" A cat makes the ramen."
— Back of the first volume
Neko Ramen is a very Slice of Life manga by Kenji Sonishi, which ran in Monthly Comic Blade from 2006 to 2012. It resembles what it may be like to walk into a friendly ramen shop where the chef knows your name and order. But your chef is kind of an idiot. And also a cat.
Taisho, the titular Neko to his counterpart Ramen shop, is determined to show the world, and his straight man, Tanaka-San, that besides the fact that...
- He is a cat.
- His father models for cat calendars.
- He was expected to turn out just like his old man(cat).
- He originally wanted to be a sushi chef.
- And has multiple failed careers as a driving instructor, doctor, athlete, artist and horse race gambler behind him...
...he is in fact a truly great ramen chef.
Tanaka-San believes his ramen is adequate at best.
Originally a Japanese Flash Animation, now a Japanese full-length feature film. With puppets.
Compare Peanuts with Snoopy, or most newspaper comics with sapient animals. Unrelated to Cat Soup.
This series features examples of:
- Character Development: Surprising for a comedic strip. Taisho is shown to be a Tragic Hero when we learn his back story, and Straight Man Tanaka gets just enough character development to show that more than just a straight man, he's genuinely kind.
- Furry Confusion: Some cats appear to be sapient while others aren't. This leads to some weird situations, like Taisho keeping his former human girlfriend's cat as a pet.
- Unreliable Expositor: Taisho's stories often end up not being quite true, especially the "friendship bowl" story.
