Exploding Kittens – TV show based on the card game is coming to Netflix
Netflix has earned itself a reputation as a platform that’s not afraid to screen the weird, the wonderful and the downright bizarre in its darker corners. But as well as providing an outlet for David Lynch shorts and mind-bending Dutch cartoons, Netflix has commissioned more than a few oddities in its own right. Exploding Kittens, an animated TV series based on a popular card game has to be among the weirdest. But with a cast list that includes the likes of Tom Ellis and Lucy Liu, it’s not something to be dismissed out of hand.
The enduring popularity of card games
When you stop to think about it, the idea of a TV series based on a card game makes a certain amount of sense. The online age has not diminished the popularity of this age-old pastime. In fact, in some cases it has increased it. For example, thousands of people enjoy playing blackjack online for money every day. It’s the world’s most popular casino game, and you can bet that more people play it now thanks to online casinos than did before the internet age. You could say the same about other classic casino card games like poker and baccarat.
At the same time, new card games have appeared on the scene and people lap them up. As well as Exploding Kittens, there are games built on similar principles such as On a Scale of One to T-Rex and You’ve Got Crabs.
Exploding Kittens – the basics
If you’ve not encountered the game before, Exploding Kittens is a light hearted game with rules that definitely don’t demand the same strategic thinking as blackjack or poker. Players take it in turns to draw a card. If you draw an exploding kitten, you are out of the game and the last player left in is the winner. Some of the other cards will help, for example miss a turn, while others, such as draw three more cards, put you at greater risk of disaster.
The Netflix adaptations
The Exploding Kittens TV series will explore the eternal battle between good and evil by envisaging God and Satan transported to earth and inhabiting the bodies of two house cats. As well as Ellis and Liu, the series will feature voice acting from Abraham Lim, Mark Proksch, Ally Maki and Sasheer Zamata.
As part of the build up to the animated series, Netflix has already launched an accompanying mobile game, which is exclusively available to Netflix subscribers. This version has a couple of extra cards in the pack compared with the original game. When it was first released in May, subscribers reported a number of bugs, but most of these seem to have been ironed out with the latest updates and patches.
It’s a fun way to get in the Exploding Kittens frame of mind in advance of the animated TV series, which is expected to arrive on Netflix at the beginning of 2023.