CBR Captain Action Cat: The Timestream CATastrophe

What do you get when you throw a Golden Age, a Silver Age and a Modern Age Action Cat into the mix?

A Timestream CAT-astrophe! Aw, Yeah!!

Aw Yeah, Comics!!

Patrick the Wolf Boy / New readers review
Tiny Titans - Tiny Titans/Little Archie / Superman Family Adventures / DC Super-Pets
Itty Bitty Hellboy / Aw Yeah Comics!
Li'l Dynamites
Revival Vol. 3: A Faraway Place
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Comic title: Captain Action Cat: The Timestream CATastrophe
Written by Franco Aureliani, Art Baltazar & Chris Smits
Drawn by Art Baltazar

Published by Dynamite Entertainment/Dark Horse Comics/Aw Yeah Comics!
From 2014
Lineup Aw Yeah Comics! series/Comics' Greatest World universe
Format: Standalone crossover miniseries Captain Action Cat: The Timestream CATastrophe issues #1-4.

Aw Yeah, Crossover time!!

The Timestream CATastrophe is an epic crossover miniseries from EISNER and HARVEY award winning creators Art Baltazar and Franco.

Following a reprint of their indie all-age series Aw Yeah Comics! through Dark Horse Comics, the duo hoped onto Dynamite Entertainment to propose new "Tiny" or "Itty Bitty" all-age versions of several of their proprieties.

The following project for the same publishers would be a crazy crossover between their own Aw Yeah Comics! characters Action Cat and Adventure Bug, several guest Dark Horse Comics characters and Captain Action, through Dynamite Publishing.

What you might ask now, is what exactly Captain Action?

Originally Captain Action was an action figure created in 1966 for the comic book/geek crowd created by Ideal Toy Corp, a sort of answer to Hasbro's own line of toys. The figurine was a fairly generic male action hero that could turn into Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, Captain America, Aquaman, The Phantom, The Lone Ranger, Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, etc. through several additional accessories. It would fell into obscurity as decades passed by, but it was finally revived in 1998 with new toy company Playing Mantis. Since 2005 they've been trying to push it back into the forefront through new waves of merchandises, toys, comics and more!

For this occasion, new characters were created by Art Baltazar and Franco based around this vintage classic propriety: Captain Action Cat, and Dr. Evil Cat!

True story!

It all began when our heroes Action Cat and Adventure Bug were facing Evil Cat! Evil Cat decided to enlist the help of the ultimate evil, the biggest bad guy he could find out there in the timestream. Using a special device he was able to capture Doctor Evil Cat back in the Silver Age!

Dr. Evil Cat didn't came alone, along the way he cam with another hero from the past long forgotten... Captain Action Cat and his pal Khem!

But along the way something went wrong, and the timestream device wrecks havoc through the timestream, losing Captain Action Cat and Dr. Evil Cat.. in the Modern Age of Dark Horse Comics! They are forced to team up with the mysterious "X" and Ghost to put a stop to the machine!

And if that wasn't enough, that's when our Modern Age, Silver Age and Aw Yeah Age collide with.. a Golden Age Action Cat frozen in ice!

They jump around from one dimension across another, to savage jungles ruled by beautiful savages! Picking up other passengers along the way, mashing alternate realities and time together!

Oh, and they all end up transformed into cats!

Soon our heroes find themselves with a timestream Cat-astrophe on their paws!

Also guest starring the actual Captain Action, as well as Dark Horse's Captain Midnight! The Occultist! Sky-Man! And the Phantom Lemur!?!

Cats everywhere! Superheroes turned into cats! And what's Lady Action doing all this time?!

The Timestream CATastrophe is one epic crossover storyline in the making!

It's really fun getting to see all these character redesigned for all-ages, before and after being turned into cats!

It's a really fun book!

Captain Action Cat wasn't the main character, as you'd expect from the title. But he's a nice addition to Baltazar & Franco's universe.

It's great to see these now-established authors given a chance to play with all these characters in one epic comic! A fun story bringing together their own Action Cat characters, Captain Action as a cat and the heroes of Dark Horse Comics!

Captain Action Cat: The Timestream CATastrophe was a really fun read, bringing together the nostalgic Golden Age, the silly Silver Age and the too-serious-for-its-own-good Modern Age, through the lens of Art Baltazar and Franco's unique Aw Yeah Comics!

Compared to their previous titles, this one offered one single continuous ongoing story.

The issues also contained a couple of companion back-up feature giving some spotlight back to Captain Action Cat and his world. Scoot McMahon even did a guest tale.

There's also a few cute pinups done by Franco.

Overall, Captain Action Cat: The Timestream CATastrophe is great!

This was a really funny and approachable all-age comic both children and adult can enjoy!

Even if you're not familiar with Captain Action (like I myself), you can easily enjoy this comic. They made it fairly simple to understand, the easiest way is to just consider it the Silver Age incarnation of Action Cat. But if you're more familiar with the characters you will notice a lot more all the various obscure nods and references they do - like they did with Tiny Titans.

Funny note, Dynamite tried really hard pushing their new Doodle Jump comics in these four issues, one of the few all-age titles they are currently releasing (including previews, pages and cover art!).

I give it:

2.5 / 3 Snoopies!