Netflix’s Exploding Kittens Is Unsurprising Yet Bonkers Fun

Nowadays, you can turn almost anything (an article, a podcast, or a board game) into a movie or TV show if you have the budget and the right people to make it happen, even a silly card game that found overwhelming support on Kickstarter nearly a decade ago. And why not, when you have Netflix to finance the whole production? Especially if they can bring in accomplished talents like Greg Daniels and Mike Judge (the duo behind the classic King of the Hill animated series) as executive producers alongside the game’s founder Matthew Inman. With such a prestigious team, Exploding Kittens is here to reign chaos on the screen, too, as it follows the capricious cat forms of God and Beelzebub after they cross paths with an ordinary and dysfunctional American family, the Higginses.

God (with the perfectly enunciated Welsh accent of Tom Ellis) has been acting quite irresponsibly lately—accidentally burning down the west end of Heaven and killing all their unicorns—so the board of Heaven decides he needs rehabilitation. They send him down to Earth to answer the Higginses’ prayer to save their family. And though he can keep most of his otherworldly powers, he’ll have to connect with the humans as a talking house cat—or, as he prefers to call himself, Godcat. Meanwhile, in Hell, Satan’s bubbly daughter Beelzebub (Sasheer Zamata) isn’t doing so well at her job either. Her punishments for mankind are “too nice” (laggy internet, horseradish-flavored Pepsi, etc.), so the board of directors chooses to send her up also as a cat (Devilcat)—stealing the idea from their rival—to work on her “evil game.”

Naturally, the Higginses are a bunch of weirdos: the Dad, Marv Higgins (Mark Proksch), is an insufferable nerd, the Mom, Abbie (Suzy Nakamura), is an ex-Navy Seal obsessed with weapons and violence, their daughter Greta (Ally Maki) is a science/medical freak, and their son Travis (Kenny Yates) is a gamer chasing online fame after he went viral as a little kid for the wrong reason. So Godcat certainly has his work cut out for him in trying to make these loons bond and reignite their love for each other while also dealing with his nemesis.

Given this bonkers premise and its potential, you’d expect Exploding Kittens to go wild with all sorts of crazy ideas, sick jokes, and unexpected gags. And to some degree, the series does just that. Similarly to genre favorites like The Simpsons or Family Guy, Inman and Shane Kosakowki’s show runs a lot of random subplots, giving each of these characters something ridiculous to do (individually or in pairs) in almost every episode. It’s a formula that worked well in animated comedies over the years, but that’s exactly why it gets old too soon. 

Once the freshness of the concept wears off after the first few episodes, the lack of a coherent central plot becomes palpable. Don’t get me wrong, the writers pack in plenty of quick-witted jokes with the right amount of pop culture references—needling stars like Timothee Chalamet or Steven Spielberg—alongside some creative and hilarious cat-based jests. Story and character-wise, however, Exploding Kittens doesn’t deliver anything out of the ordinary. It’s watchable and decent enough but never really manages to stand out in a major way.