Adventures in Advent: Advent 2024, Day 12

Advent doesn't have to just be for lovers of Christmas. In fact, it doesn't even have to be for people. There's dozens of Advent calendars out there for people's pets! Obviously, the joy and excitement is for the owner. However, there's something to be said about catering to our four legged friends. According to a 2023 report, the pet industry generates over $137 billion in the United States alone. It's expected to triple in less than a decade!

To be fair to both the cat lovers and dog devotees, I'm looking at 2 pet Advents. 

First is for the pups. Smartbones is a smaller scale pet treat company that specializes in 'healthy alternatives to rawhide.' In their calendar, doggies will receive products made from chicken and pork, including chews made of bacon and cheese and vegetables. 

Have a pup over 50lbs? Don't worry! Smartbones has a calendar filled with appropriate size treats for all sizes of canines. 

Felines can also enjoy treats with their Advent calendars. But I didn't want to be repetitive. Instead, let's look at enrichment. Having owned a cat my entire life, I know that they get bored really easily. Ever had a kitty knock something over for no good reason? It's because they are craving excitement and interaction. Many companies know this and offer a variety of Advents that feature 24 different cat toys that focus on different textures and assorted activation of the senses. There's toys with feathers, bells, crinkly materials and scratcher material like sisal and hemp rope. 

However, with each cat toy Advent, there seems to be one 'toy' that's solely for the benefit of the cat parents: the bow-tie with adjustable strap. I don't know about you but most of my cats would rather been dunked in Alpo and have to spend the night with a pack of Chihuahuas than have to wear clothes. Much less a necktie. But Lord knows, my wife and I just swoon over the sight of our cat babies in human style clothing.

Affordable, fun and festive. Next year, think about including your favorite pet in the Advent adventure.

Joker's Asylum II: Mad Hatter

This tragic tale of the origin of the Mad Hatter is just as deranged as the madman telling it. The story was quite good- though last year I read another version of the Mad Hatter's origin in the pages of Batman: Arkham City that I thought was just perfect. This one is good, but it's not instant classic material.

   The same cannot be said of the art. Bill Sienkiewicz draws the main layout. But for some reason, parts of the artwork is overlapped with doodles by the great Keith Giffen. It looks like someone is scrapbooking for the insane or something here.

   If this sort of layout had appeared in a Justice League Europe issue or a volume of Ambush Bug (and I'm pretty sure it has), then I would say it's great and necessary for the work in question. But in this edition of Joker's Asylum, well it's a hot mess. I hate that DC didn't do further volumes of this series but if this issue was the only sample offered to the masses for review, I can see why further minis and one-shots were never greenlit.

   This series can do better.

   Not Worth Consuming

   Rating: 4 out of 10 stars.