the head. They are Pixie and Bob, the Bricard twins. They were the fake cops in Venice, and they were very fond of Kitty. Pixie tases him and he blacks out.
He drifts into a flashback where he remembers being alone in Kitty’s house and hearing voices. She stopped in with some friends, at 3 AM, to pick up some stuff. She needs to help someone named Agnes. Felix is resentful that she is helping someone else and not being with him. He is afraid that he will lose her like he lost his parents. Kitty urges him to be strong, brave, and resourceful.
He comes to and throws a bowl of soup into Bob’s face. Admittedly, it is gazpacho. Bob recovers quickly and throws balls of yarn at Felix, but this is no ordinary yarn. It exudes clouds of smoke. Pixie lectures Felix about how Kitty saved their lives. He never really knew her and never realized how proud of him she was. The smoke clears and Felix is gone.
He is on the roof of the train, and Schrodinger calls him again and says he will call everyone off if Felix comes to work for him. Pixie and Bob show up and they fight briefly until Felix makes a daring escape from the train which sends him tumbling down a hill and onto a road where he is nearly hit by a woman in a convertible. She offers to give him a ride, introduces herself as Agnes as she starts driving, and kicks him out. He grabs onto the door as he dangles over a precipice. There is a tunnel moments ahead and he has that long to explain. He runs through his explanation and when the car door hits the tunnel wall, he is already gone.
He finally arrives in Paris and remembers that Kitty’s place was called the Chat Noir. It is dilapidated and dark, but he breaks in and starts looking for anything which she might have left for him, anything which could help him to survive.
THIEVERY AND SCENERY
The art of Cat Fight #2 strikes a clever balance between being a little exaggerated for the sake of action and humor, yet still being realistic and consistent. The opening scene in the train station uses the color to set Felix off from the crowd. As we would expect, there are all kinds of people in the station. It would be easy to lose the main character otherwise. But a few other notable people come to our attention. In the composition, they just look as though they are closer to us, where they would naturally be in higher focus. But among them, we see Pixie and Bob, so this sets up their encounter brilliantly.
The action beats are fast-paced and cinematic in style. The fight moves quickly, and it moves a lot through space, yet it makes sense. I love that when Felix uses things in the fight, they have been set up for us naturally. For example, early on as he pickpockets his way to the train, one of the items he filches is a pearl necklace that turns out to be handy later. In the style of action movie characters, Felix is extremely lucky. But it is fun to see him get out of situations by mini cliffhangers that only give him a few moments of peace before he discovers the next unexpected problem.
BOTTOM LINE: HIGH-OCTANE ACTION
For a fun, high-energy read, Cat Fight #2 is a terrific book to turn to. Felix is not likable, and he makes some poor choices, yet there is still something sympathetic about him. The unfolding plot is intriguing, and I like how things are starting to shape up.
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Cat Fight #2
Felix suddenly finds himself to be the target of all his grandmother’s old friends.
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By day, she’s a mild-mannered bureaucrat and Ms. Know-It-All. By night, she’s a dance teacher and RPG player (although admittedly not on the same nights). On the weekends, she may be found judging Magic, playing Guild Wars 2 (badly), or following other creative pursuits. Holy Lack of Copious Free Time, Batman! While she’s always wished she had teleportation as her superpower, she suspects that super-speed would be much more practical because then she’d have time to finish up those steampunk costumes she’s also working on.