This Cat is in Heat! Our story so far. Camili-Cat is a lean, mean sex machine from Outer Space — and an insatiable bottom.

He is lonely, poor thing, for he searches for others of his Felinoid race, and has almost given up hope. So he does what anyone would do. Drowns himself in sex, lots and lots of it, beautifully rendered cartoon-panel after beautifully rendered cartoon-panel of moaning, shuddering double-entry love.

Race, species — it doesn’t matter. Just oceans and oceans of whizzing, fizzing jizz. We did mention Camili-Cat was an insatiable bottom?

And, as those who have been reading Class Comics know, this is one cat who gets very motivated behind that essential hungry-hole fact of life.

Now the tale of the mysterious early days of Camili-Cat is about to be told in The Camili-Cat 20th Anniversary Special, which the Cat Man’s creator, Patrick Fillion says will be a prequel.

“I tried to do it all very carefully so that new readers would not feel lost or wonder what the Hell was going on,” says Fillion. In the prequel, Camili-Cat becomes steadily obsessed with finding any remnant of his extinct people. Cherishing the hope that he may not be the only one like this in the universe (sound familiar, kids?) our hero goes to the ends of space to find fellow tomcats … while having tons of soul-searching sex with impossibly hung aliens.

And now, in his own words, Patrick Fillion (photo below) tells us about his 20-year love affair with the Cat Man.

Twenty years is a very long time to know someone. You understand how they work, how they think and feel. Most of all, you cannot imagine your life without them.

Camili-Cat was born in 1985, when I was barely 12 years old. At the time, I desperately needed some kind of outlet for the feelings stirring within me.

I did not know what gay was. I grew up in a small community in Quebec where such topics were taboo. I had feelings I knew I couldn’t talk about and no one to turn to who could broaden my understanding. So I turned my energies toward creating comic-book characters and, through them, found myself exploring my emerging sexuality. I came up with several creations in those young, unknowing years, but none were as dear to me as Cam.

Certainly at the start of his life, my beloved Felinoid was a much different man [at right, early Camili-Cat, drawn at age 16.] I was strongly influenced by Marvel Comics, and as a result Cam was born with a beast-like Wolverine hairdo. He was also not quite the sexual being he is today. In fact, upon arriving on Earth, he was an alien turned super-villain!

But as my appreciation of his character grew, I stopped seeing him as a villain. I gave him a change of heart, and he became the central hero of my different comic book worlds, what today I would call titles.

As I began to understand my sexuality, I deepened Cam’s, as well. The irony is that I always drew Cam with female lovers. I think this was probably because I had no access to gay material of any kind, and had only seen adult magazines for straights. In this way, by accident almost, I establish Cam’s bi-sexuality, which has remained to this day. The erotic drawings clearly favored him, though, while the women were secondary figures in the background. But these pictures were hidden away. They were for my eyes alone. Sharing them with others, I knew, was not a good idea.

In the wonderful article Nightcharm wrote about me last year, the editor wondered if I had based Cam on my own looks. He saw a similarity. I don’t know. I guess physically we share some traits — but my stripes aren’t as dark as his! The truth is I did model his penis after mine, but his is somewhat … smaller — wink, wink. There, that’s the only naughty bit I’ll admit for now!

[Judge for yourself, below a self-portrait of the artist, in an impossibly obscene blue Speedo, alongside the artist's creation, showing "semi"-wood!]

Seriously, it was more Cam’s character that was based on me — at least the me I was as a teenager. There has always been an air of loneliness to Cam, almost a sadness about him, really. He’s an orphan in the universe, looking for others of his kind.

I felt that same rootless loneliness in my secret attraction to men. I was so young, so completely unaware of a gay community that I thought I must be some weird lone freak or something. Thankfully that all changed later on, but by then, Cam’s character was fixed. The yearning I had as a teenager — to find more people like me — is now a permanent part of Cam’s psychology. Those early years remain my source material for him. It is very therapeutic, turning personal stuff that burdens you into something creative.

I eventually left home, went to Vancouver, and finally learned that gay was okay — in fact, it was great!

Suddenly my comics became far more erotic. Cam’s female sex partners remained in the picture, but more and more my exciting new understanding of homosexuality began to take over the work — and Cam’s wilder and wilder sex life. As I further understood my own sexuality, Cam further understood his. He became my means of exploring my once hidden desires and it was truly at this point in Cam’s life that he became almost totally interested in male companionship.

[Here we see Patrick exploring his, um, desires as he reads (with one hand, please note) his latest comic book. And yes, boys, he does have a boyfriend. You guys!]

Cam has gone through some dramatic changes over the last 20 years. (Sometimes I look back at the old sketches and wonder what I was thinking!) In the 80’s, his stripes were little triangles on the edges of his body. Then, after Cam was rejected by both Fantagraphics and Eros, I decided to give him a more human look — a man’s hairstyle, with a new pattern to his stripes. For a while, I did away with his tail.

Yet for all my efforts, no one wanted him. It was the mid-90’s. I decided I was too close to the character that had helped me grown up as a gay man. I had overdosed on all that was Cam. I needed a break, and more than anything, I needed to further my career as a working artist, not hinder it. In late 1996, Cam and I parted company like two sad lovers.

I focused now on new, more commercial creations such as Cube, a series populated by gay and lesbian superheroes. Yet I knew something vital was missing from my creative life. Without quite realizing it, I was pining after Cam and his crazy sexcapades.

Then, my life took a turn. In 1998, I was contacted by Montreal-based Zip Magazine, run by a lovely man named Jeandennis, who granted me carte blanche. Draw whatever stories you want, he told me. I jumped at the chance to reconcile my differences with Cam.

With a burst of renewed confidence, I revamped my Felinoid hunk yet again, finalizing his look into the Camili-Cat we know today. He got his tail back, as well as proper, more plausible stripes. I did away with the three stripes along the shaft of his penis and decided to detail his cock with super-realistic veins. I even gave him a black feline nose.

My strips in Zip magazine brought Camili-cat the fame and fans he always deserved. I suddenly found myself with several Cam mini-strips which I decided to collect and release on my own, through my newly created publishing company. Thus, Purrfection was born, and remains one of the top-selling titles at my company, Class Comics.

I now began to tell Cam’s story. In issue after issue, I created a consistent storyline, which my new comic book The Camili-Cat 20th Anniversary Special will clarify. It’s a prequel and tells the part of the story that I always had to leave out — Cam’s beginnings and main motivation. In fact, the Anniversary book is like one big birthday party, and some really talented artists have joined me in the celebration.

Today, Cam remains the Batman of Class Comics: He’s the company’s founding superhero. Drawing him and furthering his story brings me tremendous joy. And I would like to believe he has found an enduring place in gay culture.

Most of all, I hope that somewhere out there he may be reaching some other young dreamer who won’t feel he’s so alone. Who will believe there are other “Felinoids” in the world. Because there are, there are!

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