AS YOU WILL REMEMBER FROM OUR LAST EPISODE Night Cat, the pop-singing secret identity of Jacqueline Tavarez (who in real actual life did portray a pop singer known as Night Cat, dreamed up by Marvel Comics in an attempt to glom onto the pop music market, good luck with that guys), was injected by the evil Dr. Ecstasy with a secret serum that gave her amazing super cat powers. Shortly thereafter her father was shot and killed by gangsters in the pay of the evil drug kingpin / real estate magnate Amanda Gideon. Saddened, Night Cat swears to use her super cat powers and her pop music singing talent to bring the evildoers to justice! And now, part two.
Moving! Installing computers! Driving three cars! Exercising alone in an unsafe fashion! Taking showers! All the excitement you want from both pop music and comics, right?
Yes, movie fans, it's that Stan Lee cameo that you spend the entire film waiting for. Here, Stan Lee plays "Stan Lee", lending a degree of ironic meta-detachment to this whole affair. If only the rest of this comic would be Night Cat reading the Night Cat comic book, getting to the part where Stan Lee shows up pitching the Night Cat comic book, which Night Cat would then read, and so on.
Because this is set in 1991 we have a scene where the protagonist uses new high-tech computers to solve the mystery. And like most people using computers in 1991, Night Cat gives up early on and watches TV instead, which magically provides her with the one bit of trivial information she needed. Thanks expensive 1991 computers!
And here we see some "hacking", which in this comic (and in the movies) is done by sexy ladies in revealing outfits, rather than the stained shorts and Cheeto-orange fingers of the typical real-life hacker, who was usually a not-very-sexy man. All we're missing in this comic book are the meaningless bleeps and bloops and weird fake animated "computer" imagery of Movie Hacking.
And now it's time for some super hero action! First use your super cat vision to peer through the gloom of darkness - represented in this comic book by giant white space, way to subvert the paradigm there comic - and then hit a guy in the jaw with a metal stick! Super heroes away!
Our bullets, ricocheting back at us! It's like somebody's hitting them with some kinda stick! Hey, how can we be describing an event that takes place in fractions of a second? Everything is over before we could even open our mouths! But that's comic books for you, the writer has to cram in as much dialogue as possible or he doesn't get paid as much! So keep talking!
NIGHT CAT'S SECRET WEAPONS: A metal stick, a flashlight, and stiletto heels. Look out, crime!
Just want to point out at this juncture the amazing groundbreaking boldness of this comic, which features a pop star and a truckful of drugs that the pop star does NOT immediately start abusing. Now THAT is what I call defying stereotypes!
Amanda Gideon's drug-truck enterprises are being smashed by Night Cat, so Gideon does the only thing she can do - invite Night Cat to perform a casino gig! That's death for any up and coming pop star! Two shows a night, listless crowds, rowdy drunks, iron-clad unbreakable contracts - no greater horror awaits any performer. Or maybe Amanda Gideon will just try to kill her outright. Where's the fun in that?
Lucky for Night Cat, her four "ninja-style dancers" were available on short notice. That's the big pop music craze of 1991, "ninja-style dancers". SOMEBODY's been at that truckful of drugs, I'm thinking.
Remember kids these are actual lyrics from actual Night Cat songs performed by the actual Night Cat. Were her real-life ninja-style dancers in fact "heavy"? History does not say.
Amanda's trap - replace ninja dancers with real ninjas. A time-honored gangster murder tactic. Who can forget the amazing ninja death scene in 'The Godfather'?
Sure, she defeated the ninjas, but how is she going to top this for her 9pm show?
Uh oh, fantastic electro-robot hand gangster's in the dressing room! Is he just there to feed Night Cat straight lines for her to parry with witty Stan Lee dialog?
Nope, it's time to alternately beat her up and compliment her supple limbs while hurling her butt-first at the reader. 12 year olds throughout America thank you, Mr. Krak!
One of the many amazing things Mr. Krak's fantastic electro-robot hand can do is hold knives with almost 70% of the efficiency of a normal human hand. Just think, if he'd stabbed her when she came into the room, this comic would be over! Way to blow it, Mr. Krak!
Mr. Krak's fantastic metal hand can ALSO be fitted with a useful drill attachment. Why, if he didn't have that robot hand, he'd have to use his regular human hand and pick up a normal hand drill, like a sucker! No sir. It's ungainly, useless drill attachments right on down the line for Mr Krak, until his drill gets shoved into a power outlet and he dies. Well, the knife to the throat would have killed him eventually, I guess.
I can't decide what I like more about this sequence; the gratuitous crotch display, or the amazingly over-excited thug hollering into his radio. GUYS GUYS EVERYTHING'S COOL THIS TOTALLY HOT CHICK IS TOTALLY COMING YOUR WAY GUYS!@!1!! If I ever hire thugs I want them to be this enthusiastic about their jobs.
And now it's time for the amazing showdown between Night Cat, in her tight revealing outfit, and Amanda Gideon, in HER tight revealing outfit, to the approval and delight of all the 12 year old boys reading this comic.
Nothing says 'deadly crime lord' like a sports bra and sensible athletic shoes! But wait - her only weakness - a flashlight! Curse you, Night Cat!
I'm pretty sure this entire sequence - the hair pulling definitely- is in the service of some kind of fetish somewhere, but darned if I'm going to have that in MY Google search history. Nope, let's just relax and enjoy our super heroine dropping Amanda Gideon to her horrifying death. Super heroes, everybody!
One week later Night Cat stands with her back to the audience and belts out one more of her top ten hits, and then reminds us all that the Night Cat has only BEGUN to prowl! Yes sir! Look out for all that Night Cat action coming your way! Which, let's see... nope, never happened.
Night Cat failed to set the pop music world on fire - though an actual Night Cat record was released. Tracks from her LP can be found on the You Tubes, and I'm sure the record can still can be found in the cheap bins of record stores the length and breadth of Long Island NY. Jacqueline Tavarez herself did not stay in the singing world and moved on to films, where she can be seen in the fine cinematic masterwork "Tromeo And Juliet" and in other films of a more, shall we say, adult nature.
But how could such a sure-fire concept of an unknown singer combined with tired super hero comic cliches fail to click with the public? What's wrong with that stupid public? Why, they even had the T-shirts all ready to roll!
Sizes available? S, M, L. Surely comic book fans, a fit and active lot, would NEVER require an extra-large or god forbid, an XXL shirt. Never!
So; Night Cat. There you have it. What have we learned from all this? Say it with me, kids: comics and pop music just don't mix.
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