Nine years ago, an unheralded animation tottered its way onto YouTube’s Cartoon Hangover channel. The brainchild of writer and storyboard artist Natasha Allegri, Bee and PuppyCat’s off-the-wall take on reality and droll humor was a sleeper hit, slowly building a fandom of its own that was so enchanted with the premise that they funded the most successful animation-related Kickstarter in the history of the platform to fund the first season.

Fast-forward to 2022, and Netflix has picked up the show, with sixteen episodes of a new(ish) series dropping last week and sending fans into paroxysms of ecstasy. So, if you’re new to the wild and wayward universe of Bee and her long-suffering… whatever-it-is… what should you expect? We have you covered.

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Bee and PuppyCat: The Plot

     Netflix

It’s easy to see how Bee and PuppyCat appeals in the fraught and straitened circumstances of the present day. Bee is a rudderless twenty-something who is trapped in a cycle of minimum-wage jobs and struggles to make the monthly rent. One day, her savior falls from the sky, in the shape of an alien, half-cat, half-dog creature, who she befriends.

In return for her companionship, PuppyCat arranges for Bee to be transported to another dimension where she sees TempBot, a massive, sentient television screen with the power to assign the weird and wonderful jobs that allow her to pay the bills.

With TempBot acting as a cosmic plot generator, the adventures of Bee and PuppyCat can literally range across time and space. Throw in a continuing mystery over the backstory of PuppyCat and a will they, won’t they relationship between Bee and her chef friend Deckard, and the makings of a hit arise. Almost three-quarters of a million dollars were raised on Kickstarter in 2013 to transform what was then a brief YouTube video into a full series of ten six-minute episodes.

A second season, subtitled Lazy in Space, was leaked online in 2020. Netflix’s soft reboot truncates the first season into three specially-produced episodes, with Lazy in Space forming the rest of the season’s content.

Bee and PuppyCat: The Cast

Voicing the part of Bee is Allyn Rachel. With few TV and film roles to her credit before Bee and PuppyCat, Rachel has since appeared in minor supporting roles in films such as Kong: Skull Island and the 2018 Mark Wahlberg vehicle Instant Family. Her television work has been more varied, including a recurring role opposite Doctor Who star Karen Gillan in the short-lived ABC sitcom Selfie and appearances opposite Kristen Bell in The Good Place.

Her co-star – if “co-star” is the right term – is a Vocaloid named Oliver. Using a software program for voice work is all but de rigueur on high-volume YouTube and TikTok channels these days but a little less usual for a TV series. The gambit works, though, as Oliver’s tones, suitably edited, make for an otherworldly-sounding PuppyCat – the cat (maybe) who has a “dog smell.”

The part of Deckard, meanwhile, is voiced by Kent Osborne, whose animated credits include Kung Fu Panda and Monsters vs. Aliens, and who has written for other animated projects such as SpongeBob SquarePants, Phineas and Ferb, and the Cartoon Network’s The Amazing World of Gumball.

And with a variety of big-name voice actors offering their services over the years, including Star Trek: The Next Generation’s Marina Sirtis, King of the Hill’s Stephen Root, Looney Tunes voice artist Eric Bauza, Donna Jay Fulks of the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, and the inestimable creator of The Room Tommy Wiseau, Bee and PuppyCat’s esteem and cred could hardly be higher.

Release & Reviews

Bee and PuppyCat: Lazy in Space is now on Netflix, and the reviews have been equal parts gushing and enthusiastic. “Like a warm hug from a long-lost friend,” declared The Verge, while “nonchalant, whimsical, and comfortably relatable” was GameRant’s verdict. It’s not merely the combination of cutesy visuals and reassuring plotlines that does the trick for viewers, but the exacting nature of the work, spearheaded by Japanese studio OLM and American company Frederator Studios, and the attention to detail that has given the show the stamp of quality.

But the big question on fans’ lips is: will there be a third season? With the series only available for streaming since the beginning of the month, Netflix has made no announcement so far. It is doubtless analyzing such metrics as completion rate to gauge audience response. Earlier this year, however, creator Allegri posted short animated clips to social media that were not previously released, suggesting a third season is at least in the offing if not being actively worked on. As always with such things, however, popularity and viewing figures are the only surefire way to guarantee the series’ continuation.