Since its start, Universal has been America's Monster Movie Studio . . .

Rating: 8/10 (11 July 2016)

. . . which makes THE SECRET LIFE OF PETS par for Universal's course. When most people think of monsters, Frankenstein, Dracula, Godzilla, and Hitler are among the first to come to mind. If you specify American monsters, Bigfoot, the Boogie Man, Candyman, and The Duke are on the tips of everyone's tongues. PETS cleverly provides animated documentation of Duke's decades-long rampage through American Life and Culture during the 1900s, as the usurper of U.S. dog Max's Home Sweet Home. (If you're not up on 1900s American History, a boy named Marion got depressed over his Ma running out on his dying Pa and renamed himself after the family mutt, as "Duke (Mad Dog) Wayne." Shortly thereafter, this struggling cheap-flick "singing cowboy" was recruited to the Dark Side by the American Fascist Party, where he literally fingered thousands of Real Life Working Stiffs for bankruptcy, political prisons, "suicide," and premature death as the self-appointed U.S. Snitch-in-Chief.) In PETS, gluttonous Big Dawg Duke steals Max's food, bed, and mistress before turning Max over to dogcatchers. It would take an entire book to itemize all the tie-ins between PETS' plot and characters with America's All-Time Leading Monster, Duke "Mad Dog" Wayne.