Part 5: So Much Yummier
Back at Selina's apartment, we're treated to the same shot of her entering, only this time, the door is creaked open
much slower this time, as Selina ominously stands completely silent for a long, creepy moment, before she abruptly drops "Ms. Kitty" on the floor, and repeats the same "Honey, I'm home" refrain to herself as before, only this time, she says it in a incredibly eerie, forlorn whisper, her delivery of the "joke" now as utterly drained of its life as Selina has apparently been, as, when she finally flicks the light switch back on, it suddenly, shockingly reveals the hideous bloodstain she sustained from the fall still lying on her forehead, as well as her skin still retaining its deathly pale tone, like that of a walking corpse.
Not even noticing that she's left the door wide open, Selina then slowly trudges inside in a mindless zombie-walk, carelessly dropping her coat and keys on the floor, knocking a lamp over as she walks by it, and spilling a large amount of milk on the floor as she pours it for Ms. Kitty, before taking a big, long swill straight out of the carton herself as the drink runs sloppily down her face, her icy blue, deadened eyes staring straight ahead for a thousand yards the entire time; even after the trauma she just survived, Selina is trying to cope by going back through her normal, daily routine on a sort of auto-pilot, albeit a severely damaged one, completely failing to notice the messes that she's making, as she is no longer the endless chatterbox she once was, but a shambling shell of a human being, and the tense, eerie swellings of the orchestral strings on the score underline Selina's mental fragility all throughout the scene.
Walking back to her answering machine, Selina presses "Play", and is immediately greeted by not just one, but two(!) back-to-back messages from her mother obnoxiously nagging her to call back, messages which Selina has no significant reaction to, no longer having the ability to care as she just keeps chugging the milk, perhaps trying to awaken the feline instinct within her, which gets awakened anyway when the same soulless robovoice from before comes back on to make sure that Selina's tried Gotham Lady Perfume, with the promise that "One whiff of this at the office, and your boss will be asking you to stay after work, for a candlelit staff meeting for two!".
Obviously, this is not only a grotesque selling technique, but also one that triggers Selina by reminding her of the recent trauma she suffered at the hands of her own boss, as she finally breaks from her zombie-like stupor to express emotion again, and a look of sheer, emotional pain and horror begins to break upon her face. The final coup-de-grace comes when the robovoice mentions that the perfume is only available at "Schreck's Department Store", as the mention of Max's last name causes an already tense-as-a-rubber-band Selina to finally snap, as a blood-curdling shriek ERUPTS out of her, she hurls the carton at the machine, and grabs it and violently smashes it full-force down on the table, as Selina's civilized facade has finally cracked for good, and she begins...
the transformation.
Immediately going to the pile of childish stuffed animals lying in her living room, Selina grabs these symbols of the arrested girlishness that society has forced upon her, and tries to force them all down her garbage disposal, grabbing a butcher knife and frantically stabbing them down the drain as she does so, as more cats begin to pop their heads through the open kitchen window like a perverse sort of audience to Selina's mental meltdown, as she finally turns the disposal on and sends fluff grotesquely flying everywhere, her mouth spread wide in a maniacal, almost Joker-ish grin as she does so.
Grabbing a frying pan, Selina begins randomly smashing the walls in a blind fury before hurling it directly into a mirror, a representation of the ongoing self-destruction of the "old", demure Selina, as she rifles through a pile of household supplies, haphazardly throwing miscellaneous objects around before finding a can of spray paint, and creating a long, ugly black streak across her formerly girlish-as-can-be pink walls, before slamming open a closet, and spraying a sweater inside it black, before tearing the article down (the sweater is pink, of course, but it also has an image of kittens upon it, ironically enough). Selina then furiously paws through a rack of her clothing before grabbing an uncharacteristically sinister-looking vinyl jacket, possibly a hint at a dark side that Selina has kept hidden until now, as she moves into her bedroom and casually smashes two of the letters on the neon "Hello There" sign on her wall as she walks by.
We're then treated to a disorienting close-up of an odd-looking pink bedroom just before a sudden rush of air also paints it black, as the camera pulls back to reveal that it's really just a dollhouse that Selina is in the process of vandalizing, before she loses patience with the indirect approach and just starts smashing it with the spraycan herself, finally pushing the house off of its table entirely and dumping the contents of a sewing kit in its place. As the silent Greek Chorus of strays continue to watch this transformation in rapt fascination, Selina places the vinyl jacket upon the table, silently and obsessively beginning the process of altering it for her own purposes, as she utilizes scissors, needle & thread, a sewing machine, and other tools of this stereotypically "feminine" activity to weaponize it for her own personal liberation as a woman, the corners of her mouth curdling upward in a twisted little smirk as she does so, a genuinely frightening sight to behold, and one of the first genuine signs of joy that Selina's expressed the entire film.
After a while, we transition to a outer shot of Selina's apartment (appearing, oddly, a bit similar to the close-up of the dollhouse earlier), as the strays gather outside upon a ledge, and the light from the neon sign still casts its girly pink glow, except the damaged sign now displays the message "Hell Here", an apt description of the scene we just witnessed if I've ever heard one. Soon, a figure clad completely in black from head-to-toe creeps in front of the window, lasciviously bending over and stretching, before we hear a familiar but undeniably transformed voice say "I don't know about you Ms. Kittty, but I feel...
so much yummier" in an ultra-low, sultry purr, and, even though we never see this mysterious figure up close, just the distant sight of her silhouette alone brims with a frightening, newfound danger, and the ominous omen of a woman forever changed.