Captain Ginger: Volume Two: Dogworld

Captain Ginger #2

by Stuart Moore, June Brigman, Roy Richardson

The acclaimed saga of cats in space returns for a devastating second volume! Captain Ginger and his feline crew embark on a vast, six-issue adventure when they follow a mysterious hyperspace signal to the home of their unknown canine 'cousins'. But trouble aboard ship may doom them before they even meet the dogs.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Science Fiction, Animals, Cats, Fiction

144 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2020

About the author

STUART MOORE is a writer, a book editor, and an award-winning comics editor.

Among his current writing projects are THE ZODIAC LEGACY, created and cowritten by Stan Lee and published by Disney, featuring an all-new team of teenaged super heroes in a series of illustrated prose novels and graphic novels; DOMINION: LAST SACRIFICE, a comic book series for Amazon/Jet City; and THANOS: DEATH SENTENCE, an original Marvel prose novel. Recent work includes EGOs, an original comic book series from Image Comics, and GARTER'S BIG SCORE, an original ebook novella for Kindle. He also contributed two series, TEACH and OUT WITH A BANG, to the launch of the online comics app Stela. Other comics work includes WOLVERINE NOIR and NAMOR: THE FIRST MUTANT (Marvel); FIRESTORM (DC Comics); assorted Star Trek and Transformers projects; and the science-fiction graphic novels EARTHLIGHT, PARA, SHADRACH STONE, and MANDALA. Prose writing includes the novel version of Marvel’s CIVIL WAR, and Disney Worldwide's JOHN CARTER: THE MOVIE NOVELIZATION.

Reviews

[Chad · Rating 3 out of 5]

This series reminds me a bit of Planet of the Apes, probably just because of the evolved animals in the future setting. In volume 2, The Cats return to Earth where they find the evolved dogs who are even worse off than they were. I liked the introduction of the dogs and would have liked to see them stick around longer. But I guess Moore is only a cat person, c'est la vie.

Received a review copy from Ahoy Comics and Edelweiss. All thoughts are my own and in no way influenced by the aforementioned.

[Wayne McCoy · Rating 4 out of 5]

'Captain Ginger Volume Two: Dogworld' by Stuart Moore with art by June Brigman and Roy Richardson continues the saga of cats in space by adding...dogs.

Captain Ginger and his crew are in imminent danger when this volume opens, so they shove as many people as they can in escape pods and crash land on a nearby planet. There they find a race of sentient dogs who were also set adrift among the stars by now vanished humans. Things are tense between the cats and dogs, but a larger enemy may force them to call a truce.

I really liked the first volume of this series, and this one continued to be good by adding the dog element. I like that these really feel like evolved animals, not just animals acting like humans. The art is fun and sometimes as odd as the premise.

I received a review copy of this graphic novel from Ahoy Comics, Diamond Book Distributors, and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this graphic novel.

[Alex Sarll]

Continuing the cats-in-space series, though this time out the fairly generic Star Trek-type motifs dominate, at least initially. Which is a shame, because I don't even much like Trek itself, never mind the knock-offs, whereas cat-people being amusingly awful is quite entertaining. On the upside, as the title suggests and the end of Volume 1 teased, this installment does see the introduction of the uplifted descendants of the other, better chief pet species. Alas, the writer is a cat person, so they come out of it far less well than the cats, which is of course an outrageous calumny. Some very cute pictures of the real dogs who modelled in the back, though.

(Netgalley ARC)

[Darik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okay... I get it now.

The first volume of Captain Ginger flummoxed me. It was clearly a pastiche of Star Trek, but featuring a main cast of anthropomorphic talking cats-- which, y'know, sure; sounds like fun. But this story was set in a weirdly grim world where the human race had died off years ago-- killed off by germ warfare from a race of energy beings called the Lumen-- leaving a crew of genetically-engineered humanoid cats behind in a single ship (alongside roving groups of regular housecats who keep getting into the machinery) to try to find some sense of purpose in the universe (and to figure out how to operate the human technology that they don't fully understand). The story was strangely rudderless, the crew couldn't manage to keep the ship together, the wild cats kept peeing on things... it seemed like kind of a mess.

But reading book two, I get what writer Stuart Moore is going for here.

Star Trek, at its core, is a story of how scientific and social progress has rooted out the majority of human weakness. With no more material want and an endless galaxy of wonder to explore, humanity is no longer troubled by greed, hate, ignorance, or war. Money no longer exists; people act out of a desire to grow as individuals and/or to work towards the good of society. We've come to accept all cultures and all peoples equally, and we always work to find a peaceful resolution to any conflict. It's a utopian fantasy of humankind finally transcending the worst elements of human nature.

Captain Ginger is a direct refutation of ALL of that.

Ginger and his crew-- evolved and sophisticated though they are-- are still very much animals. They fight. They panic. They make mistakes. They're dependent on the technology left to them by the "feeders" to survive, but they don't fully understand it-- they just know how to use it... barely. Captain Ginger himself tries desperately to cling to the high-minded ideals represented by the ship (note that he's the ONLY crew member wearing a uniform), but he can't quite manage it; his crew won't listen to him, and his attempts at diplomacy with the Lumen fail spectacularly. No matter how sophisticated the environment you drop them into, Moore says, they are still just flawed creatures limited by their instincts, their perceptions, their prejudices, and their bodies. And they are us.

(Honestly, I should have realized what was up last volume when one of the kittens evolves into a super-advanced, giant-headed Cosmic Space Baby Cat-- but then we see that he's still easily distracted by quick movements and bright lights. Even a hyper-evolved animal is still basically an ANIMAL, according to Moore-- and loathe as we are to admit it, that's what we are, too.)

But just because they can never be perfect doesn't mean that they can't be better. As the story moves along, the wondrous ship they started out in (the Indomitable) becomes more and more of a wreck; systems fail, hulls are breached, technologies destroyed... the crew just doesn't have the capacity to maintain the utopian ship they were born into. But still, they manage to survive-- limping away from one devastating encounter after another, finding ways to adapt and persevere. This volume ends on a dire note, but one still tinged with hope: the hope that even flawed, imperfect people (and, yes, cats) can find a way to move forward by working together.

... Oh, and this one has dog-people, too. So that's pretty fun!

[Shaelene (aGirlWithBookss) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had a copy of the first volume that I hadn’t read yet and seeing this available for request on NetGalley was the perfect excuse to read it.

I'm a self-proclaimed cat lady, I've had cats all my life, I can’t remember a time where cats weren’t at the center of my world. So of course I had to read this adorable book.
You can best think of this series as cats on steroids trying to survive in space. And what a world of fun it is. I like that the creators made the cats look and feel kinda rough, thier not all cute and rom-com like, they are badass survivors! There are so many aspects of this series and this book in particular that I love.
In this volume, we delve much deeper into the cat's world and the wider world that is out there in this seemingly barren universe. They meet their foe, the lumen, that force them onto this foreign world where they run into a colony of dogs, and Captain Ginger and his crew must learn to cooperate with these strange beings in order to ensure survival for all.

This one really tore at my heart strings, there are some very tragic moments, and while others that made me laugh, and of course we have the classic enemies to frenemies storyline.
With an ending such as the one we were left with, and more questions answered, and some left- I'm curious and excited to see where this story could go.

Overall, yes, I very much enjoy this series and will be looking forward to seeing volume 3.
4 stars.

**ARC provided by Diamond Book Distributors via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

[Theediscerning · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the first book in this inventive series, we saw how humankind had homogenised itself genetically, and died off, leaving some of earth's creatures floating through space in colonising spacecraft. Our key concern was the one containing the cats, and their incessant ways of having kittens and getting on the furniture when they weren't wanted. This time, we start with their discovery of another species – the planet of the dogs. But if these cats are the ones seeking their destiny, their safety and their maker, and are clearly Adama's lot of humans in BSG, how close are the dogs to being the Cylons? Yes, this book would have had to be inventive, the amount of analogues you might think of while reading this. Luckily it is inventive, and luckily it is fast-paced enough to stop you thinking around it too much, and just enjoy it for what it is. I don't think the ending here allows this series to be wrapped up with a third trade – I would presume to get five books in total. As long, that is, as I get a chance to see them all – as before I liked this book more than I'd expected to.

[April Gray · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of action going on here. The Cats have been making some progress since the end of Volume 1, but then the Lumen show up again, and the Cats' ship is badly damaged. The crew is evacuated, but the Captain stays aboard to try to stop The Lumen from following them. He damages their ship, but ends up crashing on the planet the signal the Cats were following came from. The rest of the crew is split up on the planet's surface, some near some ruins, some near an encampment of Dogs. There are obvious tensions between the Cats and the Dogs- will they be able to work together against their common enemy, or will they end up fighting like...well, you know.
Lots of feels going on here, there's death, betrayal, love, hate, dashed hopes, and more mystery surrounding the Creators. A lot happens, but nothing gets resolved (this isn't necessarily a bad thing, it keeps the story going, right?). We do get a cliffhanger though! So, yay for that? I'll be looking for the next volume!

#CaptainGingerVolumeTwoDogworld #NetGalley

[Casey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did not expect a second volume that adds dogs to the mix to be better than the first, all-cats-all-the-time volume, but I greatly preferred this volume. At turns emotionally resonant, action-packed, and funny, this was a ride. Landing in Dogworld expanded this universe beyond the cats' spaceship and species, and the artistic depictions of the planet are enthralling. I also appreciated some entertaining little pieces of this world, like the dog culture idiom, "Now that's the ball at the bottom of the lake, isn't it?" 🐶

[Paul Sparks · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good artwork and a really engaging story, very reminiscent of Adrian Tchaikovskys Dogs of War which is one of my all time favourite books, well worth a read

[Aaron · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent comic. I just wish the last four issues had been published in periodical form.

[Elaine White · Rating 5 out of 5]

** I WAS GIVEN THIS BOOK FOR MY READING PLEASURE **
Copy received through Netgalley

~

Captain Ginger, Vol. 2, by Stuart Moore
★★★★★
144 Pages


Volume 2 of Captain Ginger takes us into a whole new exploration – Dogs!
As a dog lover, I was thrilled to see that the diversity and variety of the cats extended to the dogs, too. It certainly was a great follow-up to that last corrupted file log we got to read in Volume 1.

Not only does the story continue exactly from the end of Volume 1, but it also further explores the origin of cat/dog intelligence and how they became the way they are. It was interesting to see the cats and dogs interacting with each other, how they each had their own history, their own problems, their own way of coping with the situation they'd found themselves in. Typically, their natures remained – the cats saw an obstacle and battled it, while the dogs accepted their new life without much complaint.

The characters stay with you, and each have their own unique personality. Ecru is playing a seriously dangerous game. I was gutted that Rattle and Roll were separated. Devastated for Science Cat and Big Dog. Very intrigued to see that Captain Ginger isn't just telling this story to a comm or a diary, but is actually speaking to someone.

Volume 2 manages to not only explore a complete storyline, but leave me wanting me. I'm left with a lot of questions. Who is Ginger speaking to? Will the cats ever get off Dog island? Where did Ecru go? Why did she steal the AI, how and what does she intend to do with it? Will we ever find out who Ginger's father was?

So much to explore and discover in Volume 3. And you can get your butt I'll be there for it.

[Kitt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just. So. Good. Cliche jokes make it even better. Strong themes of space travel mewtiny [so sue me] and socio policies.
And now... Dogs!
What could you not love?