A girl likes to have some jewels... and to steal them!
"Probability" is just a five-dollar word for "luck." And I'm nothing but bad luck, baby''.
— Felicia Hardy, Black Cat #3.
Felicia Hardy, the Black Cat, got her first ongoing self-titled series in 2019, by Jed MacKay, Mike Dowling, Travel Foreman, and Nao Fuji.
Felicia's old mentor, the Black Fox, returns and asks for her help to commit several heists. Those heists, however, put her in conflict with Odessa Drake, who runs the New York Thieves Guild.
While the series twelfth issue was suspended due to the Covid-19 pandemic, and a new volume that serves as a tie-in for King in Black debuted in December of 2020, with the suspended issue repurposed for the new volume. The second volume (and Jed MacKay's run) ended with Giant-Size Black Cat #1 in November 2021.
For the Black Cat's character page, see here.
Tropes in the series:
In General
- Anti-Hero: The Black Cat has been a superhero at times. In this comic, however, she's a criminal doing big crime heists. She still does some heroic deeds from time to time and is not overtly malicious making this a downplayed trope.
- Bookends: The run opens and closes with Felicia's line of "Consider the cat."
- The Bus Came Back:
- Felicia's crew members, Boris Korpse and Bruno Grainger first appeared in the 1970s in Amazing Spider-Man #194. This is their first appearance in comics in five decades.
- Issues #2 and #3 feature Xander the Merciless, a Doctor Strange villain who hasn't been seen since 1977.
- Everyone Has Standards:
- The spirit of an Asgardian tree branch tries to tempt Felicia by offering to make her heart's desire a reality; the death of all her enemies, all the treasures of the world and every lover she has ever had returned to her. However, the third one is what ends up snapping Felicia back to her senses as she refuses to use magic to make someone else love her. Even Dr. Strange is impressed by her tenacity.
- Black Cat is horrified when her mentor the Black Fox makes a deal with the the Gilded Saint for immortality in exchange for the Saint being given all of Manhattan.
- Felicia enlists the help of Star, Overtime and Quantum — super beings who wield the power of an Infinity Gem — in her plan to cure her mother's cancer. Quantum's habit of kidnapping superpowered teens makes Felicia uncomfortable.
Volume 1
- Anti-Magic: Felicia's bad luck powers allow her to counter Xander's magic.
- Atrocious Alias: Issue #2 reveals that Felicia once used the alias "Francesca Featherbottom" when she was a teenager and amateur thief. The Black Fox comments on how embarrassing the name was after he bailed her out of jail.
- Backseat Changing Room: In issue #1, after a Black-Tie Infiltration where Felicia had to wear a fancy black dress, she makes her escape from the event in a car driven by her henchmen. The ensuing Chase Scene has her changing out of the dress and into her Spy Catsuit uniform while in the backseat of the car.
- Batman Gambit: It's just the Black Cat and a couple of guys supporting her. There's no room for those grand, chaotic superhero fights... and Black Fox wouldn't like all that chaos, anyway. Finding each victim's Achilles' hill and exploiting it is always the way to go.
- The Dreaded: When planning to break into the Fantastic Four's home to steal a book from Reed's collection, Felicia makes it a point to only do so when Sue Storm is away citing her as the scariest thing inside the building.
- Has a Type: Felicia's research on Tony Stark points out that he has been romantically involved with two different redheads. Felicia dyes her hair red to seduce him, a plan she is not particularly fond of given she lost Peter Parker to a redhead.
- Leeroy Jenkins: Discussed. Although this job is not without risks, someone must never lose sight from the difference between a calculated risk and reckless improvisation.
- "No Peeking!" Request: During a car chase in issue #1, Felicia has to quickly change out of her dress and into her costume, and warns her two henchmen to keep their eyes upfront.
- Rule of Cool: One of her heists got her in Tony Stark's nanoforge, while Iron Man was outside, aware of the intrusion and trying to take down the door. So she used the Nanoforge to create an Iron Man armor for her own... and asked the computer to add cat ears to it, because why not?
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Felicia and Wolverine escape Kade Kilgore by jumping out the window and swinging away. Unfortunately, since Wolverine's bones are made of metal he is too heavy and the cable snaps. Logan tells Felicia he'll "make his own way down" and she simply uses another cable to swing away.
- Technology Marches On: In-universe. Black Cat and Spider-Man fight against the Hydra Dreadnought, a top superweapon when it was built. But that was many years ago. The source code has since reached the dark web, so it was a piece of cake for Felicia's crew to create a virus that would stop it.
Volume 2
- Best Served Cold: Black Fox and three of his friends once stole treasures from Dracula. While they escaped, Dracula had the last laugh since Black Fox would grow old and see all his three friends die. Dracula also made sure that no vampire would turn Black Fox into a vampire without incurring his wrath.
- Continuity Nod: In issue #2 Felicia recalls all the major heists she achieved in the previous volume.
- Clothing Damage: Both Black Cat and White Fox's suits get pretty torn after beating a bunch of assassins named the Maidens (many of whom were armed with swords).
- Crazy-Prepared: Queen Cat steals Black Cat's stolen loot to use as bait for a trap. However, Black Cat is able to track the good thanks to tracking devices on them and she uses them to find Queen Cat's location.
- A Form You Are Comfortable With: While under the influence of the Asgardian tree branch, Felicia has a mental conversation with the personification of the branch's wild magic. The magic takes the form of Felicia's mentor the Black Fox.
- Discard and Draw: Felicia uses an Asgardian tree branch to empower herself at the end of issue #2, becoming more powerful than ever.
- Everyone Has Standards: In Issue #3, Felicia has tapped into the power of an Asgardian tree branch in order to fight off Knull's symbiote creatures. The branch tries to tempt Felicia by offering to make her heart's desire a reality; the death of all her enemies, all the treasures of the world and every lover she has ever had returned to her. However, the third one is what ends up snapping Felicia back to her senses as she refuses to use magic to make someone else love her.
- Friendly Enemy: While Felicia is this on some level with almost all her enemies, she seems to legitimately like Queen Cat. When she learns of her backstory and why she is so obsessed with Black Cat Felicia actually encourages her to keep coming after her.
- Godzilla Threshold: Issue #2 has the team cornered by symbiotes while Dr. Strange remains unconscious. Seeing no other way out, Felicia uses the Asgardian tree branch that was supposed to be used by Dr. Strange to empower herself.
- Guest-Star Party Member: Besides Black Cat being coerced into helping the Tiger Division, Seol Hee/Luna Snow of the Agents of Atlas also joins them for that particular mission.
- Immortality Immorality: Issue #5 reveals that the New York branch of the Thieves Guild offer a deity named the Gilded Saint ten percent of what they steal in exchange for immortality.
- Impossible Theft: Issue #1 ends with Felicia telling her crew they are going to steal Dr. Strange from Knull.
- Not That Kind of Doctor: While being chased by symbiotes, Felicia yells at Korpse to wake the recently rescued Dr. Strange up. Korpse fires back, "I am not a medical doctor. I am a blowing-things-up doctor."
- Odd Friendship: Turns out Boris Korpse has formed one with Bats, Dr. Strange's ghost hound.
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Felicia doesn't like being forced to help White Fox and the Tiger Division to free Taegukgi from mind control.
- That Man Is Dead: Queen Cat in Issue #4. Even after regaining her memories of her past life, she doesn't consider herself to truly be Lily Hollister and refers to Lily as "the previous occupant of her body".Black Cat: Wait, didn't you die?
Queen Cat: Lily Hollister was in police custody for her crimes. The Goblin King blew up the car trying to rescue her, knocked her into the river. She died there. I'm who climbed out. - Third-Party Deal Breaker: The Black Fox makes a deal with the Gilded Saint for himself and Black Cat to be made immortal in exchange for the Saint getting to own Manhattan. Black Cat undoes the deal by tricking the Saint into thinking the Fox has reneged on their bargain, freeing Manhattan and condemning the Fox to being trapped in the Gilded Saint's possession for eternity.
