
...admit it, how long did you spend looking at the example picture before you started reading this article? Looking at the picture with automatic Bambi eyes setting in, with brain geared to "Such wee small biddy kitties? Whosa cute kitty? Sleepy kitty."
Kittens seem to provoke an automatic pleasure/protective/affection reaction in many (if not most) people. For this reason, they are often used by creators to arouse those feelings toward a character as well. Want to show that someone is a softy despite their crusty exterior? Have them rescue a kitten! Want to indicate that they're evil instead? Torturing or killing a kitten will do it. Want to lighten a mood that's gone Darker and Edgier? Add a kitten or two.
Kittens increase the cuteness factor exponentially. Examples on this page should be limited to works where this is deliberately used with kittens or cats, not simply "this work includes a kitten," or "this work includes a cute little animal."
Cat Girl can be a Sister Trope if you're creative enough. See also The Internet Is for Cats.
Compare Cool Cat, Fun Size, Mega Neko, Precious Puppy, Big Friendly Dog, Kindhearted Cat Lover, Cuteness Proximity, Bunnies for Cuteness, Panthera Awesome, Great White Feline, and High Koala-ty Cuteness. Contrast with Cats Are Mean, Hair-Raising Hare and Mister Muffykins. (Except when Cute Is Evil, in which case they go hand-in-hand.) In most cases, though, kittens are portrayed as more friendly and likable than adult cats, hence the contrasting tropes of Right-Hand Cat and If You're So Evil, Eat This Kitten!. In fact, when a dog is chasing an adult cat, the dog is usually portrayed as the hero but when a dog is chasing a kitten, the dog is often the villain.
Examples:
- This Nexus S 4G Advertisement. Featuring a cameo of Nyan Cat!
- This Bouygues Telecom commercial
with live kittens as office workers.
- Every advert for cat-related products, such as cat litter (one UK advert involved a white kitten searching the house for the litter tray with a child-like voice over) and cat food. They also tend to appear on the packages of said products (especially for food that's specifically designed for kittens).
- This advertisement for Sauza Tequila
, in which a fireman (who has just rescued a kitten from a burning building) teaches you how to make a margarita. With the kitten's help.
- Chessie
, the mascot of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway. She was introduced in 1933 to promote the railway's overnight trains, and soon took over C&O advertising. The railway added two kittens (Nip and Tuck) and a husband (Peake the tomcat). In 1972, when the C&O merged with the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad and the Western Maryland Railway, Chessie became the mascot for the entire Chessie System. You can still see her silhouette on boxcars.
- This advert for Chocolate Digestive Biscuits.
- This commercial for Pampers diapers
may contain a lot of adorable animal babies, but the different feline cubs shown surely attract the most attention and adoration, and it's likely no accident it ends with a lion cub.
- In Dear Kitten
, a BuzzFeed viral ad campaign for Little Friskies brand cat food, an older cat explains the facts of life to a new kitten, combining Cute Kitten with Cats Are Snarkers.
- This commercial
for the Swedish air-travel website Flygresor.Se, featuring a whole group of kittens wearing little airplane costumes. It got popular enough to warrant several "sequel" ads with the same concept.
- The Progressive commercial "A Pet Too Far
" has lots of cute little animals, but Mittens the kitten is the most popular one.
Jamie: She's a diva.
- Osamu Tezuka
- Atom Cat: In a world where Astro Boy is just a cartoon show, a bullied Astro Boy-obsessed kid is forced to take his little tomcat away from home. When a group of aliens disguised as humans accidentally run over him and his pet cat, they try to cover it up by healing both the boy and cat up and erasing their memories of the event. However, because they have never seen a cat before, they unwittingly give the near-death tomcat all the powers of Astro Boy based from their readings of the injured boy's memories. With the ability to speak, lift heavy objects and fly, Astro Cat spends the rest of the series saving his sweetheart, Mink, or his owner from danger, both mundane and supernatural. Subverted by one of Astro Cat's enemies, Mephisto, a devil-like feline with supernatural powers who's lived since Egyptian times, who attempted to make Mink his bride.
- Kimba the White Lion. No points for guessing who the main character is. This even extends to his Love Interest and future wife Kitty/Laiya.
- Yuusha Dan, a young Ainu native, Kotan, who's a Friend to All Living Things befriends a white tiger after it escapes from a train carrying him to the zoo. Together they fight off villains while searching for a fantastic treasure.
- Unico: The 1981 movie and original manga has a cute kitten named Chao/Katy the Cat
(renamed "Chloe" in Unico: Awakening). She's a black kitten that Unico first meets after accidentally falling into her basket. She reveals to Unico that she was abandonded by someone and dreams on becoming a "Cat Witch" due to reading a book about fairy tales. Chao/Katy later wishes to become a human after believing an old lady to be an actual witch (much to to confusion of Unico) which the titular unicorn temporarily grants the next morning. While Unico reveals to her that he granted he wish, Chao/Katy doesn't believe him until she suddenly turns back into a cat. After saving the old woman from drowning with Unico's help, she permanently becomes a human girl.
- President Aria
◊ from ARIA.
- Hetalia: Axis Powers:
- Greece is shown as a diehard cat lover. And China has an obsession with
Hello KittyShinatty-chan? - See also: The world CAT-ference
, Nekotalia
, and EVEN MORE nations as kittens.
- Sometimes cats just show up in random scenes for no purpose other than to be adorable. A strip where Italy practices his training on a cat, for instance, or where Japan pets one while delivering some exposition.
- Greece is shown as a diehard cat lover. And China has an obsession with
- Azumanga Daioh:
- Kamineko and Mayaa, the latter of which is actually an Iriomote cat cub. Kamineko only plays it straight only when luring Sakaki in for the kill. Otherwise, he's an evil little bastard (or alternatively possibly just acting like a real feral cat and averting All Animals Are Domesticated... Or just hates Sakaki).
- Additionally, Chiyo in a cat costume in Sakaki's imagination. Awwwww!
- And if that weren't enough for you, Sakaki likes to fawn over Nekokoneko ("neko" meaning "cat", and "koneko" meaning "kitten"), a pair of white cats with Blank White Eyes (more accurately, a kitten resting on top of a cat's head). In fact, Sakaki fawns over any cat. Even though they usually run away or get violent with her.
- Then there's also the very, very realistically-drawn newborn kitty that Yukari tries to hand off to the girls, and those in photos from Sakaki's Cat Fancy-style magazine. It was the Art Shift that made them realistically adorable.
- Would you believe this trope is used in Battle Royale? The island the students fight on seems to have a lot of kittens. Shuya and Noriko get a literal Cat Scare moment, a kitten is cruelly killed by a maddened student and there is a whole Flash Back sequence about one guy who took to his class a very young kitten. All those kittens are realistically drawn.
- WHENEVER Sebastian from Black Butler finds a cat (cue Ciel calling him a neko-baka, cat-obsessed idiot. Even if it's true when he sees one). Yes, cats are cute enough even to make demons gush over them.
- Yoruichi from Bleach has the ability to turn into a black cat, which for some reason makes her voice sound male. Rather amusingly though, one of Yoruichi's first appearances consists of Urahara perhaps succumbing to this trope, and tossing her up and down in the air in a playful manner, while saying something nonsensical.
Urahara: Upsy daisy! Upsy daisy! [tossing Yoruichi up and down]
- Keroberos and his "Evil Counterpart" Spinel Sun in Cardcaptor Sakura are pretty darn cute in their power-conserving size. Kero's Big Eater tendencies and love of sweets, and what happens to Spinel when he eats sugar, only add to the delight.
- A Certain Magical Index:
- Sphinx, the cute little kitty Index smuggled home. She was so taken by his cuteness she'd named him shortly after she saw him.
- Also, MISAKA. Aw, she's taking care of the kitty and oh shit Accelerator just ruptured all her veins by making her blood flow backwards.
- Chi
◊ from
◊ Chi's Sweet Home is a cute, friendly kitten.
- Umibozu of City Hunter fame has a debilitating fear of cats, particularly if they're adorably cute kittens. This is mainly used for Hilarity Ensues purposes, but it also lead to a few serious scenes, such as, in one story, one of Umibozu's worst enemies knowing this weakness, and cornering him with it (but is ultimately saved by Ryo, who immediately after bursts into laughing at this scene).
- The Student Council mascot Arthur in Code Geass. He enjoys biting Suzaku, his unofficial owner, but he's much nicer toward pretty much everyone else in the show. Word of God says that Arthur does like Suzaku. His bites are supposed to be his way to show his affection, which is Truth in Television, as cats may bite or otherwise nibble on the object of their affection.
- Comic Girls has Kaoruko's cat Nyaos, which is adored by most of the cast (except Tsubasa), especially when she has that beret on her head.
- Yune of Croisée in a Foreign Labyrinth has a knack for finding cats wherever she goes, and she just can't... help... petting... them— 'scuse me, gotta chase a cat! Even the ending theme and mid-episode transition cards feature her with cats.
- Gatomon/Tailmon from Digimon Adventure and Digimon Adventure 02... which makes it even funnier when she kicks your ass.
- He doesn't look much like one, but Doraemon is a robot cat. He had cat ears once upon a time, but they were chewed off by a mouse when he was sleeping. Poor guy is now terrified of them. His sister Dorami invokes this trope full force.
- Bulma's father in Dragon Ball has a gigantic soft spot for animals, and takes in stray cats, dogs, and dinosaurs (yes, dinosaurs) and lets them have free roam of Capsule Corporation. His favorite is a small, black, seemingly never-aging cat that spends almost all of its time perched on his shoulder. The cat is named Tama in the Japanese version and Scratch in the American dub. One of the very few times it moves off his shoulder is to rest in Android 16's hand and nuzzle into it in Dragon Ball Z. And that's not even getting into Yamcha's best friend Pu'ar, a sentient, floating shapeshifting cat; well, more of a cat-like thing, but still...
- In El-Hazard: The Magnificent World, there's Ura the armor cat. Why does El-Hazard have an armored vest that happens to be a talking cat? Because he's adorable.
- In Fairy Tail, Natsu has Happy, Wendy has Carla, and Gajeel has Pantherlily. Sabertooth's Dragon Slayers Sting and Rogue have Lector and Frosch, respectively.
- Fruits Basket:
- Not only can Kyo turn into a cat when hugged by a girl, but he even attracts cats to him, like a pied piper of cute. He's just chilling in class, minding his own business, when BAM! a dozen cats are suddenly draped all over him.
- Kisa turns into an adorable tiger cub. When Tohru first meets Kisa in her tiger form, she mistakes Kisa for a cat while proclaiming how cute she is.
- Fullmetal Alchemist:
- Cute kittens seem to be all over omakes. Al taking in a stray is probably part of the reason "Flame vs. Fullmetal" is a fan-favorite in Fullmetal Alcehmist 2003 (bear in mind, Al is an animated suit of armor).
Ed: Come on Al, don't run! Think of the kitten!
Al: I know, I'm the only one who is! [Cut to the kitty holding on to Al for dear life] - In another omake even Scar loves them, then things got weird...
- Cute kittens seem to be all over omakes. Al taking in a stray is probably part of the reason "Flame vs. Fullmetal" is a fan-favorite in Fullmetal Alcehmist 2003 (bear in mind, Al is an animated suit of armor).
- In GA: Geijutsuka Art Design Class, a misreading of the word for "sketching" inspires Kisaragi to draw cats in her croquis book and on a pasteboard where a cat who's "looking for a girlfriend" has been drawn; she later finds the same pasteboard with a bunch of kittens on it.
- Hanamaru Kindergarten: Pa-pa-pa-pa Panda Neko!
Hinagiku is also playing with a kitty in the eighth ending.
- Tama & Shiranui of Hayate the Combat Butler invoke this trope when they show up. Isumi even comments on Shiranui being a cute kitten, before he starts his evil plan.
- Inuyasha has Kirara the two tailed demon cat. In her 'rest' form, she is an adorable little kitten.
- Jewelpet has Garnet, Sango, Alex, Tour, Kaiya, Lapis, Diana and Dian. Being a Sanrio franchise, it's to be expected.
- Neko's cat form in K, especially when she's with Shiro, sitting on his shoulder, and they blink in unison, or she waves her tail at the same time as his hand (throughout the first episode).
- Piro in Kanon. Despite being allergic to cats, Nayuki loves the little guy.
- Komaneko the cat from the 2009 Japanese stop-motion series "Komaneko: The Curious Cat".
- An episode of K-On! has Azusa taking care of a little bitty kitten that actually belongs to Jun. Azusa is uncertain due to her inexperience, but relaxes for a bit after the kitten climbs into her lap and lies down there.
- No wonder why Lucky Star has a kitty mascot, who turns out to be Kagami Yoshimizu's Author Avatar. The character is sometimes referred to as Nyamo.
- Lyrical Nanoha:
- Suzuka's house in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha is filled with lots and lots of cute kitties, including one that got its wish to become a bigger kitty.
- Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha ViVid later increases its usage of Rule of Cute by introducing Asteon, Einhart's Device which Hayate, Rein, and Agito made in the form of a snow leopard cub.
- ViVid Strike!: Being Einhart's apprentice, Fuka's device Huracan is also in the form of a kitten.
- Episode 21 of Maison Ikkoku, in which Godai has to look after a cat called Kyoko.
- A Man and His Cat: Fukumaru gets jealous when Kanda says that he saw cute kittens on the train to work. Then Kanda says that no cat is cuter than his.
- Shamisen in The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya series, owned by Kyon's family after participating in the movie the SOS Brigade made. Unusually, it's a male calico. A talking, philosophical male calico.
- My Bride is a Mermaid has an entire episode revolve around a kitten. Merfolk regard cats as their natural enemies, so when Nagasumi picks up a stray kitten, he finds out he can weaponize it and reduce hardened gangsters to gibbering wrecks. Everybody else at his school is just awed at the cuteness.
- Mikoto Minagi from My-HiME has two pet cats that follow her around. Mikoto from My-Otome, on the other hand, is a cat. Well, one of the Mikotos is, anyway. The other one is a cat-themed god with the sleeping habits of a cat.
- While not a kitten, Naruto gets help from an adorable cat named Ishi in completing the first step of the Rasengan.
- Ridiculously Human Robot Chachamaru in Negima! Magister Negi Magi has an Animal Lover scene when she fed the kittens (she was supposed to be evil at the time). Yes, it was adorable. Then Chachamaru gets her artifact: a Kill Sat with a cute cat motif.
- Meanwhile, the Alternate Continuity series Negima!? includes a kitty character in the form of Shichimi. While the cat may be annoying at times (although not as annoying as Motsu), Shichimi also has her share of cute moments (especially when said moments involve Nodoka in some way).
- Even Neon Genesis Evangelion is cuter with kittens, until the manga version of Kaworu murders them with his bare hands.
- Sakamoto-san from Nichijou. As a Talking Animal (thanks to a scarf invented by the professor), he demands respect and hates being treated as cute, and becomes embarrassed when he finds himself giving into stereotypical endearing cat behavior.
- In Nyan Koi!, the main character Junpei, has been cursed to understand cats which he has an allergy to. To cure the curse (which will turn him into a cat over time), he has to grant 100 wishes to the cats he meets. Meanwhile, he's surrounded by a growing harem who likes cats.
- The main characters from the anime and manga series Nyanpire: The Animation.
- The Prince of Tennis: Ryoma's adorable cat Karupin exists to show that he's not a complete Jerkass. Said cat had a whole episode dedicated to him. It's a mix of funny and heartwarming from the start to the end.
- A black cat named Amy in the opening of Puella Magi Madoka Magica. Other than a drama CD, she doesn't exist anywhere else. According to the PMMM wiki
, Gen Urobuchi admits that he was not aware of any cat and that he was surprised when he saw it at the storyboard of the OP. Amy was never part of the original storyline as she was fabricated by SHAFT for the OP of the Anime to mislead viewers and fans with a Red Herring. However, SHAFT approached Urobuchi for the Drama CD and asked him to include the cat in it, so Urobuchi accepted and she was included in the drama CD. Amy is actually the reason why Madoka was a Magical Girl in the third timeline; her wish to Kyuubey was to save the kitty's life when she was seriously injured.
- Shampoo from Ranma ˝ is cursed to turn into a cute kitten with pale pink fur and violet socks and ears. One of the more adorable transformations, but unfortunately a trigger for Ranma's number one phobia.
- Sailor Moon stars Luna, Artemis, and in later seasons, their Kitten From The Future Diana.
- In the twelfth episode of Sgt. Frog, Giroro takes a liking to a white kitten he finds in the rain (the Funimation dub gives her a name — Miss Furbottom). She goes on to become a recurring character.
- Sketchbook. Sora would love to take one of the strays as her own.
- Blair in Soul Eater. True to the series form, she actually kicks a lot of ass as a magical kitten!
- The cat-like fairy mascot from Suite Pretty Cure ♪, Hummy.
- All five of Super Sonico's cats. There's even an episode that focuses on them!
- This short anime made in 1947 called "Suteneko Tora-chan"
(Abandoned Cat Little Tora) follows a family of anthropomorphic cats who adopts a homeless kitten.
- Japanese electronics giant Sony owns a franchise called Tama & Friends, which features plenty of cute kitties. For example, an OVA based on the frachise features the title character walking up to his owner (with a close up of his face
◊) and licking him - only to find out the human owner has transformed into a cat. This turns out to be All Just a Dream.
- Ryo-Ohki from Tenchi Muyo!. Nyaa~. She's technically a cat, but close enough. She combines the cuteness of kittens with the cutness of bunnies, for a massive cuteness overload.
- Tokyo Mew Mew: When the main heroine Ichigo Momomiya gets excited, the extreme result is turning into an adorable black kitten.
- A "small black cat" appears, randomly and inexplicably, in each episode of Trigun. Her name is Kuroneko-sama and you will refer to her as such! note
- An Ushio and Tora OVA had an animated short called "Tora and the Kitten". It's just as adorable as it sounds.
- Vampire Game has Duzell, a deadly vampire king reincarnated a century after his defeat to wreak brutal vengeance on his foe. In the form of a kitten. Specifically, an orphaned baby fantasy wildcat adopted by a Rebellious Princess. It’s not exactly the most dignified revenge narrative.
- Windy Tales has massive amounts of cats. Everywhere. And they can fly.
- Yu-Gi-Oh! GX: Okay, Pharaoh was pretty amusing at times, but in all its seriousness 5Ds manages to top him.
◊
- Early in YuYu Hakusho, Kuwabara is being blackmailed by a random thug who is holding his kitten hostage. That's right - the character who looks most like a normal street thug is a kitten lover.
- Nya from Zatch Bell!. Sadly, this is a filler Mamodo.
- Even Yu-Gi-Oh! isn't safe from kittens and their cuteness. Meet Rescue Cat
, Catnipped Kitty
, Cat's Ear Tribe
and Naturia Extrio
. The last one looks like a tiger kitten.
- Chrysalis Pantail
. It's a baby panther! In a shimmery, pink shell!
- Chrysalis Pantail
- Averted by, of course, George Carlin:
"You attack a baby, he cries. Attack a puppy, he cowers. Attack a kitten, he fights! One day old and he's lookin' for some shit!"
- Anyone who has seen the milkbar fights at Tinykittens HQ or any of the other live cat rescue channels can attest to this, including with kittens one hour old.
- Garfield: Nermal likes to boast that he's "the world's cutest kitten". To Garfield, nauseatingly so. Subverted in that some strips imply he is an adult that pretends to be cute.
- Hellboy agrees with this trope, underlining how he's an Anti Anti Christ.
- Dex-Starr uses this to his advantage by being a) aggressively adorable and b) adorably aggressive. Then he blows your head off with his Red Lantern powers. His tragic backstory just makes him more desire-to-hug inducing.
- The (not so) pious Helene (a story by Wilhelm Busch) has one. Though the trope gets subverted when her cat and
◊ another one (a tom)
◊ first kill Lene's canaries
◊ and then wreak havoc in the house.
- In Astro City story "Pastoral", Cammie, however grudgingly, admits the farm has cute kittens. This proves a plot point later when she is wrestling with Curious Qualms of Conscience, goes off to play with them instead, and follows one to learn a crucial point.
- The titular heroine of Albedo: Erma Felna EDF is an anthropomorphic cat girl who was this in her younger days, the same goes with her baby son. Also, her younger brother, named Tasak, was also this when he was a kid.
- Salem in the early (i.e. 1960's) Sabrina the Teenage Witch stories. He was small enough to fit in Sabrina's hands.
- The Snow Cat Prince: Syv, the youngest of seven cat princes, who looks like this
.
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Mirage): Lunk, a stray kitten Michaelangelo found and adopted one Christmas Eve, as shown in the Michaelangelo #1 one-shot from the late 80's.
- A Kitten Named Woof: Woof is a stray colourpoint kitten living in an attic of an old house. Very cute and quite naive.
- The Adventures of James Vega and Sergeant Whiskers,
a Mass Effect story done as a takeoff of a forum meme postulating that Vega likely owns a cat.
- Ann-Kathrin Kniggendorf
is well-known in Galaxy Rangers fandom for her Dark Fic. The main exception to this? A series of vignettes where Gooseman adopts a kitten. (See "Possessor" under "Story Cycles")
- Sarah Girl 1998's fanfic, "Cat Mario," has Mario wearing the Cat Suit. Once he shows it to Lumpy and SpongeBob, they just about fall in love with its cuteness. Apparently trying to ignore their affection, Mario offers them some Super Bells, which give them Cat Suits of their own, to their joy. When Meowth arrives and sees the characters wearing their Cat Suits, however, he finds them more ridiculous than cute, leaving Mario to decide not to let Lumpy and SpongeBob wear the Cat Suits anymore.
- One look at a cute kitty in the distance in Gankona, Unnachgiebig, Unità
, and Italy rushed toward it at full-speed. Poor Japan nearly died as he was on Italy's back while the latter was speeding. The cuteness of Pookie helped make things better though.
- Game Theory has Vesta, an adorable eight-week-old kitten. Although after Nanoha makes her a Familiar, she's a Cat Girl or a Panthera Awesome much of the time.
- Mall Rats sees Lincoln and Leni Loud from The Loud House renting a movie and wanting something cute so Lola would enjoy it. Frank picks out a movie with a cute little kitten called Archie.
- In Mass Effect: End of Days, an Asari named Phaos gets a kitten as a present, and remarks it should be illegal for an animal to be that adorable.
- The Nutdealer Expanded Universe: "Unrelated" cements its status as a Breather Episode by focusing on Nathan and Tommy petting stray cats in a park.
- All Mixed Up!: Oscar's personal anagrammed form is a basket of kittens with orange stripes. He ends up turned into this form by Mariana Mag at the end of Chapter 9 before she even has a chance to land on the platform of the Language Room, showcasing her agility and high speed.
- Forever And A Mile introduces the younger and more tame versions of spider-cats, known as spider-kittens. They reside in gaps in Precinct 13579's ball pit.
- Disney Animated Canon: Many.
- Figaro from Pinocchio, who was spun off into his own series of short cartoons. Figaro is now canonically Minnie's cat.
- Dinah from Alice in Wonderland.
- Duchess's three kittens Toulouse, Marie, and Berlioz
◊ from The Aristocats from 1970. One must wonder why it took so long for Marie to make her appearance at Walt Disney World, considering Japan's equivalent just had to have one of the kitties appear at Tokyo Disney Resort. Out of all the characters in the film, Marie seems to be the character
◊ that people would mostly remember when they think of the film. She even has her own merchandise line in Japan and America. She's even got her own manga called "Miriya & Marie"
that was first released in Japan and Brazil in March 2015. The manga later gained an english translation by Tokyo Pop and made it's western release in Summer 2018.
- Oliver & Company is Oliver Twist... only the main character's a kitty.
- The Emperor's New Groove: Villainess Yzma gets dosed with a vial of her own transformation serum and turns into an evil, terrifying... floofy little kitten.
- Many people find Mittens from Bolt cute.
- Big Hero 6 has the the Hamada family's calico cat. Even Baymax finds him adorable.
- In Turning Red, the ultimate test for Mei's control of her red panda transformation is The Kitten Box: five absurdly cute kittens crawling all over her, purring affectionately. The Cuteness Overload nearly does get to her.
- Lightyear: Sox, Buzz Lightyear's Robot Buddy, has the shape of a cute little cat, to help provide better psychological help and well-being to Star Command space rangers once they go back from missions.
- Kitten-like proportions and demeanor contribute a large part to the appeal of Toothless the Night Fury in How to Train Your Dragon.
- Puss-in-Boots in Shrek, the cutest badass ever. He knows it and uses it to his advantage.
- In his spin-off film Puss in Boots, a flashback shows Puss when he was an actual kitten.
- A tie-in short film features Puss running into the Diablos, three adorable kitten siblings who are assassins for hire.
- The Cat from The Bad Guys (2022). Once he warms up to Mr. Wolf, he fully qualifies as this in his interactions with the Bad Guys, whether it's nibbling his fingers or rubbing against him.
- Jiji from Kiki's Delivery Service is so sweet he can cause a sugar high! In the English dub, he's voiced by Phil Hartman, so you get cute and snarkiness.
- My Neighbor Totoro got a short film sequel, Mei and the Kittenbus, that plays exclusively in the Studio Ghibli museum. And if anything on earth is cuter than a Catbus, it's a Kittenbus.
- The section of Allegro non Troppo set to Sibelius' Valse Triste. Watch this
without tearing up at least a little. Bet you can't. No other animal would have worked as well as the cat. Not even a puppy.
- The Secret of Kells has Pangur Ban, the white cat of Brother Aidan of Iona.
- Home (2015) has Pig — a small, chubby cat who's put through some slapstick.
- Lucky and Zorba has Yoyo, an adorable ginger kitten.
- The Cat Returns exists solely because of this trope. It's about a girl who's taken to the magical world of cute, talking kitties and then herself begins to transform into a cute, talking kitty.
- Cat Soup uses kittens as the "cute" half of Grotesque Cute.
- Edmund from Rock-A-Doodle gets turned into a cat by the evil owl because he finds kittens "more digestable."
"Jeepers, I'm all furry!"
- You really can't blame the Misaimed Fandom of Kung Fu Panda for thinking Tai Lung is awesome — after all, he's incredibly badass and cool and oddly sympathetic — but the real clincher comes when we see Shifu's flashbacks to raising him from a kitten. A rambunctious, big-eyed, fluffy-tailed, eager-to-please, kung-fu-lovin' kitten. The creators themselves admitted that they may have gone a bit too far in trying to avoid a one-note villain.
- The same applies for Defrosting Ice Queen Tigress. While some found her behavior in the first movie grating, seeing her as a sad young kitten trying to earn the approval of a man incapable of giving it did astounding things for her popularity.
- Goes even further in the spin-offs, in the Orphanage, the directors and other kids were terrified of her because she was so strong despite all she wanted to do was play and have friends. And it got to the point where every time she asked an innocent question like "Why is the sky blue?" or "Why is soup hot?", the directors would openly ridicule her for "being stupid", alienating herself further from others.
- The same applies for Defrosting Ice Queen Tigress. While some found her behavior in the first movie grating, seeing her as a sad young kitten trying to earn the approval of a man incapable of giving it did astounding things for her popularity.
- In Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Flint uses LOLCats to distract Sam. It is amazingly effective.
- The Salesman: A cute kitten is a resident at the apartment complex, providing random moments of cuteness. This may be because the mood of the rest of the film is rather bleak.
- In the French comedy The Closet the hero's quasi-mentor figure owns an adorable kitten. In fact, it was because the main character found the kitten on the terrace of his apartment that he ended up meeting his gay neighbor who helps him.
- The Adventures of Milo and Otis has this in spades, doubled with Precious Puppies.
- In universe example: Leo Spitz of Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen started off his conspiracy website by selling kitten calendars. Later, Sam uses them as his Madness Mantra.
- Horribly, horribly subverted in The Brothers Grimm. The most infamous part in the movie is when a small, adorable white kitten is walking along the floor during an absurd scene where a woman is being threatened with a large, spinning blade. When the torturer sees the animal, he gets startled and (read at your own risk) kicks it in the air, where we see it hit the blade and get chopped up into pieces as its flesh flies everywhere.
- Crosses the Line Twice: the evil General then takes the kitten's eye that's been splattered to his coat, and eats it like a rare delicacy — a Take That! at French food?
- Similar horrible, horrible subversion in Pet Sematary Two: at one point the evil, reanimated dog is shown in a kennel at a vet's office, growling at another kennel with three adorable tabby kittens in it. The kittens hiss back. Cut to the next morning, where we see an excited little girl being led into the room by her mom who tells her that she can pick whichever kitten she wants, only to scream in horror at the sight of the dog's busted-open kennel and the kittens' busted-open kennel caked with blood and gray fur.
- Hellboy's film counterpart likes kittens even more than his comicbook version, keeping entire litters of kittens in his room. In the first film's moment of awesome, he whups a baddie while simultaneously rescuing a basket of itty-bitty kitties.
- Invoked in the DVD commentary of A Series of Unfortunate Events where Daniel Handler, assuming his Lemony Snicket persona, spends most of the movie trying to convince viewers to watch something else:
You know what I really like? A basket of kittens. I think everyone watching this film should just go out and buy, or otherwise procure, a basket of kittens.
- Several kittens appear in Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers. Strangely enough, Michael, who is known to kill dogs, completely ignores the kittens.
- Jonesy in Alien. Not even the xenomorph can resist thinking the cat is cute.
- The Spirit establishes that the main character likes cats, and The Octopus the villain pretends like cats and introduces us to a cute kitten, Muffin, "his favorite" who he then proceeds to... melt to death.
- In Licence to Kill, the Hemingway House where James Bond meets up with M has some kittens wandering about (used for a Mythology Gag — the mysterious figure stroking one of them turns out to be Bond's boss, not a Blofeld-like character with a Right-Hand Cat).
- When Bruce Lee fights Chuck Norris in the climactic battle in the Colosseum in Way of the Dragon, they are surrounded by adorable baby kittens.
- Keanu, the feline star of the film of the same name, who is so adorable that a gang war is fought over him. Just look at the film's page image!
- Thunder the cat from the 2013 French-Belgian film Thunder and the House of Magic.
- Cats & Dogs The Revenge of Kitty Galore uses this to thoroughly stomp out the last remnants of the first film's Always Chaotic Evil stance on cats that Catherine (the heroic cat agent) haven't already removed — the kittens (Catherine's nieces) are cute and very friendly, being only excited and happy to hang around and play with a dog.
- Upside-Down Magic: Most of Nory's animal hybrid forms have some part of a kitten, such as the body of a kitten with dragon wings (a Dritten), the head of a kitten on a badger's body and the feet of a kangaroo, and the head of a panda on the body of a penguin with kitten ears.
- The Winter Guest has two roughcut adolescent boys who smoke, swear and talk crudely about sex, adult life and whether Growing Up Sucks. You know their hearts are good when they immediately take up the abandoned kittens they find and plan to adopt them, thus introducing themselves to mature responsibility. And cuteness.
- A Kitten For Hitler has a little Jewish boy travel to Germany to give Hitler one of these for Christmas hoping it will give him a change of heart. It almost works, until he notices the boy's Swastika shaped birthmark and Star of David necklace.
- The Electrical Life of Louis Wain: Invoked. Louis and Emily adopt an adorable kitten, and Louis's art based on said cat become incredibly popular. Though the notion of cats as pets had already existed, it became more popular after his art became widespread. In part thanks to Louis, people now see cats as cute housepets rather than as vermin-catchers.
- Cats vs. Robots has Stu and Scout, a pair of kitten siblings that Max brings home after saving them from the river in "This Is War". Obi recruits them to retrieve the Singularity Chip for him.
- Discworld:
- You (yes, that's her name), in the novel Wintersmith, even softens Granny Weatherwax. Slightly. Deny it though she may. Nanny Ogg's angelically challenged tomcat Greebo (he's a big softy, really), on the other hand, found an encounter with her somewhat disquieting, to say the least.
- Greebo himself was apparently once a fluffy kitten. Now, he's an absolute menace feared across the Disc, and with good reason - he's known to have killed two vampires (he ate one) and at least one elf, and terrorises every normal animal in sight. He's seen cornering a full-grown bull and trying to play with it like a mouse, causes bears to climb trees in his presence, and brings in dead wolves the same way other cats bring in mice. The only things that consistently scare him are the Nac Mac Feegle, Legba (Mrs Gogol's decidedly uncanny cockerel), and You.
- Death, who is normally dispassionate (though kind, in a detached sort of way), has a soft spot for cats and gets really upset when he has to collect a bunch of kittens at once because someone drowned a sack of them in a rain barrel.
- In The Last Hero, he also had a few things to say about Schrödinger's famous thought experiment.
- In Reaper Man he is buying chocolates as part of a venture into human courtship, and finds one box decorated with pictures of cute kittens. He asks in menacing tones, "Are they cat-flavoured?"
- And then there's this exchange from Thief of Time, on a diorama of stuffed kittens.
Susan: I wonder what happened when the man who did this met my grandfather.
Lobsang: Would he have met your grandfather?
Susan: Oh, yes. And my grandfather is rather fond of cats.
- A Song of Ice and Fire:
- One of the ways it's made clear that Tommen Baratheon isn't bad is that Tommen is given a trio of kittens, of whom he becomes very fond. This is in contrast to his older brother Joffrey, who was once told that a cat was pregnant with kittens, so he cut them out of her with a knife. And if you think that this series could never be cute, just listen to the names Tommen picks: Ser Pounce, Lady Whiskers and Boots. After four books full of endless grim tidings, betrayals and suffering, this is exactly what the audience needs.
- It is mentioned that Princess Rhaenys also had a black kitten which she named Balerion after the ginormous historical dragon of that name, who was incidentally also called "the Black Dread". After her death, it is implied that little Bale grew up fending for itself to become a true Fire-and-Blood Targaryen; it is the toughest, meanest old cat currently in the Red Keep, and one well able to give Arya Stark the complete run-around in the maze of secret passageways. Martin has even basically confirmed this
- In The Belgariad and The Malloreon series by David Eddings, Kal Zakath, the "evil" emperor of Mallorea, is foreshadowed as turning out to be a decent guy at heart by his affection for his striped tabby cat and her kittens. A Running Gag soon develops where 'Zakath is constantly trying to give the kittens away to people, as his cat keeps having so many of them.
- Warrior Cats. They manage to even make Tigerstar and Scourge look adorable when they're written/drawn as kittens. And of course, fan artists will always fall back on this trope when it comes to drawing chibis.
- In the The Cat Who... series of books by Lillian Jackson Brown. There is a cast of several Kitties, but the main stars are the Psychic cat Koko, and his partner Yum Yum.
- In T.S. Elliot's "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" and the musical based off of it called Cats, there's a couple dozen, and a subversion: Grizabella, the Glamour Cat, is now quite old and ugly.
- In Kafka on the Shore, Johnnie Walker murders cats and saws off their heads, cutting out their "cute little hearts" and EATING them.
- Subverted by Umbridge in Harry Potter. Just because she likes (moving!) pics of kittens and decorates her office with them in Order of the Phoenix, this doesn't mean she's one of the good ones.
- In Whispering Nickel Idols, Garrett acquires a bucketful of kittens whose very presence seems to radiate feelings of happiness, contentment, and party-time good cheer. It turns out that they're disguised lesser avatars of a goddess of merriment and the night.
- H. P. Lovecraft was a Kind Hearted Cat Lover. He only owned one cat in his lifetime, but fed and named every alley-cat he found. His Dreamland story "The Cats of Ulthar" explains the chilling reason why "In Ulthar, according to an ancient and significant law, no man may kill a cat". The Ulthar cats return in his longest work, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, where they respect and aid the hero because he loves little black kittens. HPL also wrote an essay on why cats are better than dogs
. (Just don't ask what his cat's name is...)
- In The Witch of Blackbird Pond, Hannah's cure for sad children is blueberry cake and a kitten. It never fails.
- There is an entire subgenre of mystery books called the Cozy Mystery in which the protagonists very often have a pet cat, who may even help in solving the murder.
- German philosopher Oswald Spengler wrote in The Decline of the West this: "A peacock is indubitably speaking when he spreads his tail, but a kitten playing with a cotton-reel also speaks to us, unconsciously, through the quaint charm of its movements." Even cultural pessimists think everything's cuter with kittens!
- Letters Back to Ancient China has the narrator/protagonist often talking about his Shiao-shiao and how misses her.
- In the Rainbow Magic series, Kirsty has a kitten named Pearl.
- Yoko the cat
◊ from Rosemary Wells's "Yoko" series from the late 90's. She's a sweet-natured and kindhearted anthropomorphic Japanese kitten who loves sushi and is very friendly with others. She is also one of the main characters in Timothy Goes to School. Another character that shows up in the Yoko series is a Spanish kitten named Juanita.
- The Tale of Tom Kitten and The Tale of Samuel Whiskers by Beatrix Potter all have cute kittens.
- The fire kittens from The Bad Unicorn Trilogy, especially Moki. Subverted with Loki, who, despite being a fire kitten as well, is pretty evil.
- In Black Sunday the first published novel by Thomas Harris (who went on to write more books featuring one Hannibal Lecter) one way the main character is established as being a real monster is that he puts his wife's kitten down the garbage disposal when she makes him angry.
- Huckle and his sister Sally from the Busytown series by Richard Scarry are cute kittens.
- Kee Kee the main protagonist from the book series "KeeKee's Big Adventures"
which has her travel around the world.
- My New Kitten: The white kitten seen in the story does the typical cute things you would see.
- In Big Little Kitty by Jan Biggers, Karen Kay (who is four and a little bit more) is a farm girl with a beautiful orange Christmas kitten called Muffin, who in springtime jumps onto a train to see the outside world. She explores happily in the city, while Karen waits and prays. Months pass, until early winter brings Muffin back to Karen's farm — along with her own kittens.note
- Findus the cat from Swedish children's book series Pettson and Findus (Pettson och Findus in Swedish) is a friendly brown and white kitten who's able to talk to his owner Findus.
He later gains green clothing and a green hat and is frequently seen walking on two legs and sometimes on all fours.
- Stick Dog: In "Stick Dog Chases A Pizza", Stripes becomes distracted by the sight of a pair of paws inside the passenger seat of a delivery truck, which compels her to save the creature inside. Then they see that the paws belong to a kitten, which Stripes immediately becomes enamoured with. She decides she wants to make the kitten a part of their group, and wants to take it out of the truck. Then it's revealed that the kitten was actually adopted by a truck driver, and was excited to see him coming back. Stripes is disappointed to have to say goodbye.
- Comedians Hale & Pace can't resist playing with this trope. Enter Hale with some really, REALLY cute kitten on his shoulder. Cue to Pace revealing a big microwave...How will THAT end? After much talk and zig-zagging, they finally open the microwave to reveal an already microwaved cat. Plastic, of course. (Note: This gave them instant infamy to the point that even the Other Wiki mentions the sketch.)
- German TV station hr3 used to play segments of this video
during programme breaks. Probably the only case in history where you were annoyed at the break ending.
- Mimsie
, the adorable kitten in the MTM Enterprises Vanity Plate. And if the Tommy Westphall Snow Globe
didn't piss off the audience in the final episode of St. Elsewhere, the end credits certainly did
. Ironically, the poor kitty really did pass away the same year.
- Even Keith Olbermann is not immune. The "sanity break" at the middle of his show often had one or more adorable kitten videos. Keith would occasionally interrupt himself to squee "Ooo, a kitty!" Unfortunately, he's allergic to cats. (He does have two adorable Maltese dogs, though. They're hypoallergenic.) To this day, he features adoptable kitties and puppies on his Twitter feed.
- In The Big Bang Theory, the normally aloof Sheldon Cooper turns to the comfort of cats when distressed. And of course his lullaby in times of extreme distress, for which he usually conscripts any nearby female friend to play the role of Momma/Mee-Maw:
Soft kitty, warm kitty, little ball of fur;
Happy kitty, sleepy kitty, purr, purr, purr....
- This song, whose real title is "Warm Kitty
◊," was written by schoolteacher Edith Newlin in 1937. It was published by Willis, a company that produced song books for children. It also appears in the 1940s edition of Childcraft. The producers of Big Bang Theory had permission from Willis to use the song, but not from Newlin's heirs
, who filed a lawsuit.
- Brooklyn Nine-Nine: In "Terry's Kitties", we find out that Terry's old bullies back at the Six-Five send him a kitten every year to remind him of his screwup twenty years ago. (It Makes Sense in Context, but the short version is: Terry thought he'd cracked his first case, when it turned out he was wrong, he accused a cat of being an accomplice in desperation.) Terry understandably doesn't find it cute, and keeps insulting the kittens, but Jake adores them.
Jake: (whispering to the kittens) Don't listen to him. You're a part of something much bigger than yourselves. (blows kisses)
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
- Willow and Tara decide to get themselves a kitten. Not as a familiar, but just so they can make it do cute things like playing with string.
Willow: I keep thinking, okay, that's the cutest thing ever, and then she does something cuter and completely resets the whole scale.
- Miss Kitty, incidentally, disappears after only a few appearances. We're never told exactly what happened to her; all we know is that a crossbow was somehow involved.
- Spike takes Buffy out for a night of gambling with his demon buddies. In a Visual Pun the 'kitty' is filled with actual kittens ("They're delicious!") being used for currency. Eventually Buffy gets annoyed and upends the kitty, letting them escape.
- Willow and Tara decide to get themselves a kitten. Not as a familiar, but just so they can make it do cute things like playing with string.
- The Chaser's War On Everything: The Hamster Wheel's "Australian Politics, as told through YouTube videos of cats" segments play on this.
- The Closer provides a possibly deliberate example in introducing Joel, Brenda's new kitten, given that the case the episode revolves around is particularly draining emotionally.
- The Colbert Report:
- On March 5, 2009, Stephen Colbert discussed the imploding U.S. economy with CNBC analyst Jim Cramer while videos of kittens and puppies played in the background. Well, I sure feel better about the economy!
- Also Black Comedy in the form of Colbert challenging a guest to debate him on the subject of throwing kittens in a wood chipper.
- In the 21-February-2012 episode, he challenged a fake anti-Colbert TV ad's claim that he doesn't like kittens by holding a kitten in each hand. "I love these two little kittens," he said, "And I will continue to do so until the moment they become cats."
- One infamous moment on Countdown had Jimmy Carr trying to distract the panel (from, appropriately enough, 8 Out of 10 Cats) with two baskets of kittens. This failed miserably... because the kittens promptly made a break for it, leaving him in the unenviable role of trying to keep them in line.
- The Daily Show:
- The healthcare debate had the great toss-up between healthcare and a video of kittens playing in an empty tissue box.
Jon Stewart: Healthcare is today's hot-button issue, but... how did the kitten get in the box?
- Stewart tried using pictures of cute kittens as a form of Brain Bleach on the segment about cover-ups of child molestation in the Catholic Church
. They didn't take.
- Not even Professor Butterscotch
can keep John from losing it over the bank bailouts.
- The healthcare debate had the great toss-up between healthcare and a video of kittens playing in an empty tissue box.
- Doc Martin: Even the All Devouring Black Hole Loan Sharks love cute kittens, they keep one in their van.
- Doctor Who: Not even the Doctor is immune to the power of kittens, as "Gridlock" shows.
- House: Death Cat. How can something so cute be an omen of your doom? Based on a True Story of a cat in a nursing home that predicted the deaths of residents. See article about Oscar
.
- Extremely subverted in Hyperspace, where anyone who is sentenced to their equivalent of rehab gets put in a room where all they see is kittens, and a voice saying stuff like, "Look at the kitten. The kitten obeys authority. The kitten is happy. Be like the happy kitten. Obey authority and be like the kitten." Everyone who goes in comes out brainwashed, although it does appear to wear off, otherwise the entire show would be full of people wandering around singing silently.
- Invoked in Jane the Virgin, where the narrator shows the audience footage of cute cats when confronted with heavy subject material on a few occasions.
- This is the point of the Kitten Bowl, Hallmark Channel's equivalent of the Puppy Bowl. It's cute kittens playing around in an American football stadium play-area. There is also the spinoff Meow Madness, which is essentially the same thing but with basketball.
- The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson always ends with the feature "What did we learn on the show tonight, Craig?", which is introduced with an animated kitten.
- In the Discovery Channel documentary Mega Predators, a kitten is shown when the narrator is introducing the felid relative Barbourofelis, interacting and jumping up on a skull of it. It doesn't really serve a purpose beyonf Rule of Cute.
- In the "Charlie" episode of The Mighty Boosh, Naboo advises Howard to look at a picture of kittens in a barrel to soothe himself whenever he feels himself getting too angry. The kittens in a barrel reappear during the end credits of the episode, apparently entirely for the viewer's benefit.
- In Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers season three, P.C. — short for Park Cat — who was actually Kat under Rita's spell to spy on the Rangers.
- Mystery Science Theater 3000: Crow had a tendency to exclaim "Kitties!" with delight whenever a kitten showed up in a movie...or any kind of cat...or, well, pretty much any animal at all, especially if it happened to be deadly.
- Operation Kitten Calendar on VH1 was an extreme example of this trope. It's basically a spot-on parody of The Apprentice except people are competing to make the best kitten calendar, not work for Donald Trump.
- Odd Squad:
- "Not OK Computer" has the "virus cat" that Olympia unintentionally infects her computer with, which manifests as a cat meowing rhythmically and dancing, and rapidly multiplying. Olympia originally opened it because she thought it was a file photo of a kitten sneezing.
- In "Odd Squad in the Shadows", while the Van Computer drives the Mobile Unit van to Mr. Sides' restaurant, Opal, Orla and Oswald spend time looking through the many pictures of kittens in the workbooks that the latter has made and printed, and react accordingly.
- One Day at a Time (1975) reveals that whenever Penelope has an anxiety attack, Schnieder sends her cute pictures of cute cats in wigs!
- Animal Planet uses footage of kittens at play as the "half-time show" for its annual Puppy Bowl.
- Red Dwarf starts when Lister doesn't want to give up on his cat.
- In an alternate universe, Kochanski discovered Lister's kitten when he smuggled it on board, and its Kitten Eyes convinced her not to disintegrate it.
- In an episode of Scrubs, after the guest star psychiatrist told JD about "Takotsubo cardiomyopathy" (broken heart syndrome), where the heart muscle weakens due to emotional stress, JD wonders how he's supposed to treat emotions. Cue an Imagine Spot where he dumps a box of kittens over a patient having a heart attack ("Get me a box of kittens! Stat!") and then lists the possible side-effects of kittens. Namely, allergies, tiny scratches, and erectile dysfunction.
- Just to make you go "Awwww!", here's a link
.
- Just to make you go "Awwww!", here's a link
- Data's cat, Spot, in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Possible subversion swinging back towards a straight play when Barclay's Protomorphosis Syndrome causes her to de-evolve into an iguana and then have a litter of perfectly normal kittens.
- The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien puts puppies and this trope together and gives us Puppies Dressed As Cats!
(Note: link is from Hulu and may not work in all regions. Sorry.)
- There's a show on Animal Planet called Too Cute! Kittens that looks at litters of various cat breeds from birth to a few months old.
- An episode of Top Gear (UK) has Jeremy discussing the finer points of twin turbocharged engines, but before he launches into his explanation, he remarks that some people in the audience tend to find such explanations boring, "so here's some soft little kittens for you to look at." The screen splits halfway between Clarkson and a mound of cuddly little kittens.
- VR Troopers had one episode where Ryan Steel and J.B Reese rescue a kitten from a tree. A very cute kitten.
- Earlier on in their run, X-Play sometimes censored scenes of horribly gory, mangling violence with poorly cropped photos of kittens. In one instance when the censored violence escalated even further, said kitten's eyes bulged out with a startled yowl.
- In the song Wretch by the Canadian band Protest The Hero, there is meowing at 3:31.
- "Jakdo" by pinknruby has purring most of the way through. The band made a stop-motion animation of the first 30 seconds featuring the sleeping cat and some scrunched up paper
.
- There is also Fatboy Slim's music video to his cover of "The Joker", which shows only kittens doing cute things.
- "Black Cat" by Gentle Giant has the band making various cat meows with guitars and violins.
- On that same note, Queen did a song called "Delilah", which Freddie Mercury wrote about his favourite cat. It includes a guitar solo filtered to sound like mewing.
- Subverted by The Presidents of the United States of America's song "Kitty." After a few verses of petting the kitty, it scratches.
"Fuck you kitty, you're gonna spend the night OUTSIDE!"
- The song "Kittens for Sale"
by TV's Kyle goes on at length about the cuteness of kittens.
- Mew is a name of a band.
- The music video
for Elton John's original version of "Circle of Life" naturally shows an adorable lion cub toddling about and exploring in the background. At the end of the video, Elton even got to hold him!
- Cell-Phone ringtone company Jamster (best known for creating Crazy Frog and Schnuffel), who is well-known for the creation behind Snuggle Bunny (Schnuffel Bunny in German). Also created a female cat character named "Pussycat Tiger" in 2009. The character starred in her own music video where she has a crush on a male cat
. The music video itself is cute, very sparkly, and oddly suggestive when you read the lyrics. Another feline character made by Jamster is a tiger named "Tiger Boo"
a cute tiger cub.
- On October 8th, 2020 Sanrio and Sega Toys teamed up to create new Sanrio characters called "The Beatcats".
A 5-piece Virtual Idol Unit starring adorable cats that perform J-Pop created by them. They group even has it's own Youtube channel where
they upload music videos
, merchandise, and messages to their real life fans.
- Michael Jackson's Thriller has a tiger cub used as this in the gatefold
◊ and the cover of a re-edition
◊.
- Madonna's "Express Yourself" has her black cat wandering through the rain-drenched Metropolis-like environment. The sopping wet cat comes to the singer's male friend (played by Cameron Alborzian), who takes him and brings him back to her. It's implied she sent the cat on purpose to him as an invitation to spend the night.
- In the Cool Kids Table Harry Potter-themed game Hogwarts: The New Class, Josh adopts a stray kitten in Diagon Alley that he names Geno. It ends up inhabiting his robes most of the time.
- An October front cover
of the Private Eye was entitled the "Press Regulation Special" showed four kittens singing praises of politicians and Hugh Grant's new film.
- Swords and Scorcery Creature Collection - Moon cats. Magical kitties that appear after moonrise. Those who encounter them get good luck afterwards. Although sought by mages believing them to hold access to powerful magical energy, there are no known instances of them being captured. The rare times a moon cat has been caught, it vanished by sunrise.
- In Warhammer 40,000, The World Eaters, despite being blood knights in the service of Khorne, are quite fond of khittens.
- It's something of a Running Gag among the fandom that the World Eaters are less psychotic in their downtime. And that Kharn is a hell of a guy.
- A fanwiki for it, Lexicanum, has an entry for cats in the fourth-first millenium
. An example is an Astropath's pet cat, who is described as being killed along with the entire planet's population after the planet it lived on was hit by Exterminatus.
- There are also Gyrinx - cat-like creatures used by some Eldar and human psykers as Familiars, enhancing their psionic abilities. These kitties have a strong telepathic link with their owners and are very loyal to them, which is unusual for cats.
- Cats are a frequent appearance in the Epic Battle Fantasy series, owing to its creator, Matt Roszak, being a big fan of them:
- A limbless cat named NoLegs appears in every installment - first appearing as Brawl Royale's first opponent, then appearing atop Epic Battle Fantasy 1's first boss, King Slime. All subsequent installments have him as an ally, with him being a playable character in Bullet Heaven, Bullet Heaven 2 and Epic Battle Fantasy 5.
- Similar limbless cats appear as an enemy type starting from Epic Battle Fantasy 2.
- NCHProductions' mascot, a pale yellow cat named Meow Meow, also cameos in the series - first appearing as one of Natalie's Summons in EBF2, as a sidequest-giving NPC and a skill in EBF3, and as the Meow Meow Badge in EBF5.
- Fragile Dreams: Farewell Ruins of the Moon relies heavily on this. Not only can you feed and play with stray cats, but there are three mandatory quests that involve Seto following or befriending a cat. Part of Ren's motif is her strong friendship with the cats. Cats are arguably the one thing in the game that is happy, put there to cheer the player up.
- Genshin Impact: Diona is a playable Catfolk who is of the small girl model, and thus comes across as a kitten and has the Tsundere attitude one expects from a cat. She works at Mondstadt's Cat's Tail Tavern, where patrons come to drink while in a bar full of cats; said patrons usually start off thinking Diona is just wearing something to fit the gimmick, but are surprised to find out she is indeed catfolk.
- Hidden City has Snowy, a fluffy orange cat with big eyes who somehow wanders into the City, prompting his human family to come looking for him. The game certainly milks his cute charms by featuring him as a bonus avatar in various events, and in the 2021 Halloween event, he is featured in a mini-game which the player can play every 12 hours in exchange for artifact assemblers and other rewards. The Detective describes him as "the City's favourite cat".
- The Sims:
- In MySims, the cat statue ground flair adds 3% to a building's cuteness.
- In The Sims 3, a Sim who uses the "Awwww" interaction on a kitten will receive the +10 moodlet "Kittens!" for one Sim hour. A cat that had just given birth to a litter of kittens will give herself and her family the +80 moodlet "New Kittens" for one Sim day. All the same things work with Precious Puppies, too.
- WarioWare: Smooth Moves has disco dancing kitties in Jimmy T's stage.
- In Chrono Trigger, the main character has a cat, and he can win more kitties at the fair (as well as a supply of food!). Later on, we learn Magus used to have a cat named Alfador...and if you have Magus in your active party and go where the cat is, he'll follow his owner around the area! Aww...
- Cats are pretty much a running gag in the game. When you fight Ozzie as part of Magus' sidequest, you hit a switch and fall down a pit. After heading back, everyone prepares for battle, then stops and they all watch as a cat randomly wanders in and presses the switch that kills Ozzie, then leaves. link.
- Cats are pretty much a running gag in the game. When you fight Ozzie as part of Magus' sidequest, you hit a switch and fall down a pit. After heading back, everyone prepares for battle, then stops and they all watch as a cat randomly wanders in and presses the switch that kills Ozzie, then leaves. link.
- Persona:
- There are plenty of stray cats to feed and befriend in Persona 3. One of Elizabeth's Requests is to feed one in particular. When you do feed it, it comes back looking larger and healthier.
- Persona 4 has them too, including one you can spend time playing with to increase a social stat.
- Persona 5 has Morgana, a Badass Adorable anthropomorphic cat (or cat-like creature, it's unclear) who tags along with the protagonists in their quest to help those who abuse their power reform.
- Ōkami also provides lots and lots of cats to feed in the game's strangely endearing "Animal Feeding" mini-quests. The game went as far as to reinstate the Cat as a Chinese Zodiac constellation, and this Brush God gets along quite well with Amaterasu despite the latter being a canine.
- World of Warcraft: Even Kel'Thuzad has a cat. And he gets angry if it's killed (however, rumors about doing so making him harder to kill or altering the Random Drops have been proven false).
- On the other hand, an undead questgiver has nothing better to do with her kitty than using it as a guinea pig for experiments with demonic substances.
- With pet battles, now there are many different cats to collect as vanity pets, including Kel'Thuzad's cat, Mr. Bigglesworth, now a reward if you collect certain pets that drop from older raids. Unlike most cats in the game, he's classified as undead and has ice attacks.
- The Legend of Zelda:
- The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess:
- There are quite a few cats in the game, who always come up and greet Link (be he human or wolf) with a 'Mew!'. You can even cuddle them! In the Hidden Village you can even play a game where you have go talk to them all, and one of the responses you can get if you talk to cat which you've already talked to is "We're already friends, meow!". Awww. Telma's cat is a very plot important kitty.
- There's also the minigame late in the game where you explore the Hidden Village as a wolf in order to find and talk to 20 cats, all of whom want to be friends!
- The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword: Remlits look cute and innocent, but only during the day. At night...
- The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess:
- Dwarves in Dwarf Fortress are susceptible to this trope, often adopting the fort's ludicrous supply of cats. This can be very bad for your framerate. The main developer, Toady One, has his own feline companion, Scamps
, and the update log often includes lines such as "Scamps fell asleep on my shoulder like a very tired parrot today." Awwwwwwww...
- In Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, there are cats hiding in some areas. Upon picking a cat up, it will go back to the village. Normally you can't do anything with them (aside from hitting them to make them freak out), but if you have a particular glyph, you can transform into a Cat Girl and talk to them to get some hints. Also, the cats are all named after various ingredients (like Soybean, Flour and Tofu), which makes them all the more cuter. Holding the stylus on the screen while one of the cats is present will cause a toy mouse to appear, allowing you to tease the cats with it and make them jump after it.
- Chen from Touhou Project is sometimes depicted in fanart as having cat subordinates. And her animal form, as part of her nekomata
shtick, is a two-tailed cat. She canonically tries to have cat subordinates. They don't listen to her and only hang around because she feeds them.
- No More Heroes:
- First game:
- Jeane the cat, the closest thing to family our homicidal hero Travis has in Santa Destroy. The player can interact and play with her by selecting the "Jeane" option in Travis' living room. There is absolutely nothing gained by doing this. Try to stop yourself doing it every time you're in the room.
- One of the jobs in the first game has Travis wondering around picking up cute runaway cats.
- No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle: Jeane the cat returns in this game, much chubbier. A major sidequest is to bring her back down to brainshattering cuteness, which also nets a nice extra.
- No More Heroes III: Jeane gave birth to several adorable kittens prior to the events of the game, and Travis is asked by her to retrieve them all.
- First game:
- Mega Man V for Game Boy introduced players to Tango, a cute, green robotic cat that meowed endearingly when summoned—and then sprouted spikes and rolled menacingly into enemies! Mushroom Kingdom Fusion brought him back as one of Roll's weapons.
- Super Mario Bros.:
- Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story has a Collection Sidequest in which Bowser collects Blitties, kittens made out of coin blocks by sucking them out of an enemy. Collecting all of them grants him his ultimate attack: The Broggy Bonker, which if performed perfectly will have Broggy lead the blitties in a blitzkrieg against the foe.
- Super Mario 3D World features cat-based outfits for Mario and co. Its Updated Re-release adds a campaign called Bowser's Fury, which centers around Lake Lapcat's friendly cats (who turn evil when Fury Bowser shows up) and not-so-friendly enemies with cat-like features.
- Monster Hunter: Your character can interact with the simply adorable Felyne
, a race of cat people. Starting with Monster Hunter Freedom Unite, keeping one as a partner has beneficial effects such as decreasing damage taken, enhancing the benefits of food consumed, reducing field tool breakage, affecting the size of your bombs, improve cooking results, negating the intimidation effects of some monsters, and much more. But watch out for the Melynx
; behind their cuddly appearance lies master thieves and pickpockets. In Monster Hunter Portable 3rd, two Felynes can accompany you on hunts as Palicoes, helping you fight monsters and gather items. Monster Hunter Generations lets you play as a Felyne hunter.
- You can easily buy kitten 'companions' (pets) in World of Warcraft, provided you have enough gold.
- During one RuneScape quest, certain gruesome scenes (such as a brain transplant) are censored with animations of kittens performing adorable actions such as playing with yarn or wearing pirate outfits.
- Dragon Age:
- Subverted in Dragon Age: Origins "The Stone Prisoner" DLC. Kitties aren't nearly as cute when possessed by demons.
- Played straight in Awakening. You can give Anders a cute little kitten that he will immediately gush over, naming it "Ser Pounce-a-lot". Anders' love of cats has a tragically hilarious backstory: the only fond memories he had of his time in the Circle Tower were the times he played with a cat that lived in the Tower named Mr. Wiggums. Sadly, Mr. Wiggums somehow became possessed by a Rage Demon and had to be put down — but not before Mr. Wiggums killed three Templars by himself. Also, sadly Anders had to give up Ser Pounce-A-Lot after he nearly gotten him killed during an expedition to the Deep Roads (though he still has a deep love for cats).
- In Dragon Age: Origins Leliana and Sten have a conversation about Leliana catching the 'fierce Qunari warrior' playing with a kitten. Sten of course justifies it as 'training'. (As in, giving 'warrior training' to the cat. No one believes it for an instant.)
- Subverted with Sukeban Shachou Rena for Wii, which, despite being based around a premise of cat love, ended up being the worst-selling Wii game
at 100 copies sold.
- The Nintendo 3DS Nintendogs games are named "Nintendogs + Cats". They add kittens to the roster, though the main focus still goes to the puppies. The kittens aren't terribly active, can't learn tricks, and are hard to gain money from but at least they're cute.
- The entire premise of Purr Pals, a Nintendogs clone for the DS and Wii.
- cat planet of course!
- Pokémon:
- There are several kitties in the series, many of them are sweet and loyal to the trainers, though getting into the evolutions may take too long for some. Meowth, Glameow, Purrloin, Espurr and especially Skitty are the proper kitten Mons.
- Pokémon Sun and Moon introduces a cat named Litten as the fire starter. Its fur is oily and highly flammable so it can attack with flaming hairballs.
- The ninth generation starter is Sprigatito, a Grass-type kitten. Its Violet Pokedex entry states that it has a sweet scent that mesmerizes those around it. The scent grows stronger when its under the sun.
- The resident Kindhearted Cat Lovers of Tokimeki Memorial 2, Miyuki Kotobuki and Kaori Yae, have positively adorable scenes revolving around cats: you can see in Childhood Mode a young Miyuki with her kitten Mii-chan in the front pocket of her dungarees, playing with her; and Kaori has a post-She's Back scene where she finds and happily plays with a kitten. In addition, Kaori has a beautiful Image Song named "Tsukiyo no Koneko" ("Moonlight Kitten").
- Laury Callwell Mitsumete Knight gets a few scenes where she finds three cute kittens abandoned, adopts them, and later lose them, leading to the protagonist helping her to search for them. The latter scene also draw to this trope the tough as nails Gene Petromolla and Sam Burston, revealing them as adorable Kindhearted Cat Lovers.
- While Kintaro from Mortal Kombat would normally be classified as Panthera Awesome, if you manage to pull off a Babality on him in Mortal Kombat 9, you wind up turning him into a cute kitten version of himself, complete with kittenish mewling and purring and him drinking from a saucer of milk.
- The musk cats from the Phantasy Star series, anyone? They're cute kittens that talk! In the first game, one is even a playable character!
- In Shadow of Destiny, doing an extra side quest can result in the library being filled with cute cats. You just go back into the past and give the little girl there a kitten. Back to the future, and bam. The place is filled with its descendants.
- A number of heart areas in Guild Wars 2 have kittens about, notably at the Snow Leopard shrine in the norn starting area. You can progress these areas by killing enemies, helping the priests... or playing with the kittens.
- Minecraft has kittens made of blocks and they are still adorable. They are also one of the game's only defenses against the kamikaze creepers which won't go within 16 metres of one.
- The FreeSpace 2 Game Mod Blue Planet has a bit where the "Meditation Widget" in Noemi's computer displays an adorable animated kitten picture, after the mission where the GTVA attacks Earth.
- Kitten Helpers, Workers, Engineers, and Overseers are all upgrades you can purchase in Cookie Clicker. Their effectiveness increases as you accumulate more milknote . Notable for being among the few things you can do that doesn't make the world a significantly worse place.
- The Puyo Puyo series has a pair of cute twin Siamese cats named Cait Sith.
- Jikkyou Oshaberi Parodius has Mike and Ran, flying cats that shoot balls of yarn. Mike's "force field" power is hiding under various furniture, and Ran's shield is a paper bag.
- In True Love Junai Monogatari, under certain circumstances the Player Character might find one during a rainy day. if he does, he can keep it hidden in his apartment or not. She's actually a Cat Girl... sort-of.
- In Something Else, Cat Beach has Luigi collecting 75 kittens for a cat before he allows Luigi to move onto the next level. The cat even does a cute smile at Luigi when Luigi completes this task.
- Tomodachi Life has the Rent-A-Cat Coupon level-up gift, which allows the Mii possessing it to play with a kitten, whether by themselves or with their friends.
- In Miitopia, you Mii can be cute kittens, as it is a Class that focuses on dishing out damage with Wolverine Claws and restore MP to teammates by cuddling them.
- As one could expect from a game named Cat Quest, almost its entire cast consists in Cute Kittens.
- The Evil Within: "Save Cat" in the DLC mission The Assignment. When you save the game, a black cat with a red ribbon round its neck appears for Kidman to stroke.
- Neko Atsume: Kitty Collector, as its title implies, has you collecting kittens. More specifically, you use cat food and toys such as balls and scratching posts to attract cats to your yard. However, like real-life cats, the cats in this game are a bit shy and will only come to your yard while the game app is closed.
- Jibanyan from Yo-Kai Watch is the series mascot and is a cute, talking cat.
- The Talos Principle: There's one on the cover art, and you can free one in level B7. If you do, it changes the "free will" ending slightly, with you character picking up and holding a kitten at the ending.
- In Exoptable Money, the player can buy a cat that he is she can send out to collect money, with visible hearts pouring out of the kitten each time it comes back. Don't get too attached to it, as Madame Sinclair takes notice and skins it so you can make more money off its fur.
- TinkerQuarry: Although he resembles an adult cat, Whiskers has a cheerful personality, and is quite the Nice Guy, invoking this.
- 7th Dragon III: Code VFD has you get involved making a cat cafe at one point, the completion of which requires you to go into the Tokyo Underground and rescue some cats. Offering cat food to the cafe lets you rest there, restoring all parties' LF and MN and giving everyone some SP. For the rest of the game, you can occasionally find stray cats to recruit for the cafe.
- The 144th champion in League of Legends is Yuumi the Magical Cat, who is exactly what her title describes her as. While she speaks and has an arsenal of supporting magic as she rides around on a flying Spell Book, she otherwise possesses every cute cat stereotype in the books, making her one of the most utterly adorable members of the cast.
- Eiyuden Chronicle Hundred Heroes: The Kickstarter campaign
has used the abundance of cats as a marketing point, and a golden one is available as backer-exclusive DLC. There was also a reward for premium backers to have their own cats appear in the game, but that sold out within just the first hour or so.
- Dragon Quest V:
- Talk to a cat while Madchen is in the party, and Party Chat with her afterward. Nine times out of ten, she'll be delighted.
- Saber looked an absolutely adorable golden-and-red furball as a cub. People are shocked that Sabrecats can even be tamed.
- The video game Stray marketed itself on being able to play as an adorable orange moggie wandering through a cyberpunk style world, complete with the ability to meow, jump, and solve puzzles by knocking stuff off ledges.
- In True Tail The main character is a young orphan cat named Caleb Lightpaw... yes, that is his last name.
- ASDF Movie:
- From ASDF MovieASDF Movie 2
:
Man 1: KITTEN FIGHT!
Man 2: No! Wait! I'm allergic to adorableness! - Subverted in [asdfmovie] Deleted Scene
. "Body slam!"
- From ASDF MovieASDF Movie 2
- Cyriak: Even utterly hopeless zombie apocalypses are better with kittens
. (Warning; gore and disturbing imagery).
- The main cat character from Simon's Cat and also the kitten from the episode Catnap.
- There's Good Kitty in the Arfenhouse games and movies.
- White Kitty from Goodbye Kitty. His rival Black Kitty, however, is a completely different story.
- Ollie & Scoops has many cute cats, but Scoops stands out with how affectionate he is towards Ollie.
- The 2015 student film "The Casebook of Nips & Porkington"
by Melody Wang, has Nips the Cat a cute detective who tries to recover a stolen egg. His sidekick is a middle age pig named "Porkington".
- Catsing Call: All the cats are adorable in their designs and mannerisms, although the black kitten and Osiris' servant are the only ones who are clearly kittens.
- Random kitties go here.
- Bittersweet Candy Bowl, being a comic about anthropomorphic cats (and dogs!) has Molly, Abbey's cheerful younger sister. Fanart of hypothetical offspring is also a fan favorite, and the author herself sometimes gets into it.
- Breaking Cat News is simply made of this trope. Special shout-out goes to Beatrix, the ever enthusiastic polydactyl intern, who shows up and rearranges the whole station. She sets up the social media accounts, and she's "got a system!"
- Mike is killed and one of their own is missing. What will make the College Roomies from Hell!!!'s day better? This.
- Commander Kitty has Fluffy, an adorable Cloud Cuckoolander kitten. Just
look
at
her
go
.
- Brittany from Domain Tnemrot. Also, her owner.
- Nastily subverted in Drowtales. Kel'Noz gives little Ariel a kitten - which then gets sick while Ariel is locked in a room for a week with it, and Ariel's abusive older sister Syphile, disgusted, kills the kitten in front of her.
- Dolly in +EV.
- Marshmallow Cat, from Girly, is genetically modified to be the world's most perfect cat. She gets pregnant with the scary black cat and has tons of ridiculously cute kittens.
- Krosp
from Girl Genius isn't cute exactly, but he's very good for Agatha.
- Gronk A Monsters Story has Kitty, a little white kitten. Gronk's first instinct to seeing him is to chase him down and hug him.
- Gus, in Loserz. Jodie is reduced to nigh incomprehensibility in the face of his sheer adorableness
.
- The Order of the Stick: Mr. Scruffy. In a stick figure comic, his presence never fails to add a sense of levity to the scene. Even when he's disemboweling minor human characters. (A joke about a notorious quirk in the Dungeons & Dragons game rules.)
- When the mad scientist of Narbonic has her superintelligent gerbils begin their inevitable rebellion against their creator, she sends in a cute kitten named Sir Pounce. The gerbils' human intelligence causes them to coo and aww over the kitten even as he eats them one by one. After his death, Sir Pounce is spotted in Hell.
"You can't sentence Sir Pounce to eternal torment!"
"It was an evil kitten. We can't give leniency for cuteness." - Nip and Tuck: While they are inconvenient in many ways, they are easier to wake up to than a DJ.
- Papi Nyang is all about cats and that gives us Socks, the newborn who is adorable once they start walking and talking.
- Penny Arcade:
- "And every twenty minutes, a kitten comes out!
", though that turned out to be too much of a cute thing
.
- More recently, the comic pondered the unintended consequences of sending a kitten to college. The other students would never accept him. He would always be an outcast.
- "And every twenty minutes, a kitten comes out!
- Pixie and Brutus: Pixie is designed to be as cute as possible, with big eyes and an innocent demeanor. While Brutus doesn't go into full Cuteness Proximity, he has a soft spot for her.
- Problem Sleuth:
- Pose with a little white cat because
SHIT JUST GOT CUTE.
- Another MSPA example, this time actually in canon and from Homestuck: Vodka "Mutie" Mutini
◊/Dr. Meowgon Spengler
- Pose with a little white cat because
- The Evil from Sluggy Freelance alternate between this and Cats Are Mean. Give them their daily milk, and they're the cutest little things around
. Don't give them their milk, and they'll shred you into tiny little gory pieces.
- Cat Nine of course, which can turn into other animals or cat girl too.
- A Softer World: "Calm down, guys. We can ride this out. Just convert all our stock to kittens for now. They just get fluffier and fluffier."
- Another strip plays with the idea of "Pride and Prejudice and Kittens. No. Kittens and Kittens and even more Kittens, oh my goodness, by Jane Austen."
- Squid Row: A good reason to take in a cat: it's really a kitten!
- In Sticky Dilly Buns, the irascible Ruby acquires a kitten whose cuteness (arguably mostly an Informed Attribute) serves to relieve her Hair-Trigger Temper; see, for example, the scene where he's introduced to Amber (who names him "Minow").
For a Bilingual Bonus, French-Canadian cats do not "meow" or "miouw". They minow. Hence the name.
- Wapsi Square: Selenium, the kitten that acquires Amanda.
- The kids in We Are The Wyrecats like to keep cats around their workspace. K.A.'s father isn't too keen on this, but the team loves them.
- Wooden Rose: Oh, aren't they darling?
- As usual, xkcd says it all
.
- In Rhapsodies Goblin, Lysistrata's store cat, exploits
this
for
all
it's
worth.
- The Gamercat manages to do this even though most of the main cast is made of cats: Pixel (a female cat) finds Glitch the kitten adorable, and in a story arc Gamercat himself tries to use Glitch's cuteness to pick up girls.
- In Stand Still, Stay Silent, the main cast eventually take in a kitten. At some point, the animal causes such a bad case of Cuteness Proximity in most of the team that they don't notice Lalli has woken up from his two day long Deep Sleep until the one person who noticed points it out.
- "Every time you masturbate, God kills a kitten!"
- The Hey! Answerman column on Anime News Network has a "Flake of the Week" section where Answerman responds to a stupid e-mail sent to him with a cute baby animal picture. This used to be of kittens only, but now is more varied.
- Probably one of the reasons LOLCats is so popular. We haz our own bible
nao.
- Subverted by the fan encyclopedic wiki of Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000, Lexicanum — the mentions of the species of cats
existing in Warhammer 40,000 in its article is promptly followed up with the mentions of a pet cat of an astropath, who was apparently killed by the Exterminatus of the planet it was on. Grimdark.
- Several pictures on Cute Overload
are this. To say nothing of kitten-only websites such as The Daily Kitten
, The
Daily Kitten
, Kittenwar
, and Itty Bitty Kitty Committee
.
- Tuck was pretty much the only one in his family not to be smitten by Cheddar Underfoot, mainly because cats are yet one more thing the he's allergic to. Unfortunately for him, given just was being done to the kitten when Brian saved its life in the first place, there wasn't any way that the cat was going to go.
- SCP Foundation:
- The pufferkittens
, classified as Euclid owing to their ability to generate enough d'awww to disrupt normal staff activities.
- Josie the Half-Cat
is a cat without her back half. Other than that, she is a normal kitty, and she is free to roam around the facility.
- Subverted by SCP-2559-J
which is a gigantic oncoming mass of kittens who crushed a researcher and her assistants when they tried to open a portal to an alternate Nazi universe, but instead ripped open another dimension known as the "Plane of Infinite Kittens" which is apparently where all kittens come from. The mass of kittens, or kitten pile as it's commonly called, are proven to be invulnerable to conventional weapons and can exist without harm from extreme temperatures and pressures.
- The pufferkittens
- Ume: Neko Moe Assassin
is a series of videos of a little kitten doing what he does best, which is... well, being cute. Being very very cute.
- On /b/, every Saturday is "Caturday" and there will be at least one thread involving pictures of cats. In fact, cats serve as /b/'s Morality Pets. They absolutely hate those who abuse kittens, as seen by their efforts to bring Kenny Glenn and Cheyenne Cherry, who did just that For the Evulz, to justice.
- Here are another forty cats that think they are hats
.
- Cute Boys With Cats
and Cute Girls With Cats
.
- There's even Punx With Kittens!
- Pusheen the Cat is a pastel-colored series of Iyashikei webcomics, web videos and other paraphernalia about the life of titular chubby Pusheen and her family and Ridiculously Cute Critter friends.
- Whateley Universe: in the Timeless stories, James has a pet kitten even though you're not supposed to bring pets to Superhero School Whateley Academy. It's so cute that even Eldritch Abomination Carmilla finds it adorable.
Carmilla: "No hurting the cute kitty!"
- "Foster Dad John"
takes in cats that are about to have their litters and raises them and their kittens in front of a live-streaming webcam for all the world to see, before adopting them out after they are old enough to be neutered.
- In Canada, the Langley Animal Protection Society runs a similar livestream known simply as TinyKittens.com
. You will never get anything done again.
- The LAL Cat Archive
may have been the oldest known online repository of cat pictures, being active in 1995.
- YouTube:
- "He's the meanest little kitty so we named him Sparta."
- Also Loki!
- He's a cat (meow) flushing the toilet!
- Cat! I'm a kitty cat! And I dance dance dance! And I dance, dance, dance!
- We've heard of cats perched on shoulders, but we've never heard of cats perched on heads. This cat is so comfortable it doesn't mind using his owner's head as a blanket while she rinses and flosses her teeth. He's a cat AND a hat!
- New Earthenware Pot Kittens
coming to a market near you!
- "He's the meanest little kitty so we named him Sparta."
- The Angry Video Game Nerd:
- He has an adorable "death kitty" named Boo that he unleashes on some of the games he's reviewed.
- He also has another cat, Yeti, who he playfully sicced on Doug Walker before they filmed their final battle.
(at 2:39) "NO, NOT THE KITTEN!"
- Buzzfeed's Dear Kitten
videos, narrated by an adult cat telling the new kitten about life around the house. It is both funny and sweet, especially the adult cat's begrudging love for the kitten (especially in the sequels):
Adult Cat: Welcome to the household... you'll do just fine. - For Cartoon Network's Fridays block from 2003-2007, they would have a short skit called "Whiskers, the Kitten Who Can Name Fruit" which was exactly what it says on the tin. Here's a collection
of all the fruits said by the kitten. And here's an even longer collection
- And then there is the "Surprised Kitty"
that has actually been featured in the French Yahoo page because it is so cute it would put you in a good mood for the day.
- The self-explanatory Youtube video "Adorable Kitty"
. WARNING! The following video contains lethal levels of cuteness and should be watched with extreme caution!!
- "Little Kittens"
is all over this trope. "These cats are the only thing between me and suicide!"
- Tiny white kitten: "Dis bowl is mine! No hooman, this is MY food."
Someone needs to share with the other kitties...
- Ninja cat comes closer while not moving
.
- Cracked finds kittens can offset some of the evil
of the Third Reich.
- So here's a cute kitten instead!
- He's not technically a kitten, but he's still Maru!
- If Maru doesn't qualify, his new roommate Hana
definitely does.
- If Maru doesn't qualify, his new roommate Hana
- Prepare to have your mind holes blown by SKILLCAT
and GONGCAT
- Brad Jones of The Cinema Snob has several cats, who will on occasion serve as a Funny Background Event in his v-logs and reviews, most notably during Brad Tries.... Even Brad Jones' Demo Reel had a shot of Lloyd.
- YouTube personality Tobuscus has a video clip series called "Cute Win Fail". Needless to say, the "Cute" segment has a disproportionately high number of cats doing absurdly cute things, with babies and dogs as the other favorites.
- Nyan
Cat
- While he's better known for his ARMA videos, Dslyecxi from Shack Tactical has a pet cat named Eby. One of his non-ARMA videos told the tale of how he adopted Eby
which is a liberal dose of this trope as the recovered Eby races all around the house, not in the least bit slowed by his missing foreleg nor showing any sign of just how close to death he had come.
- Since then, Eby has been the subject of two other videos on his channel. One was really just an update on how he was doing by showing him eating various foods Dslyecxi was feeding him
(namely lettuce and a pretzel) while the second showed that he did not lack the evil side of his feline nature as he attempts to sabotage his human's attempts to fly a Harrier
.
- Since then, Eby has been the subject of two other videos on his channel. One was really just an update on how he was doing by showing him eating various foods Dslyecxi was feeding him
- corn cat!
- Neko no kimochi!
- Cole and Marmalade
, a pair of youtube-famous cat brothers. While they're fully-grown cats now, there are some videos on their channel from when they were kittens.
- The Six Cats Parade has some videos with cute kittens
when Rico, Billy, Manchinha, Pitty and Jessica were kittens and the videos of black kittens playing and fighting.
- "Basket Cat" Shironeko
, a Turkish van cat with a perpetual relaxed expression. His owner's youtube channel features videos of Shiro and his family relaxing and being one with nature.
- Tamara Chambers has two cats, Ike and Wendy, that always appear in Tamara's Never Seen. She loves them a lot.
- A Russian Youtuber Robin Seplut
feeds stray cats in his spare time. His videos feature a lot of different cats and kittens, from cute to heartbreakingly injured, yet he tries to help them as much as he could, up to renting an apartment as a temporary foster house that helped a number of young kittens and some adult cats to find their new owners. One of the kittens ended up as his own pet, yet even though eventually she grew up into a cute adult cat, this is somewhat compensated by her seemingly endless aggressive energy and her tendency to grapple just about with everything.
- Mitchiri Neko Marching Band
features a whole parade of kittens! There's also an odd one out in each group to up the cuteness factor, and the song they play for you is just so darn catchy.
- Outside Xbox: "7 Stupidest Ways Humanity Got Destroyed
" starts with Ellen saying "There's never a good way for humanity to be wiped out, unless it's some kind of kitten supernova."
- The Slow Mo Guys presents Slow Mo Kittens
. Gavin also filmed his cat Smee running around
in his yard and as a kitten.
- Boris of Life of Boris-fame adopted one of his babushka's rescue cat's kittens. It is a precious little ball of fluff, named Artyom. Of course, some time has passed and Artyom has grown from a kitten into a young cat, but is no less fluffy or precious.
- Cole and Marmalade, being a cat video-based channel, has plenty of videos featuring the cats as kittens, usually involving them meowing loudly and playing.
- There are several Van Beuren Studios cartoons that featured cute kittens as the protagonists, a trio of which were minor recurring characters in their Rainbow Parade shorts, including the kits in "Rough on Rats", "Merry Kittens", "Rag Dog" and "Scottie Finds A Home". Felix the Cat also counts in his three shorts produced by the studio.
- Mo and Bo of Abby Hatcher are cat-like Fuzzlies. There's also Melvin's pet cat Elvin.
- In Baby Looney Tunes, Sylvester makes the trope.
- The titular character of Battle Kitty is both a badass and a cute kitty.
- Orange Kitten and Periwinkle of Blue's Clues are of the Talking Animal variety.
- Chuck Jones did a very effective series of cartoons where an adorable kitten brings out the protective, loving side of a big tough bulldog.
- Adventure Time runs with this trope in the episode "Box Prince", about a kingdom of kittens living in cardboard boxes.
- The titular character in The Amazing World of Gumball can be cute when he wants to be. "The Origins" shows that when he was age four, he was absolutely adorable.
- Spunky ("Catteries Not Included") and Boots ("Gorilla My Dreams") in Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers.
- Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood:
- Katerina Kittycat, Henrietta Pussycat's daughter. Yes, she's really that sweet.
- Daniel Tiger since he's a cute and friendly young tiger.
- The Archer episode "El Secuestro" has Archer finding out that Cheryl, the ISIS secretary, is secretly a heiress with a pet ocelot... and the notably Jerkass secret agent is instantly smitten with the exotic cat. "Oh my God, you guys! Look at his little spots! And his tufted ears!"
- Flo and Zo from Clifford's Puppy Days.
- Mr. Mumbles from Dan Vs.. Her cuteness is the reason Dan won't get mad at her.
- The Disney shorts "More Kittens", Three Orphan Kittens, "Lend a Paw", and several others. In "Three Orphan Kittens", the very cute kittens manage to wreck a kitchen in a very cute way. In "Lend a Paw" Pluto rescues a cute kitten from drowning in a stream.
- Garfield and Friends (and its TV successors): Capitalizing on the comic strips, Nermal declaring himself as the "world's cutest kitten" is often taken to absurd extremes, frustrating Garfield to no end.
- Elisa's cat Cagney from Gargoyles.
- The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy:
- Inverted in the episode "Anger Mismanagement". The counselor asks Grim Mandy and Skarr to imagine their happy place. Grim's is a cemetery, Skarr's is beating a man erecting a giant Skarr statue, (Mandy's only shows white noise). The counselor then asks them to think of "fuzzy cute kittens". Grim imagines a pet cemetery and Skarr has the kitten raising his statue instead.
- Billy's pink cat, Milkshakes.
- Looney Tunes: In a short Sylvester is an alley cat who gets out of the cold when Elmer takes him in - then finds his position in jeopardy when an alley kitten gets taken in too. "I can't keep you both...hahaha, baby kittens are so cute!"
- In My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic episode "May the Best Pet Win", one of the pets involved is an adorable little "putty tat". She makes her glorious return in "Read it and Weep" as part of a group of large predators trying to maul the hero of the Show Within a Show.
- Pip Ahoy! has Alba, who looks, sounds and behaves the part.
- Spoons and Teensy in the Pound Puppies episode "Hello Kitten".
- The Powerpuff Girls (1998):
- In the episode "Catastrophe", the Powerpuff Girls have to find one of the kittens for a giant monster in order to help him leave Townsville alone.
- There was also "Sweet 'n' Sour", where a group of cute animals, including a cat, started robbing Townsville, using their cuteness. They were so cute that the townspeople hated the girls for trying to stop them.
- Doom Kitty from Ruby Gloom.
- Ruff is the brains side of Hanna-Barbera's do-gooding duo from The Ruff & Reddy Show.
- Sagwa and her siblings in Sagwa, the Chinese Siamese Cat.
- The title character of Sheriff Callie's Wild West.
- Star Trek: Prodigy makes the absolute maximum emotional hay out of establishing that Gwyn Would Not Hurt A Child and the Diviner and Drednok would by making the child in question a tiny Caitian, sold into slavery in the mines of Tars Lamora.
- Strawberry Shortcake has a pink kitten named Custard.
- Subverted in Super Robot Monkey Team Hyper Force Go where the team wipes an invading time-traveling insectoid species from existence, causing an alternate species of "space kittens" that transform into vicious monsters to take their place in the timeline.
- Teen Titans:
- In a first-season episode, a botched practical joke leaves Starfire angry at Beast Boy — who tries to cheer her up by turning into a kitten. It doesn't work the first time, but the second...
- There are metric tons of fanart where BB is in kitten form — and being stroked, petted, or otherwise admired by Raven or Terra. Try to guess the obvious Double Entendre.
- The Tick: When the Tick was trying to masquerade as a villain to track down another villain, he was asked to prove it by, well, eating a kitten. Naturally, he beat all the bad guys and saved the kitten, instead.
- In Thundercats 2011 young Catfolk Wilykat and Kit are cute Cheerful Children, but also experienced Artful Dodgers who very deliberately invoke this trope when searching for marks to pickpocket. When they try to convince The Hero Lion-O to let them tag along with his team of Thundercats, they Cat Smile, Faux Paw and employ kittenish mewling to play on their sympathies.
- This trope + The Woobie = Furrball from Tiny Toon Adventures.
- Tom and Jerry:
- Averted in the cartoon "Triplet Trouble" when Mammy Two Shoes adopted three kittens who turned out to be complete brats that terrorized Tom and later went after Jerry. It was one of the few times Tom and Jerry teamed up against a greater foe.
- "The Unshrinkable Jerry Mouse" has another interesting variation: Jerry protecting a new kitten from the jealous rage of Tom. In other words, a mouse is protecting a kitten from a cat, never mind that kittens eventually turn into cats.
- In Xiaolin Showdown, the cat wearing Catwoman wannabe Katnappe uses genetically altered super-kittens as weapons against the Xiaolin.
- Buurpoes the kitten
◊ from the Dutch children's series Woezel & Pip is a very cute kitten. She's close friends with the titural puppy characters
, and mostly purrs out her sentences and words.
- Wander over Yonder: Little Bits is this, as well as both Cats Are Mean and Cute Is Evil since she uses her cuteness to hypnotize victims by appearing to be innocent, when in fact she's an evil bounty hunter.
- When the (extremely popular) Sheffield branch of Virgin Megastore finally closed, they left a sign in the window reading "Thank you and goodbye. We love you all. P.S. HMV kills kittens for profit."
- There's a Japanese train station which never got any service or tourism — so Tama, a cat, was made station master. The station's now raking in the tourism money, which, according to Stephen Colbert, goes to "repairing the horrific accidents that result from having a cat as station master." She was so popular that the moment she passed away, the company officials and the cat's fans decided to elevate her as a goddess during her funeral
.
- This is closely related to the idea of killing/eating kittens as a definite sign of evilness, as in this rather elaborate insult hurled at a Canadian politician
.
- Life subverts itself in that even adorable little kittens are proficient killers and learn to hunt as early as three or four weeks of age. It's creepy-cute to see a kitten carrying around a (nearly) dead mouse that looks to be nearly the size of its wee head.
- Islam in general tend to consider cats as clean and playful animals, and Prophet Muhammad, a Kindhearted Cat Lover, took care of cats and kittens with respect. Also, as they are ritually clean in addition to adorable and playful factor, they are allowed to keep as pets and enter mosques and homes.
- Some studies have indicated that having a cat "may" have limited beneficial effects on the health and well-being of people, especially older adults. Also, medical researchers have demonstrated that stroking a purring cat can lower human blood pressure and pulse rate, as well as increase feelings of peace and well-being. That said, pregnant women are advised to not handle cat litter, since it contains germs that, while harmless to adults, can pose a real danger to the fetus.
- Just search for most popular YouTube videos for "Pets And Animals" and see how many you get featuring cats.
- Likewise, search for "kitten cam" on YouTube. Tiny Kittens HQ, Kitten Academy, Kitten Cuddle Room, Alley to Attic, The Critter Room, Frank Einstein's... Many are the offspring of feral mamas who are spayed after giving birth and then everybody is put up for adoption. (Partly thanks to environmental experiments at Tiny Kittens HQ, we now know that many adult feral cats can be socialized and adopted like any other.)
- Taylor Swift has designed several greeting cards featuring kittens. She's on record as saying "I feel like kitten cards make everything better, pretty much." Here.
And of course she then went and adopted
one (two, now).
- Cat cafés are cafés featuring a number of cats that can be interacted with by customers. They started in Korea in about 1997, are rather popular in Japan, and have spread to the U.S., Canada and Australia. The cats frequently come from a shelter and can be adopted.
- In the spring of 2018, filmmaker Paris Zarcilla discovered an unknown cat with four newborn kittens
under his bed. She had apparently slipped through his open back door. Overwhelmed with protective emotions, Zarcilla decided he was now a "cat dad" and gave himself completely to their care. The crowning moment was taking the little mother to the vet and discovering that she had no chip, so he was able to keep the whole family
.
This is too much. I'm approaching nirvana. I legitimately suffer from anxiety attacks and depression and my capacity to deal with it recently has been waning. The Cat Gods have smiled upon me with benevolence and turned the monsters under my bed into kittens. - Some NYC bodegas keep cats to control rodents, and those cats are popular amongst locals who shop at the stores. For many, seeing a cat in a bodega brightens their day.note In fact, when someone complained about a bodega cat on yelp, New Yorkers were outraged and quickly rushed to the cats' defense.
- Managed colonies of feral cats are used in some cities to get rid of rats and vermin naturally. Because the cats are spayed and neutered
, they cannot breed out of control.