Feral #6 // Review
Patch got scratched. And bit. And now he’s faltering. They say your life flashes before your eyes right before you die. Patch might only be...dying. Nevertheless, his potential final journey seems to be leading him in a direction that is going to make him confront his own past in Feral #6. Writer Tony Fleecs continues a fascinating look into the lives of cats in the country with the art team of Trish Forstner and Tone Rodriguez. Brad Simpson handles the colors. It’s a deep psychological journey into the life of a slightly anthropomorphized cat who has fallen quite ill.
It’s winter. Patch is coughing. His bloodstained pause reach into the chilly river and he looks into his own reflection...sees blood red eyes and a stream of blood coming down from his nose to drip into the river. He needs to get back to Lord and Elsie. He’s starving, though. There’s a rabbit scampering around and Patch HAS still got his instincts about him so long as the madness of whatever’s inside him doesn’t get too aggressive. He’s going to be fine...just needs to eat and meet-up with the rest of his family. It looks like Elsie’s just down the path. She’ll know what to do...
Nearly the entire issue is told from Patch’s perspective. Literally. Everything is seen through the ailing cat’s eyes as he moves his way through the snowy wilderness. On the one hand...this DOES feel a bit like a gimmick for the sake of a story, but on the other hand...it’s really, really difficult to show what’s going on in the lives of these potentially infected cats without getting an eye for what it’s like to be on the inside of it all. Fleecs takes the issue as an opportunity to examine the inner life of Patch in great detail while also getting a look at some of the series’ backstory. It’s quite effective.
Forstner and Rodriguez have the perspective down more or less perfectly as they move the narrative through the eyes of Patch. This isn’t really all that easy to do. They’ve gotten the angel on the perspective perfect, which would have had to have involved sketching out a third-person perspective to get a look at his sickly posture and exactly what direction he would have been looking at things from. (The angle of the world around Patch is THAT nuanced.) the visuals are very striking beyond the perspective. A single cat alone bleeding into the snow and seeing himself reflected in the stream...it’s powerful, visceral stuff that works on a number of different levels.
Overall, Feral is beginning to look quite powerful and quite distinct from Fleecs’ similar canine-based series StrayDogs. Though it’s clearly inspired by Disney-esque cel animation, there’s raw and primal power that radiates from the narrative in ways that feel fresh and new. The powerful intensity of a snow-covered wilderness feels beautiful as it contrasts against the intense internal struggles of this issue’s single, dying cat. Breathtaking stuff.
Grade: A
