Idris Elba’s full-length furry body. Jason Derulo shouting ‘Miiiiilk!’ James Corden diving head-first into a bin. The new Cats trailer really does have it all – and if the first trailer came across as some kind of digital fur-enhanced fever dream (or, nightmare), this second hit proves that it wasn’t some mass hallucination. This December, in a little over a month, whether you’re ready for it or not, Cats is coming to a cinema near you.
There are some wild things going on here – not least some hints of the plot (as such as there is one), which revolves around the titular felines working out who gets to ‘ascend to the Heaviside layer’ and be reborn. Idris Elba’s Macavity, wanted for a princely sum of £100 presumably by some kind of cat-police (or is that a ‘Missing’ poster from his owner?), is going around menacing people – and at one point explodes into gold dust. Francesca Hayward’s central Victoria is the optimist in all this, Derulo’s Rum Tum Tugger is all hyped up at the milk bar, and Judi Dench’s Old Deutoronomy is tottering around on teeny-tiny cat feet. And did we mention all of the cat jokes and cat puns? Does that mean the cats of Cats are aware that they’re cats, and also of human sayings involving cats?
All of our Cats questions will be answered – please, please, let them be answered – when Cats ascends to the celluloid layer on 20 December.