Pusheen in Real Life

June 17, 2016 8:03 AM

Julien Therrien has a cat that looks like Pusheen (an internet cartoon cat who has created a merchandise empire). He took advantage of this, and recreated several of Pusheen's digital 'stickers' with adorable and hilarious results. (This page is in French, but is easy to get the gist of) Previous Pusheen
posted by Fig (29 comments total)

i am always happy to see cats doing silly things, or cute things, or even just napping idly and not caring at all about humanity, but this cat looks nothing like pusheen and i feel sad and betrayed.
posted by poffin boffin at 8:19 AM on June 17, 2016 [55 favorites]

Psst dude your cat doesn't really look like Pusheen. But good work anyway.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 8:19 AM on June 17, 2016 [11 favorites]

Came in to see cat who looks like Pusheen. Did not see cat who looks like Pusheen.

Am not happy.
posted by cooker girl at 8:24 AM on June 17, 2016 [16 favorites]

Distinct and notable lack of Pusheenosity.

(lights torch)

(sharpens pitchfork)
posted by jscalzi at 8:24 AM on June 17, 2016 [14 favorites]

Tough crowd!

Edit: Dude poses cat with little-to-no-resemblance to Internet Star Cat Pusheen in Pusheen poses, is still cute in own way

NO.
posted by Fig at 8:27 AM on June 17, 2016 [6 favorites]

Doesn't look like Pusheen.

Is still kitty.

I has a happy.
posted by SansPoint at 8:40 AM on June 17, 2016 [7 favorites]

I mean really, no cat is going to look like Pusheen, because Pusheen is stylized. Also flattened. Do not attempt to stylize or flatten your actually-existing cat.
posted by Frowner at 8:44 AM on June 17, 2016 [22 favorites]

3/4 stars not pusheen but is cute cat beast
posted by sandettie light vessel automatic at 9:12 AM on June 17, 2016 [1 favorite]

L'ennui for the win.
posted by davidmsc at 9:12 AM on June 17, 2016 [2 favorites]

The fact that the titles are in French give it a certain je ne sais quois.
posted by quaking fajita at 9:18 AM on June 17, 2016 [3 favorites]

Évidemment, c'est le Pusheen de Schrödinger.
posted by mondo dentro at 9:19 AM on June 17, 2016 [4 favorites]

Maybe this is what Pusheen looks like in 3 dimensions. The Pusheen you know is just the shape created by a 3 dimensional cut moving through a 2 dimensional surface. Some quick cat-calculus should be able to test how closely this cat maps to Pusheen in a 2 dimensional shift. I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of this, which this comment box is too narrow to contain.
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:20 AM on June 17, 2016 [7 favorites]

Oh c'mon, Number 10 is amazing. The look of cat apathy in that picture is so winning.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 9:26 AM on June 17, 2016

I don't know that a real cat exists that looks like Pusheen. So therefore, this was still pretty good, from a cat doing things perspective, so I liked it.
posted by codacorolla at 9:30 AM on June 17, 2016

Other people like comic books or video games or Star Wars or Game of Thrones but I had literally never personally experienced fandom until I encountered Pusheen. I am a 35 year old woman and I stopped using Whatsapp and text messaging and now use Facebook Messenger almost exclusively, because it has Pusheen stickers. I send my boyfriend anywhere from 10-50 Pusheen stickers every day as part of our conversation. At least once a day I inform him that I have recently taken a photograph of myself and then I send him a sticker of Pusheen grocery shopping, eating her lunch or napping. When our real-life actual cat goes outside to lay in the sun and nibble grass I send him the Pusheen sticker of her companion cat buried neck-high in a bowl of salad greens chewing happily. When something frustrating happens I send him the sticker of Pusheen laying on the ground grimly eating a cookie. When I have gossip, I send him the sticker of Pusheen eating popcorn. Pusheen eats a lot (and almost never eats anything but carbs) so you have to make some allowances for what is actually being depicted in each photo, but truly, haven't we all felt like [portly cat wiggling next to just-out-of-reach cupcake] sometimes?

I have been sending my boyfriend these stickers for months and at Christmas he upped the ante by presenting me with a gigantic (or, let's be honest, life-sized) plush Pusheen doll and when I opened it I screamed like I had won the lottery. (Which I basically have -- I know many people who would have noped right out there somewhere around the one-thousandth meaning-laden Pusheen sticker but he is here and he is [Pusheen and her friend cheersing with glasses of milk] devoted to me.)

This is all basically to say that no matter what your Pusheen homage or fan art, I am 100% there for you but Jesus Shitting Christ, this cat does not look like Pusheen. Pusheen is not supposed to be live action. Pusheen's entire charm is that her dimensions could literally not occur in real life. For the first time since discovering -- nay, embracing -- Pusheen I have encountered a bridge too far and I am out.

Is this how people felt when The Phantom Menace came out?
posted by kate blank at 9:33 AM on June 17, 2016 [49 favorites]

Is this how people felt when The Phantom Menace came out?

dear god I hope so
posted by BitterOldPunk at 9:39 AM on June 17, 2016 [4 favorites]

Firstly: Not really. Imagine they come out with a Pusheen movie but it's Beverly Hills Chihuahua-style live action with Pusheen played by Lorenzo Music (RIP). That's how people felt when The Phantom Menace came out.

Secondly: A real life Pusheen is possible. I want to believe.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 9:41 AM on June 17, 2016 [5 favorites]

kate blank, you have saved me from my Not Pusheen disappoint, and I thank you. *purrs*
posted by Space Kitty at 9:55 AM on June 17, 2016 [2 favorites]

I send my boyfriend anywhere from 10-50 Pusheen stickers every day as part of our conversation.

Are you sure this person is your actual boyfriend and not your imaginary boyfriend who is Jake Gyllenhaal? Just checking.
posted by The Bellman at 10:02 AM on June 17, 2016 [6 favorites]

Considering how much crankier this cat looks compared to Pusheen (pretty much everyone looks cranky next to Pusheen), I can't help constructing a narrative in which she's aware of Pusheen and unimpressed, like "Ugh, do you humans really think cats are that roly-poly and cheerful tout le temps? This is almost as bad as Garfield's hatred of Mondays." Her owner keeps setting her up in all these Pusheeny situations, and she grows increasingly airplane-eared and do-not-want, but it's worth it in the end because she gets to eat an entire slice of pizza.
posted by Metroid Baby at 10:38 AM on June 17, 2016 [4 favorites]

Are you sure this person is your actual boyfriend and not your imaginary boyfriend who is Jake Gyllenhaal? Just checking.

that's a terrible thing to say. jake is my imaginary boyfriend. rude
posted by billiebee at 10:54 AM on June 17, 2016 [2 favorites]

I just want to the kitty to lose a few pounds.
posted by Atreides at 11:04 AM on June 17, 2016

For those of you disappointed that the gray cat in the photos isn't as happy-looking as Pusheen, here is a recent video of a very happy, very pregnant cat who has just discovered her abiding love of rolling around in a sink with her pink-toed paws in the air.

(Just in case somebody really falls in love - she's currently fostered near Vancouver, but she has some potentially expensive medical stuff going on. Not my cat, I just think she's lovely.)

Note that the title of the page is full of lies; she's not feral anymore (there's a long discussion somewhere proving that she was, in fact, feral at first), she's not pregnant anymore, and she's only blind in one eye.

Oh, and here are 11 kittens living in a room together until next week.

Thanks, Tinykittens.
posted by amtho at 11:55 AM on June 17, 2016 [2 favorites]

Look, the only cats in the world other than Pusheen who ever look happy are the Neko Atsume cats and they actually get slightly annoying after a while so there you have it.
posted by holborne at 12:13 PM on June 17, 2016 [1 favorite]

You may enjoy Simon's cat.
posted by BWA at 12:22 PM on June 17, 2016 [1 favorite]

(Just in case somebody really falls in love - she's currently fostered near Vancouver, but she has some potentially expensive medical stuff going on. Not my cat, I just think she's lovely.)

Skye is an absolute darling, but has been diagnosed with congestive heart failure (specifically dilated cardiomyopathy) and the last prognosis I heard was measured in months, not years. Shelly is working hard to try to find a special home for her that will provide her with the quality-of-life care she will require.

The litter of 11 is Skye's own four plus kittens from two other feral moms who have since been spayed; one has (IIRC) returned to the feral colony, the other is currently in a Honeymoon Suite with her male formerly-feral paramour while both wait for the right home. Their litters were introduced gradually to Skye, who welcomed all comers and distributed milk and baffs liberally. Watch Farrah (Skye's calico mini-me) in particular -- she's a ham.
posted by delfin at 2:04 PM on June 17, 2016

use Facebook Messenger almost exclusively, because it has Pusheen stickers

It suddenly occurred to me that (a) I really want Pusheen IM stickers, and (b) LINE inexplicably does not have them. Its a cute cat doing things! How much more LINE-stickery can you get? Someone needs to fix this.
posted by thefoxgod at 4:38 PM on June 17, 2016

Are you sure this person is your actual boyfriend and not your imaginary boyfriend who is Jake Gyllenhaal? Just checking.

He is real and he feels [portly cat laying inside pizza box devotedly death-gripping a piece of pizza] about me.
posted by kate blank at 4:47 PM on June 17, 2016 [10 favorites]

I liked this. Good post!
posted by Too-Ticky at 1:40 AM on July 8, 2016 [1 favorite]