{"id":805766,"date":"2026-08-07T13:46:14","date_gmt":"2026-08-07T13:46:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/805766\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T13:46:14","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T13:46:14","slug":"alley-cats-review-ricky-gervais-netflix-comedy-is-bittersweet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/805766\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Alley Cats’ Review: Ricky Gervais Netflix Comedy Is Bittersweet"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tTo kick off the third episode of the Netflix animated comedy \u201cAlley Cats<\/a>,\u201d protagonist Gus \u2014 an overweight orange tabby voiced by writer, creator and frequent director Ricky Gervais<\/a> (think Garfield with a distinctly working class British accent) \u2014\u00a0describes his plan for the day. It starts with an achievable goal. Then: \u201cGet distracted immediately. Do loads of weird, pointless shit that somehow makes stuff worse. Kill something. Eat bits of it. Give up our mission. Come home here. Sleep for 14 hours.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cHome,\u201d in this case, is a derelict London rowhouse where Gus and his mates Puke (David Earl), Fang (Andrew Brooke) and Olive (Diane Morgan, better known as daft presenter Philomena Cunk<\/a>) have taken to squatting. There, the cats watch TV, from a \u201cLove Island\u201d knockoff called \u201cThick and Single\u201d to news footage of looting to nature documentaries, chat about nothing and generally do as Gus describes. \u201cAlley Cats\u201d ambles along as such for half a dozen sub-20-minute chapters \u2014\u00a0though the show is tinged throughout with a melancholy that\u2019s a little surprising from the typically acerbic Gervais.<\/p>\n

\n\tGiven the other series\u2019 swift cancellation<\/a>, it\u2019s unlikely many viewers will have watched both \u201cAlley Cats\u201d and \u201cKevin,\u201d the Amazon Prime Video series with a similar premise co-created by Aubrey Plaza. But comparing the two, as is inevitable for a critic commissioned to review<\/a> each in turn, proves instructive. Both are cartoons for adults distributed via streaming, centered on feline protagonists in major cities. Yet \u201cKevin\u201d is louder, wackier and more joke-dense \u2014\u00a0one might even say more American \u2014 than \u201cAlley Cats,\u201d which is more downbeat and droll by comparison.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAlley Cats\u201d also organizes itself around social caste, as befits its country of origin. The titular crew also hang around with a housecat they nickname Ponce (Tom Basden), who\u2019s more genteel in every sense of the term than his friends. He sounds posh; he\u2019s spoiled with pudding; he\u2019s neutered and thus immune to baser urges, including Olive\u2019s unrequited crush. The rest of the crew are more base, volleying the c-word \u2014\u00a0rhymes with \u201crunt\u201d \u2014\u00a0around freely as they debate useless topics like whether four cats could take down \u201cone fat kid\u201d or if bees are edible. (Most laughs come from these mumbled, mundane exchanges rather than conventional setups and punchlines.) Puke, the mangiest of the group, admits his private parts are \u201csmashed up\u201d because \u201cI gave a hedgehog anal.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBut \u201cAlley Cats\u201d doesn\u2019t just revel in the nastiness of feral life. The show also depicts its hardships with disarming frankness, even verging on despondency. An associate of the crew is introduced and then fatally run over in seconds. A deadbeat dad is reassured that, since his kittens were adopted and grew into well-adjusted triplets,\u00a0\u201cmaybe you not being around was their best chance.\u201d The last line of the season \u2014\u00a0not really a spoiler, since there\u2019s not much context necessary \u2014\u00a0is \u201cwe\u2019re all gonna die soon.\u201d Sometimes, this undercurrent of gloom tips over into outright nihilism. (\u201cFuck people,\u201d Gus proclaims in one of his many rants at the television. \u201cI can\u2019t wait for people to wipe people off the face of the Earth.\u201d) More often, though, the mood is more one of resignation to a hardscrabble existence that also has its pleasures.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe serialized plot of \u201cAlley Cats\u201d comes from a lost kitten (Jo Hartley) the strays resolve to help find her way back home. Gervais isn\u2019t overtly sentimental in depicting Gus\u2019 growing affection for his young, quite cutely drawn (her eyes are enormous) young charge; in fact, the story resolves on a fittingly bittersweet note for the overall tone. But there is a real tenderness that\u2019s thrown into the mix with the lewd banter and glass-half-empty outlook. \u201cAlley Cats\u201d is so compressed that it ends up stopping short of real heft. A subplot about Gus\u2019 ailing mother is introduced so hastily it almost bewilders; on a broader level, this is fundamentally a hangout sitcom about free-range felines. The show nonetheless takes an unexpected direction that makes for an enjoyably low-key binge. Even bullshitting cats have feelings.<\/p>\n

\n\tAll six episodes of \u201cAlley Cats\u201d are now streaming on Netflix.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"To kick off the third episode of the Netflix animated comedy \u201cAlley Cats,\u201d protagonist Gus \u2014 an overweight…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":805767,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[311901,88,24892],"class_list":["post-805766","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-alley-cats","tag-entertainment","tag-ricky-gervais"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=805766"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805766\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/805767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=805766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=805766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=805766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}