Webcomic / Pusheen the Cat

3 Following

"Pusheen is a sweet, curious, lazy, & plump tabby cat that loves to have adventures. Her hobbies include blogging, snacking, taking naps, and being a unicorn/mermaid/dinosaur/various wild animals/a trio of pastel aliens on occasion.
In a parallel universe with a mysterious connection to our own, Pusheen is a Pug."

— pusheen.com character page

Pusheen the Cat started out as a character in the now-defunct 2010 Tumblr webcomic Everyday Cute, created by Claire Belton and Andrew Duff, before being rebooted into her own franchise with its own cast of new characters. This webcomic series featuring the chubby grey cat and her family and friends soon proves to be popular, spawning a picture book, messaging app stickers, merchandise and even themed cafés.

The franchise's official website can be found here.

Trope List for Your Cat:

• Aborted Declaration of Love: Bo has a habit of developing crushes and ultimately never acting on them. If she does end up sending out any affectionate gesture via telecommunication, she'll scramble to undo it.
• Added Alliterative Appeal: Pusheen's Purrfect Pairings. The last of said pairs however (Coffee & Donuts) is not alliterative.
• Alternate Universe: The many official AU versions: Pugsheen, Mermaid Pusheen, Pusheenicorn, etc.
• Amusing Alien: The Pastel Pusheens are a trio of pastel-colored cats who look just like Pusheen, from the planet Koo-Kee, and they're just as cute and friendly as Pusheen and friends.
• Annoying Younger Sibling: Pip is the most hyperactive and often causes trouble for his sisters.
• Art Evolution: Look at the current Pusheen, then look at her in her very first appearance.
• Artistic License – Animal Care: Pusheen and co. eat and enjoy various human foods, e.g. cookies (with chocolate, which is poisonous to cats just as it is to dogs), ice cream and pies.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: The darkly comedic If your Cat was Giant, they would…, in which a giant Pusheen plays with a real plane, causes earthquakes with her purr, and lies on top of a building.
• Backhanded Apology: Pusheen leaves a "sorry not sorry" note for eating all the roses in retaliation for giving her only one piece of chocolate on Valentine's Day.
• Bait-and-Switch:
  • The episode on online shopping, in which Pusheen, Stormy and Pip order various goods online… only to not use them, instead playing with their packaging.
  • Pusheen's Showdown: Pip appears to be a dangerous criminal, with a wanted poster on the saloon wall. He's actually a hired performer; the "wanted poster" is a partially obscured advertisement for his show.
• Beach Episode: My Beach Essentials, Beach Day, Beach Day with Pusheen.
• Big Eater: Pusheen.
• Binomium ridiculus: Pusheen's Scientific Names for Plants.
• Birthday Episode: Each of the main six characters has their own official birth date, and so it's not uncommon for special comics to be made for the occasion; most of them involve the character's birthday being celebrated, but not always.
• Black Comedy Burst: The series sometimes dips into jokes about things like cannibalism (Dec 22, 2013 Christmas strip), references to tragic media (Pusheen's Reading List for Thine Cat), gun violence (Pusheen's Showdown), and mass destruction (If your Cat was Giant).
• Black Comedy Cannibalism: Dec 22, 2013 Christmas strip: a gingerbread version of Pusheen stands next to a sentient gingerbread man. Within three panels, the gingerbread man is reduced to a pinch of crumbs next to a chewing gingerbread Pusheen. The Oh, Crap! face the gingerbread man makes before getting eaten just seals it.
• Bland-Name Product: There are Super Nyantendo game consoles.
• Broken Record: A list of what Pusheen likes about fall consists of just pie, pie, pie, pie, pie, and of course, pie.
• Canon Discontinuity: Everyday Cute is defunct with most of the strips lost, and all its characters except Pusheen and Stormy (e.g. Carmen, Socks and Beebs) are not acknowledged on the official Pusheen site.
• Carnivore Confusion: Main characters in this Intellectual Animal universe are depicted as eating meat (especially on Thanksgiving, with Pusheen hunting down a (deliberately badly drawn) turkey at one point) and fish. There are no explanations given.
• Cats Are Lazy: The heroine Pusheen is a fat cat who sleeps frequently and can sleep anywhere.
• Cats Have Nine Lives: The "age" section on Pusheen's official bio says she has "all 9 lives left"
• Continuity Reboot: It is a reboot of Everyday Cute.
• Crazy-Prepared: Pip's Present: Pusheen is prepared enough to nicely wrap both a gift and a decoy gift for Pip.
• Crossover: There have been collaborations with Hello Kitty, Final Fantasy XIV and Vocaloid.
• Cute Giant: If your Cat was Giant, they would…
• Cute Kitten: Pusheen and her siblings.
• Does Not Like Spam: Pusheen likes eating many foods but broccoli isn't one of them.
• A Dog Named "Dog": Pusheen's name is derived from the Irish word puisín meaning "kitten", her dog counterpart Pugsheen has "pug" in their name, and there's also Sloth the sloth.
• A Dog Named "Perro": Pusheen's name is derived from Irish puisín for "kitten".
• Early Installment Character-Design Difference: Pusheen's mother had yellow fur in her first appearance. In all later appearances, she has white fur.
• Expospeak Gag: Nicknames for Your Cat, after giving the nickname ideas "bun", "roll", and "loaf", gives one more nickname alongside an image of a confused Pusheen: "A baked mixture of flour, water, and a leavening agent such as yeast".
• Feminist Fantasy: The series has a female protagonist, and all characters regardless of gender are depicted as being friends and engaging in a wide range of activities without conforming to or being expected to conform to any gender stereotype. Only one female character (Bo) pursues romance, and even then it's not much of a focus.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: In Player 2, when Stormy is fast-forwarding through the game's dialogue, pausing it at the right times reveals that the princess in the game is scolding her for trying to skip the dialogue, pointing out that she's going to miss important information and that the game has no walkthrough.
• The Gadfly: Pip is a mischievous troublemaker.
• Gamer Chick: Pusheen and Stormy are shown to play video games and own professional gaming equipment such as consoles and headsets.
• Gender-Equal Ensemble: Of the six main characters, Pusheen, Stormy, and Bo are female, and Pip, Cheek, and Sloth are male.
• Gift Shake: Pip's Present: Pip does this to the Christmas gift Pusheen gives him; his guesses go from roast turkey to a full playground set to a car. Becomes even more hilarious when the box is revealed to be empty.
• The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry: Pusheen and Stormy are portrayed as this in a few strips e.g. The joys of having a younger sibling.
• Hand Rubbing: Pip as deviled egg, and Pip as gargoyle.
• Hard Truth Aesop: Pusheen's Guide to House Plants: Certain hobbies might be difficult to take up and not for everyone, and sometimes you have to settle for the closest equivalent.
• #HashtagForLaughs: #Slothcare, #GhostPerks With Boosheen the Ghost.
• Holiday Episode: Many strips and web episodes are made to tie in with holidays. You can even sort strips by holiday on the official site.
• Hollywood Genetics: Pusheen's mother and father have white and brown fur, respectively, and yet Pusheen and her siblings have fur colors in different shades of grey (or black, in Pip's case). Neither parent has any sign of Stormy or Pip's fluffy fur styles, either.
• Hot on His Own Trail: Both times Pusheen tries to investigate who ate her cookies, she comes across bits of crumbs pointing to herself as the one eating them.
• Hot Springs Episode: Pusheen is depicted taking a yuzuyu bath with a capybara in a hot spring.
• Hyperactive Sprite: The webcomics are not still; they're all constantly animated GIFs.
• Imagine Spot: A number of strips, such as Kitten Adventures with Pusheen the Kitten and The Adventures of Pip and Cheek, depict characters imagining themselves going on fantastical adventures, juxtaposing it with what they're actually doing in real life.
• Intellectual Animal: The characters are non-anthropomorphic animals who can cook, celebrate holidays, use the Internet, etc.
• It Runs on Nonsensoleum: The buttered cat problem is given a shout-out in one of the earliest strips (still part of Everyday Cute): Pusheen defies gravity by jumping off a window with a piece of buttered toast strapped to her back, causing her to spin endlessly in mid-air.
• Iyashikei: A Western example. The web series is just a cast of Ridiculously Cute Critters in a loosely established universe without much of a plot, whose sole purpose is being lighthearted and cute.
• Keet: Pip; he's hyperactive, can be a troublemaker and likes adventure.
• Letting the Air out of the Band: Happens during Meowgical Girl when Stormy and Pip walk in on Pusheen daydreaming.
• Micro Dieting: Cheek is a skilled baker, but due to his size, all his baked goods are comically small to his friends.
• Mockumentary: Pusheen Breads: A Documentary, the first ever voiced Pusheen short. It features loaves of Pusheen bread engaging in antics accompanied by a completely straight-faced narration as if it was a nature documentary. It's even watermarked with the logo of "Nyational Biographic".
• Naked People Are Funny: Or in this case, naked cats.
  • Sweater Weather: Stormy doesn't wear any clothes, with the caption saying "all natural". She even turns her tail to the camera and winks. Of course, she's also covered in very thick fur.
  • The last panel of A Cat's Guide to the Arts shows Pusheen demonstrating "performance art" - that is, grooming herself, with one of her back stripes conveniently looking like a Censor Box.
• Never Trust a Title: At no point in Pusheen's Showdown is there a fight or confrontation, and Pusheen spends most of the short being scared by the appearance of a seemingly intimidating figure.
• No Antagonist/No Plot? No Problem!: The series has no conflict and near-total absence of plot.
• Parody Names:
  • Celebkitties: Kitty Perry, Fluffin Bieber, Taylor Hissed, Conan O'Kitten, Lady Pawpaw, Steve Pussemi.
  • Catoons: Catbob Fluffypants, Catventure Time, Powerpaw Girls, Sailor Mew.
  • Pusheen's Reading List for Thine Cat: Purrlock Holmes, Romeow and Juliet among others.
  • The Mockumentary short is credited to Nyational Biographic.
• Partially-Concealed-Label Gag: Pusheen's Showdown: Pip is believed to be a dangerous gunslinger, with what appears to be a "Wanted!" Poster of himself. The poster is partially concealed by other posters on top of it to appear like a wanted poster, while it's an advertisement for a performer.
• Present Peeking: Pip's Present short: Pusheen gives him a wrapped gift box with an express warning not to open before Christmas. Of course, he ends up opening it anyway and finds out the box is empty. It's a decoy; Pusheen keeps the real present.
• Pun: Many strips rely on this, often cat-related.
• Pun with "π": How to Calculate Pi.
• Related in the Adaptation: Stormy is not said to be Pusheen's younger sister in Everyday Cute.
• Ridiculously Cute Critter: Everyone.
• Rhymes on a Dime:
  • Many strips have all their captions be rhyming words or phrases.
  • "A Pusheen Bakery Christmas" is written like a Dr. Seuss story.
• Roses Are Red, Violets Are Blue...: Valentine's Day 2013 strip, Bo-etry with Bo the Bird.
• Shameless Fanservice Girl: Stormy in Sweater Weather and Pusheen in A Cat's Guide to the Arts.
• Sherlock Homage: Every time Pusheen tries to become a detective, she wears a checkered deerstalker cap. There's also "Purrlock Holmes".
• Skewed Priorities: Pip Asks: Can I eat it?: he can chew on pretty much anything he likes, but eating Pusheen's food is a "NO!!"
• Sluggish Sloths: Sloth likes to "take his time in all things" and "laze around".
• Smart People Wear Glasses: Strips dealing with scientific topics (How to Calculate Pi, Pusheen's Scientific Names for Plants) have Pusheen wear glasses and a bowtie.
• Spoiler Title: Player 2 – gives away the resolution that Stormy eventually gets a second console and a 2-player mode.
• Suddenly Voiced: Pusheen Breads: A Documentary is the first voiced piece of Pusheen media after years of comic strips and unvoiced shorts.
• Sweet Baker: Cheek the hamster loves to bake hamster-sized treats and share them with his friends.
• Transformation Sequence: Meowgical Girl has Pusheen getting cookies late at night and daydreaming about transforming into Super Pusheenicorn in a typical Magical Girl style until Stormy and Pip interrupt her daydream and get some giggles at the sight.
• Unconventional Food Usage: Practical Uses for Bread, in which Pusheen uses different kinds of bread as bedding.
• Uniformity Exception:
  • The last dessert/drink pair in Pusheen's Purrfect Pairings is not alliterative.
  • Catoons: The last work listed (Sailor Mew) is originally a manga, not a cartoon.
  • Pusheen's Reading List for Thine Cat: One of the works listed (Romeow and Juliet) is a play, while the rest are prose stories.
• The Un-Reveal: Pip's Present: Even with the reveal that the first gift Pip gets is a decoy to counter Present Peeking, we never know what gift he's actually given later.
• Very Loosely Based on a True Story: Pusheen and Stormy are based on real cats the authors have owned. The original Everyday Cute comics are a fictionalized account of the authors' lives with their pets.
• Villain Protagonist: Which RPG Baddie are you? portrays Pusheen and co. as fantasy RPG villains and invites readers to see themselves as these villain types.
• Visual Pun: Many strips rely on this e.g. How to Make Your Own Luck: a horseshoe is literally a shoe with a horse face drawn on.
• "Wanted!" Poster: Pip has one in Pusheen's Showdown. Subverted, it's a partially obscured advertisement.
• Wildlife Commentary Spoof: Pusheen Breads: A Documentary features serious, formal nature documentary-like narration playing over goofy animations of Pusheen-shaped pastries.