BooksForKidsBlog

Wednesday, September 17, 2014

Canned! Captain Underpants and the Tyrannical Retaliation of the Turbo Toilet 2000 by Dav Pilkey

If you're concerned about what is going on here, don't worry. George and Harold are confused, too. You see, George, Harold, and Captain Underpants had just undergone an epic adventure that started out in the dinosaur age and ended at their school, forty years in the future. Now, thanks to Melvin Sneedly (the tattletale genius) and his time-traveling Robo-Squid suit, they were all hurtling backwards in time. Back a long, long time ago to that dull, old-fashioned age known as the present.

Oh, I almost forgot. Traveling with them were three purple-and-orange-speckled eggs laid by their pet pterodactyl, who with their other pet, Sulu the bionic Hamster, had just saved the planet.

See? That wasn't confusing at all, was it?

Got it? Well, never mind, because George and Harold arrive back at their old school just at the moment they left, flushed down the Purple Potty. Sneedley informs the lads that they no longer are on the lam for the bank heist, back then, er, yesterday. He's hacked into the bank's computer and altered their surveillance tapes.

"Just don't grow a mustache or a beard anytime soon, and you guys'll be fine."says Sneedley.

So, with the evil Turbo Toilet 2000 stuck in the future, or whatever, the guys are fine. All they have to do is pretend to do their work in school while they draw comics to sell to their classmates to fund their fun and... But wait! The boys forgot that the next day back in the present was the big multiple-choice, timed-test day--and if they don't pass, they'll be stuck in Principal Krupp's elementary school for even more eons. Exhausted, they go to bed early, but awake to find that they've slept through their testing. Nooooo! Not another year in Ms. Ribble's miserable class at Jerome Horowitz Elementary School!

But wait! They can fix this. They sneak into Smedley's garage and borrow his time-traveling Robo-Suit and set it to take them back to yesterday so they can pass their tests. What could go wrong?

George and Harold ace their tests and dash to their tree house for some R & R and discover one tiny glitch...

George pushed the tree house door open and looked inside. "Oh, NOOOOOOO!" said George.

Harold climbed up and looked inside. There, sleeping at the table, was Harold himself. And next to him, snoring on the beanbag chair, was George.

"I don't understand," George whispered. "How come WE'RE here?"

"Oh, I get it," said Harold. "This is us from yesterday!"

George, Yesterday George, Harold, and Yesterday Harold are now a doppel gang of their very own, and the more the merrier, in Dav Pilkey's latest silly graphic novel saga, Captain Underpants and the Tyrannical Retaliation of the Turbo Toilet 2000 (Scholastic Press, 2014). In this eleventh book, not only are there two of this dynamic duo, but Mr. Krupp morphs into Captain Underpants on cue and Melvin Sneedley, Super Diaper Baby, and Mr. Krupp's faculty--Miss Anthrope, Mr. Meaner, Miss Labler, and Mr. Rected--all get cameo roles in the plot, until the hullabaloo flushes out the Turbo Toilet 2000 and he's finally sent down the tubes... But ...what about those extra Harolds and Georges?

"Oh, yeah!" said Yesterday Harold. " I guess there are a lot of loose ends in this story."

"Uh-oh! That can only mean one thing!" said Harold.

"Another SEQUEL!"

Kids need not despair. With two pairs of their heroes to screw up, there are bound to be still more Captain Underpants stories. "Subversively hilarious." says Publishers Weekly. "Dizzyingly silly!" adds Kirkus Reviews.

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