Ricky Gervais’ full impact on TV comedy is hard to measure, but it says something that his later-in-life rise to fame 24 years ago co-creating The Office led directly to the heartfelt cringe of The Paper, which only premiered a week ago. Few projects have those kinds of legs, but there will certainly be plenty of legs on display in the Brit comedian’s newest Netflix creation, which is not at all what I was expecting.
Coming to streaming at some point after the 2025 Netflix schedule has concluded will be Ricky Gervais’ Alley Cats, in which the award-winning creative will take on the role of a domesticated-yet-feral cat who will presumably have strong personal opinions about hot-button topics. Such as milk saucers and where to hole up when it rains.
Title: Alley Cats
Creator: Ricky Gervais
Directors: Ricky Gervais And Elliot Dear
Cast: Ricky Gervais, Tom Basden, Andrew Brooke, David Earl, Kerry Godliman, Jo Hartley, Diane Morgan, Natalie Cassidy and Tony Way
Episode Count: Six 15-minute episodes
Premiere Date: TBA 2026
Unsurprisingly, Gervais won’t be portraying a live-action feline, and Alley Cats will indeed fall under the umbrella of adult animated comedies, with its “bold 2d animation style” being handled by Blink Industries. That studio worked on one of my very favorite series ever created: the surreal not-quite-kids show Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared, as well as the spookily fun Netflix series Dead End: Paranormal Park. That alone is enough to get me in the door.
Here’s a logline of what to expect, straight from the streaming service:
- "Alley Cats is a slacker sitcom created by and starring the multi award-winning Ricky Gervais. The adult animation follows the trials and tribulations of a group of feral British cats from all walks of society, who seek companionship while ruminating on everyday life. From the funny to the absurd, the series is packed with Gervais’ signature style of heart and social commentary that audiences have come to expect."
I'm not sure if this means we'll be watching a bunch of cats debating the existence of God and the worthiness of cancel culture, but those wouldn't be unexpected topics for the UK comic, whose most recent Netflix stand-up special in 2023 sparked joke-related petitions.
The always quotable Gervais poked fun at himself in his statement promoting the new show, saying:
I play a fat, lazy, rude, opinionated creature with fangs, who’s not as smart or brave as he thinks he is. So quite a stretch.
Where's the cat drummer performing a rimshot with a pair of fish skeletons?
Here's a first look at Alley Cats' characters, and I'll leave it up to everyone else to figure out which of the fat cats Gervais is meant to be playing.
Ricky Gervais, who is prepping for the impending release of a new stand-up special (Mortality), last brought his acting talents to the screen to voice a fish for this year's DogMan. (Flippy better watch out for his newest character.) His last original creation was the Netflix comedy After Life, which wrapped up its three-season run in 2022.
Stay tuned to see when Alley Cats will be available to stream via Netflix subscription. No purr-chase, necessary.
