When all is said and done, Ralph Wolf and Sam Sheepdog are just working stiffs, grubbing to make a buck just like you and I. Heck,they even punch in and out on a time clock, just as I used to do when working summer factory jobs! The difference is that their time clock is attached to a tree, rather than a cinder block wall…
Although Ralph and Sam are mortal enemies while on the job, it’s really just a job for them, and they are acting out their expected roles, Ralph Wolf trying to claim the sheep grazing in the field, and Sam Sheepdog thwarting Ralph at every turn, often with extreme force. Sam is easily the physical superior to Ralph, fully capable of giving the wolf a pounding, as he often does…
Now, an inevitable comparison must be made between Ralph Wolf and Wile E. Coyote. Ralph so resembles the coyote that you might think Wile E. is making a guest appearance in another cartoon series where he is battling a sheep dog rather than a road runner. The differences in drawing styles are so minimal that Ralph and Wile E. might be considered twins separated at birth who just chose different avenues of employment, with each remaining predators…
Now, the physical differences between Ralph and Wile E. are so minimal that they can easily be overlooked or discounted. Sometimes, Ralph is drawn with a red nose, whereas Wile E. isn’t. The real difference between the two is one of attitude and psychological disposition. Wile E. Coyote is obsessed with catching the road runner; it’s what he always plots and attempts to do all the time. For Ralph Wolf, catching sheep is strictly a day job, one which he engages in only after clocking in, and ceases immediately upon clocking out. Ralph has a life outside of the sheep fields, and in his off-hours doesn’t define himself in terms of absconding with sheep. Heck, he even retires after hours to a house, and is cordial and genial with Sam Sheepdog, because after all he’s just working a job, and doing what’s expected as a predator. Ralph’s job doesn’t define him, whereas Wile E.‘s doesas a life calling, a mission, a total purpose for his existence…
As evidenceof the surprising geniality between the wolf and the sheepdog, consider that they greet each other cordially each day upon clocking in and out, and cease hostilities completely to observe lunch break, which is also signaled by a whistle. Clearly, these two have good unions working for them…
Ralph Wolf does share traits with Wile E., and occasionally orders products from Acme! I would love to own stock in that company, even though many of their products are defective, or don’t work as intended. From cradle to grave, Acme has something for you to meet your every need…
Something that’s touching is the fact that Sam Sheepdog and Ralph Wolf actually seem to respect and even care about each other. When Ralph in one cartoon came back to work one morning visibly in bad shape from the previous day’s thrashing, Sam actually advised the wolf to take the next day off! I don’t see the same element of concern between the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote. Arguably the Road Runner enjoys being chased, knowing that there’s virtually no chance of the Coyote’s schemes succeeding, and his being caught. At times, the Road Runner seems to enjoy taunting or startling the Coyote, although he once after the Coyote endured several falls, held up a sign indicating that he “just didn’t have the heart” to inflict another one upon the suffering canine…
Ralph Wolf and Sam Sheepdog do talk at the beginning and end of their days to one another, whereas Wile E. Coyote can talk, but rarely does. I have upon occasion seen Ralph Wolf hold up a sign to convey his thoughts, just as Wile E. often does. I rather like the relationship that Ralph and Sam have with each other, because after all, they’re just working a job, and the mayhem on it is nothing personal…
(It all reminds me of the day I encountered Foghorn Leghorn in a henhouse…but that’s a tale for another day.)
Animated anthropomorphic cats really seem to be coming into their own lately, and they’re speaking their often off-color minds! First we had Kevin about a dispossessed pet cat, then we had a cat or two in the wildly-sexualized animals of Mating Season, we’ve got kung-fu cats fighting on the internet, and now we’ve got coming to Netflix August 7th Alley Cats as a series of six 15-minute shorts about the lives of a group of British feral cats, complete with accents…
Ricky Gervais plays the character of Gus, described as a rude, fat, and opinionated cat who is kinda the leader of the group. The artwork (which is good) portrays the distinctive attitudes and personalities of the felines…
The cat clan muses over a variety of things, ranging from humans to how they would like to die to the biggest thing that they could take down if they worked together. There are cat tropes presented, like fear of pickles. But when a kitten wishes that they had never been born, leader Gus makes it clear to him that it’s good to be a cat!They show this by creating chaos on the streets in this quirky, raunchy, dark comedy that is again not for children!
Now I really like Ricky Gervais, who is a British comedian and passionate global animal rights advocate. He has generously supported and campaigned for animal rights organizations, anti-animal cruelty groups, and conservation causes. He has opposed trophy hunting, and strongly condemned fox hunting, describing it as cruel, barbaric, and senseless. He is a vegan who leans left politically, while criticizing woke culture and identity politics. I find him quite relatable…
So if you are beyond childhood, have access to Netflix, and are a fan of anthropomorphic animals (especially felines), you may want to check out Alley Cats, coming your way August 7th…
(Me and my crew, in my sweet fantasies…)
Addendum: Having now seen all six available episodes of Alley Cats, I regard it as a mixed bag having its moments. The series has been panned for crude vulgarity, with some reviews calling it mirthless and unfunny. The series also pivots unevenly between shock humor and emotional sentimentality, as when the episodes deal with themes of grief, aging, and atheism. I also found that I had to listen to the episodes rather closely in light of the British accents and idioms presented, and the turns of phrases…
I’ve seen far worse vulgarity on the small screen recently, most specifically on such shows as Mating Season. The sentimental moments provide a leavening influence, however, as when Gus visits his dying mother, or defends a cat’s existent to Kitten. Without issuing a spoiler, the ragtag group of cats presents the notion that a family can be defined in terms of the group with which you associate, rather than the house in which you reside.
I think that there’s more that can be done with this adult series, and hope that it continues…but opinions are sharply divided on the show…
When AI is used for good rather than evil, you can get some wonderful creations such as the rash of Kung Fu Cats that are on the internet on sites such as YouTube. Fighting dogs, cats, humans, and even hamsters, these martial arts adept felines are almost unstoppable, although their weakness appears to be cat toys, which can distract them..
The images and videos can satirize those hokey old martial arts flicks that have been around for decades, and the traditions and characters that we loved and hated in them…
I for one will never look at my cats the same way again, lest a script for Hidden Tiger, Hiding Human play out before my eyes with my unwilling participation…
In commemoration of Father’s Day, we bring you Alex the Lion dancing both solo and with his Dad from the film Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa!
Alexthe Lion is initially displaced from Kenya to become a performer in the Central Park Zoo in New York City, and when displaced from that environment becomes a fish out of water, although one equipped with impressive dancing skills that he uses to quell a group of starving stranded tourists in Madagascar from NYC intent upon having him for dinner! Convinced of his true identity, Alex escapes his predicament through the power of his art…
Originally intended for an earlier 2026 release, a new animated version of the Dr. Seuss classic, The Cat in the Hat is now projected to open in November of 2026 to better capitalize on the Christmas trade. It should be better received than the 2003 live action version of the story that featured Mike Myers…
Sometimes referred to as “The Cat who Fell Flat,” the 2003 movie was I think a better film than it’s often credited to be, although it’s a bit crass, and the humor is rather “out there.” A sequel was originally intended, but the widow of Dr. Seuss so disliked the film that she forbid live action films of her husband’s work to ever again be made. The successful How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000) predated The Cat, and was a winner with Jim Carrey.
Believe it or not,the title role in The Cat in the Hat live action movie was originally intended for Tim Allen, but he had a conflict so the part went to Myers, who was a pretty big box office draw having done the Shrek films and the Austin Powers series. It’s really hard for me to imagine Tim Allen as the character despite his many talents, and I think that Myers brought the required manic energy to the part. While the makeup was a bit creepy, he did look more like a cat than the strange hybrid “cats” of the movie musical version of Cats. The 2003 live-action film adaptation faced heavy backlash for featuring adult-oriented humor that alienated family audienceswith adult double entendresand crude potty humor, and some have gone so far as to suggest that the Cat’s visual design and performative tricks are rooted in 19th-century blackface minstrelsy…but I think that this is an extension too far…
I still love The Cat in all of his incarnations, anyways, who in this 2026 film appears appropriately enough to be on a reclamation proving mission for himself, risking losing his “stripes” (iconic hat) if he fails. The Cat is my fave Dr. Sseus character, before and after The Grinch achieved massive popularity. This Cat is modern, in touch, and slick, without any apparent adult content; you can be hip, appealing, and funny without being dirty! He’s resilient, too, gettingmaced in the eyes upon his initial contact by the kids he’s trying to help.– – Welcome to 2026, Cat! If the Cat can find redemption, dare we hope that Pepe Le Pew is not far behind?!
This animation is friendly to the Cat in the Hat character, which was originally translated from the classic 1957 children’s book to an animated TV special in 1971. The upcoming 2026 film comes from Warner Bros. Pictures, so it has a good pedigree. Maybe we’ll have a Thing or Two to say about it, with the Things in this film revealed to be more than a duo…the talking fish is there, too…
With a title such as “Mating Season” and a cast of anthropomorphic cartoon animals, you may rightfully have a suspicion of what the show is largely about. Your second clue comes with the realization that the new 10-episode first season show on Netflix is produced by Titmouse, the same studio that gave us Kevin, about the anthropomorphic tuxedo cat trying to find himself in the big city after his human owners break up, and essentially dump him in an animal shelter…
“Kevin” is Shakespeare, however, compared to “Mating Season.” This show is RAUNCHY, and definitely NOT FOR CHILDREN! I cannot shoutthat from a sufficiently tall enough building. Not only do the denizens of an anonymous forest have sex, but they have it often, and with others outside of their own species! Struggling a bit to relate a somewhat sanitized version of a central occurrence in episode 1, a hyperactive, highly sexualized male raccoon named Ray winds up sharing intimacies with a flirty female skunk, and in the aftermath of that, they wind up with a “copulatory tie,” joined together at the genitals until later in the episode…
(Picturedabove; Ray, Josh, Fawn, and Penelope…)
Now I do know that raccoons are stereotypically among the bad boys of the furry fandom, and that the fandom has always had a “yiffy” component, but I worry a bit that some outside of the fandom are going to see all of the highly sexualized animals on parade here, and think that’s mostly all that the fandom is about. It took us a long time, for example, to put the CSI episode featuring fursuits behind us…
The artwork in Mating Season is good, as is characteristic of Titmouse studios, and far better than most of the mass-produced cartoons on television. We need to consider, however, the messaging conveyed by such an adult cartoon. The show is unapologetically vulgar, and emphasizes shock value at the expense of character development. It’s strangely reassuring, however, to learn that I am still capable of being shocked, almost to the point of feeling violated as a furry. I do not enjoy wallowing in the mire; we furries are better than this! 😼
I mean, Rigby the raccoon of Regular Show (below) would be shocked by Ray the raccoon, and that’s saying something! 🙀
Nowin all fairness to the series, episodes beyond the initial one do seem to be slightly tamer, and we can sense the closeness of the animal community. There’s quite a variety of different species represented, such as Penelope the lesbian fox, her straight friend Fawn the deer, Josh the bear deserted by his mate, Dylan the wolf, and Summer the lesbian hound, who has an intense but doomed relationship with Penelope.So beyond the sexuality, the series deals with relationships, and the difficulties inherent in them. For example, the wolf moves in with the deer, but they split up as the wolf urinates everywhere to mark his territory, and invites his pack to a real “animal house”-styled celebration of the full moon, complete with drinking and howling….
Now this is cute; furries are actually directly referenced in the series (I believe in episode 3), and some of the animals play at being human! Turn-about is fair play, I guess. So perhaps I was initially too harsh on the series out of my initial shock, and Mating Season can be quite funny and clever if you’re OK with the vulgarity and strong sexual content…it’s just not for everyone, and definitely for adults only…
Amazon Prime’s adult animated series “Kevin” featuring anthropomorphic animals is highly polarizing to viewers, with one review terming it “unpleasant, unfunny, and unwatchable,” while others have found it “heartwarming!” But as a furry and cat lover, I had to check this out…
At the heart of Kevin is an anthropomorphic neurotic tuxedo cat (voiced by Jason Schwartzman) who loses his home when his humans break up, casting him into a local pet rescue center in Queens called “Furrever Friends” filled with “independent” animalswhere he encounters a number of homeless and displaced animals, predominantly felines, most of which are even more disordered and scarred by life than he is. Take for example “Cupcake,” voiced by Whoopi Goldberg, who portrays an emaciated, battered, and battle-scarred feral catwho is fearless, cynical, and yet quite adept at surviving in the environs of New York City…
…and man, the animals in the city are tough! His feral instincts triggered, Kevin chases a squirrel who in turn pulls a knife on him! A half-dead pigeon begs Kevin to eat him to put him out of his misery (thankfully, he refuses)! These are not cutesy animals, but rather hardened, grim individuals who provide the inexperienced, once pampered house cat with an education in the “School of Hard Knocks.”
Make no mistake, this is NOT a cartoon series for children! The language is generously sprinkled with vulgarities and obscenities, and the animals are raunchy, and at times quite twisted. There is humor here, but it’s quite dark. There is a content advisory for “nudity, violence, substance use, alcohol use, smoking, foul language, sexual content, and flashing lights and strobing patterns that might affect photosensitive viewers.”- – Something for everyone, right?! As a furry I like all things furry, but this series at times pushes the boundaries into rather extreme territory that will turn off many. The series explores the question of finding where you belong in the world, which is something that most of us will ultimately contend with. It just won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but that’s why we have buttons to change the channel or turn sets off…
All eight episodes of the first season of Kevin may be streamed from Amazon Prime, and I’d consider it an acquired taste…you’ll either love it or hate it, but it may grow on you…
Episode 8 of Season 5 of MonsterQuestdeviated from previous installments of the revived series in that it focused entirely on aliens, and had the flavor at times of being an X-Files episode. I almost expected to see Fox Mulder make an appearance, but regretfully he did not. I liked this change of pace from the usual cryptid coverage, usually featuring Bigfoot in varying forms. I only take issue with space-faring aliens being categorized as Monsters, when I regard them as advanced life forms…
Anyways, the episode featured “accounts of people who claim they were stalked, attacked or even taken by threats from beyond our world, because not all monsters come from the woods – sometimes they come from ABOVE!” Alright, I’m all in for this one, but why must we call possible aliens “Monsters?”
The show kicked off with the story of the “Allagash Four,” four Boston college students who claimed that they were abducted by aliens. Going on a planned week-long camping trip in Allagash, Maine in August of 1976, the four young men set up by Eagle Lake, using a canoe for night fishing on their fourth night there. They felt a sensation that they were being watched, and saw a ball of light rising behind them that had a “rolling effect” to it. They waved a flashlight at it, after which a beam of light reportedly came out of the orb and illuminated them. Terrified, they started paddling back to shore, and had almost made it there when suddenly everything went black! Their next memory was of standing on the shoreline, with no idea of how they got there…
Thinking that they had only been gone an hour, it turned out that they had been gone for several hours, with no member of the group being able to account for the “missing time.” They went their own ways afterwards, graduating from college…but twelve years later, they experienced recurrent nightmares of being trapped in a room with strange beings having a long neck and big eyes. They reached out to an investigator, Ray Fowler, who put them under hypnosis separately. Each recounted being trapped on a gurney, paralyzed, while a panel was placed on their chests, and scrapings were taken from their arms and legs. A 1993 book on the abduction brought both wonder and doubt, but the men are standing by their abduction story…
Then in Fyffe, Alabama in 1989, 50 people reported seeing a triangular-shaped craft hovering in the sky in one of the most well-documented UFO mass sightings. The government contended that they had seen helicopters, but witnesses said that the object made no noise, and was completely silent. In a related case, one man’s father-in-law at night saw a light out in a field, walked up to it, and was hit by a beam of light that struck him in the forehead, rendering him unconscious. He woke up the next morning in the middle of the field with nothing around him…
Several apps exist supposedly to facilitate contact with extraterrestrials. A story was presented of a man who in 2014 used such an app to contact a large, 7′ to 8′ black alien with a large head and neck, and long arms. He passed out following his initial contact, but in the middle of the following night, heard a shrill, screeching sound outside of his window, thinking that his dog was killing some small animal there. Going outside to investigate, he beheld a silent light in the sky hanging there above the treeline. Shining his flashlight, he then saw the reported alien standing in the middle of the road, who was surprised and ran away. The man retreated to his house and stood guard with a pistol, hearing an all-consuming voice in his head that essentially said“If I wanted to kill you, you’d already be dead!Go back to sleep, NOW!” The man woke up the following morning, and his dog didn’t return for three days, behaviorally changed. The man regrets having initiated the “contact…”
References to “Little Green Men” that are now part of the language originated in a tobacco farm in Kelly, Kentucky in August of 1955. In an isolated, rural areaa man went to get well water, and saw a small, silver object thirty to forty feet above him. Others from the household came to investigate, at which time a 3-1/2′ to 4′ figure came out from behind the house. The figure was related to have a big round head, long talons, and a luminescent green glow! Alarmingly, he hovered above the ground. While others ran inside the house, a grandmother then went outside to check things out for herself, screaming “I saw it!”
At this point, an uncle inside the house shot at the alien through the window…welcome to ‘Murica, right?! Gunfire didn’t seem to much faze the alien, and another was seen perched in a tree. Aliens then came up to the doors and windows of the house, and were met with welcoming gunfire. Lacking a phoneor other means of outside communication, it was decided to send someone to the next town seven miles away for help, where that person went to the local police department that in turn summoned about two dozen responders to go to the house in the middle of the night…
Upon arrival the responders saw shotgun and rifle shells all over the yard and in the house, and searched but found no bodies or blood, human or alien. Saying that there was nothing that they could do, the police departed. The family was sworn to secrecy by the father, but the next morning many gawking newcomers came in cars, wanting to see the “little green men.” A local radio station came to interview members of the family individually, and their stories all agreed. Drawings were also made by family members that were consistent. State troopers the night of the incident had seen lights in the sky that they couldn’t explain, as had other people.
Project Blue Book actually reviewed the state police findings, and put surveillance aircraft in the air. Their results were inconclusive, but there was no evidence or indicators of a hoax, either. The case remains unresolved… 🤔
Also covered was the classic Travis Walton November 1975 UFO abduction, when a member of a six-man logging crew disappeared after being struck in the chest by a beam of light reportedly emitted by a UFO that he went to investigate. A massive manhunt found nothing, but five days later and 15 miles away from the site of the disappearance, the victim emerged, saying that he was abducted by aliens, and examined. The presumed abductee passed numerous polygraph tests. A book and a 1993 movie were made of Walton’s reported experience…
Some reported alien abductees have presented with red dots in a triangular pattern on their skin. The spring of 2022 case of a retired policeman was examined where he first woke one morning to find numerous marks on his foot that disappeared the following morning. Two weeks later, the man had the sensation of being dropped on his bed, opening his eyes to to see three glowing beings in shining gold color that emitted light; they gradually faded from sight. The man compared the experience to coming out of anesthesia. He told his wife, and had three red dots in a triangular pattern on his skin although no memories of how they got there. Regression therapy was sought from a hypnotherapist, uncovering memories of being put on a table and covered with a gel blanket by a gold being with black eyes who sent low voltage jolts through the gel blanket into him. He reported having a telepathic communication from the alien in which he was asked “how do you feel?” One alien tapped a spot on his arm, and then he was back in his room, looking at the alien; the abductee’s memories ended there. He asked the therapist if his experience was a dream, and she contended that it was a repressed memory…
Oregon has long been a UFO hotspot, with over 3,600 UFO sightings reported there since 1974. In one of the mostfamous, a farmer on a quiet farm near McMinnville snapped photos of a strange flying object hovering over his property. The photos actually appeared in Life magazine, but scientists later concluded that the object was likely a small model hanging from a wire. Many still believe that the farmer captured something unexplained, and the area now hosts one of the largest UFO festivals in the U.S.!
In another Oregon case from 2019, a woman sitting outside noticed a smoke-like circular cloud which contracted into a humanoid figure with large eyes and a pointed chin. He walked down a pathway, apparently not perceiving her. Retreating into her house where her children were, the woman went about shutting her blinds, seeing while so doing the same humanoid figure in a vacant apartment across the street! She called her sister, who advised her to take a picture. The woman did so through the blinds, feeling that the alien was staring back at her. The alien never reappeared…
So there you go, faithful readers! Just remember that not all aliens are monsters, and may regard us as interesting primitives…
Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa in a February of 2026 commercial entitled Lucky Doe features a trio of deer by a recognizable New Jersey highway leading to Atlantic City who come across a lost or discarded cell phone still functional lying on the road surface. One deer tentatively hits the touchscreen on the phone with a hoof, accessing Borgata’s mobile app, and then these deer are off to the on-line gaming tables, really into it and throwing out some fancy moves while at it! I mean, these deer practically have a private rave right there on the asphalt, until vehicle headlights cause them to freeze, and then run offas the owners of the phone come back to reclaim it…
Does just wanna have fun, ‘ya know, maybe while making a little dough on the side… 😉🦌
Skinwalker Ranch in Utah has been regarded to be a paranormal hotspot, kind of an interdimensional gateway. MonsterQuest reports that as early as the 17th century, Franciscan priests saw strange lights in the sky here. In 1994, unsettling events such as burn marks on cattle and mutilated cattle were seen. A Skinwalker often manifests as a large wolf, possibly as a curse activated during a Navajo and Ute war. Firearms discharged at such creatures have seemingly had no effect, and their footprints simply vanish after a short distance...
Domestic incursions of skinwalkers have been reported as shadowy creatures or “dark entities,” with TV and radio sets turning themselves on and off. In 1995, a series of tragedies including orange orbs that seemed to scan the area were reported by owners of the ranch, who later sold the property at a loss…
Now theMothman of Point Pleasant, West Virginia has been an icon of paranormal interest, with over 100 sightings reported since 1966-1967. Standing 7′ to 9′ tall, the Mothman has feathery wings, red eyes, and a terrifying cry. In 1966, an incident was reported where the creature came up on a porch of a home, and followed a car, even though the vehicle was fleeing him at a speed of 100 to 110 mph!
In 1967, the Silver Bridge in Point Pleasant collapsed, killing 46 people. A menacing winged creature was seen before the bridge collapse, which some have seen as perhaps an omen or a warning…
MonsterQuest then shifted to coverage of the Texas Dogman, of which indigenous Native American tribes had long told tales. A man in 2021 was found dead in the woods of neck injuries from an animal attack attributed to the Dogman. The same creature was seen in 2013 by a woman driving near Dallas who saw something moving close to the ground that bounded or hopped. It was described as having a hump on the back of its neck like a hyena. The woman sped away terrified, fearing pursuit. “Wolf-like” prowlers have also been reported elsewhere.
All of this raises the question of whether a Dogman can be his own best friend…
(RIP, John Candy…)
Northern California has long been a hotspot for Bigfoot, with the Patterson-Gimlin video supposedly capturing a massive, hair-covered bipedal creature that was muscular and moving upright…
In 1983, three Bigfoot-type figures were reportedly seen by teenagers playing an outdoor game on a field in the Pacific Northwest. One of the figures was seen to have leaped over a 10′ high fence…
Lastly, MonsterQuest in a final inconsistent example presented Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania as being a hotspot of demonic possession stemming back to a massacre of Native Americans in the late 1700’s. A case was cited where an exorcism was performed on a woman whose eyes turned black, made guttural noises, and smelled “like rotten meat and death.” Religious symbols were used to dispel the entityfrom the afflicted woman…
FOXSYLVANIA 
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