The Cat in the Hat Comes Back

Plot

Once again, Sally and her brother are home alone for the day, but this time, their mother has left them with instructions to clear away a large amount of snow while she is out. However, they are soon interrupted in their work by the arrival of the Cat in the Hat. Sally warns her brother not to talk to the Cat, because, "He plays lots of bad tricks. And tells him not to let him come near. Because her brother remembers what he did the last time he was here."

But the Cat lets himself into their house, and when the brother follows him in, he finds the cat eating a cake in the tub. He yells at the cat, turns off the water, and drains the tub only to find that a long pink ring has formed around the sides of the bath tub. The Cat offers to help, but his preliminary attempts to remove the spot fail as he only transfers the mess to a succession of other objects: their mother's white dress, the wall, their father's pair of $10 shoes, a rug, and their father's bed. Unsure of how to remove the stain from the bed, the Cat calls on the help of Little Cat A, who lives inside his hat, who lifts his hat to reveal Little Cat B, who reveals Little Cat C. The three Little Cats go to work, sending the stain to the television, then a pan, and finally outside.

Seeing the spot cover the snow, Little Cat C lifts his hat to reveal Little Cats D through G. All the Little Cats wage war on the snow spots, shooting at pink snowballs with pop guns, but it only spreads the spots more, so Little Cat G lifts his hat, revealing Little Cats H through V. The cats work more, but the spot keeps spreading and all the snow is pink, so Little Cat V takes off his hat to uncover Little Cats W, X, Y and the microscopic Little Cat Z. Z takes his hat off and unleashes a "Voom", which cleans up the spot, clears all the snow from the paths, and puts all of the Little Cats back into the Cat's hat. The Cat leaves, with the promise that he and the Little Cats, A through Z, will return someday.

Analysis

The book ends in a burst of flamboyant versification, with the full list of little cats arranged into a metrically perfect rhymed quatrain, designed to teach the reader the alphabet.

Adaptations

Little Cats A, B and C were also characters in the 1996 TV series The Wubbulous World of Dr. Seuss (Little Cat N also made an appearance, but only once and some of the alphabetical cats appeared in season 2 regularly as Little Cat Z began to be visible).

The Cat in The Hat Comes Back was part of the Beginner Book Video series along with There's a Wocket in My Pocket! and Fox in Socks.

Adrian Edmondson narrated The Cat in the Hat Comes Back for a Harper Collins audiobook that also includes The Cat in the Hat, Fox in Socks and Green Eggs and Ham.

Cancelled film adaptation

Universal Pictures was set to adapt the book, as a stand-alone sequel to the film adaptation, The Cat in the Hat (2003). However, due to poor box office returns and critically negative reception, and the fact that Audrey Geisel decided not to allow any further live-action adaptations of Dr. Seuss' books, the film was cancelled.