Basic Brief-ing: Veggies With Wedgies by Todd Doodler

It all begins when Farmer Jones carefully hangs his family's laundry outside to dry.

What can happen, right?

If the clothesline features undies, lots of super silly storybook lines are sure to follow, at least if author-cartoonist Todd Doodler is in the vicinity of the vegetable garden.

"WHAT ARE THOSE?" ASKED PUMPKIN.

Cuke hasn't a clue, but thinks they are cool. Beet thinks they look beguiling. Mushroom thinks they look mysterious. Nobody knows what they are, but Asparagus aims for a pair anyway. Pea pipes up with a supposition that they are undies brought by the Underwear Fairy.

Carrot pops up and pointedly offers a brief explanation of the purpose of undergarments.

"UNDERWEAR IS WHAT PEOPLE WEAR UNDER THEIR CLOTHES!

UNDER WEAR! GET IT?"

Of course, nothing will do but that the vegetables take down the Jones' family's drawers and try them on, with many comic misfits ensuing. Mushroom puts one pair of tighty whities on his head. Corn does a lot of hopping and wiggling to stretch the underwear to fit. Onion winds up wearing his backwards, thong style.

"THE VEGGIES ALL HAD TERRIBLE WEDGIES."

Only a Todd Doodler story would set up such a preposterous plot line just to get to that internally rhyming punchline, but as he so ably proved in his top-selling Bear in Underwear books, a man can create a career with unlikely characters drawn in, well, drawers, as he does in his latest, Veggies with Wedgies (Little Simon, 2014).

Underwear is a subject that preschoolers universally perceive as hilarious, and the penchant persists well into the primary years. A stalk of broccoli in briefs or an onion giving himself a wedgie is bound to draw a drawer-ful of giggles from tots just coming to terms with their own underthings. Get to the bottom of undie humor by pairing this one with Claire Freedman's Aliens Love Underpants, Dinosaurs Love Underpants (The Underpants Books) or Aliens in Underpants Save the World (The Underpants Books).

Not So Bare Bear: Bear in Long Underwear by Todd H. Doodler

Bear and his friends are inside drinking hot chocolate.

Bear is feeling cozy, but a little cooped up from being inside all day.

He looks out and says, "The snow has stopped falling. Who wants to go outside and play in the snow?"

In no time the whole gang, Bear, Skunk, Rabbit, Turtle, and Hedgie, are bundled up and romping in the snow. They decide to build a really great snowman, and soon they step back to evaluate their work.

"You call that a snowman?" says Bear. "He needs clothes."

Quickly Bear adds his own hat to the snowman's head. But something is still lacking, his friends suggest, and Bear proceeds to add his scarf to the snowman's neck. But he's still chilly-looking, and cool is apparently not cool for this snowman, so Bear then adds his snow pants and his warm jacket. But does that leave him standing in the snow in his trademark whitie tighties?

Well, no. Bear has obviously planned ahead, in the latest in Todd H. Doodler's popular Bear in Underwear series, titled Bear In Long Underwear (Blue Apple Books, 2011). With his characteristic deadpan wit and flat, bright acrylic illustrations that feature sly visual humor on each page, this bear in his natty red union suit is dressed just right for the occasion.

As Publishers Weekly says,"Toddlers should continue to find Doodler’s lovably dim cartoon animals and deadpan humor—and, of course, the underwear theme—irresistible."

Animals Undercover: The Underpants Zoo by Brian Sendlebach

If the residents of the zoo could wear underpants, what would they choose?

Most of us haven't spent a lot of time lingering over thoughts of zoo animals' lingerie, but cartoonist Brian Sendelbach has, and in his reently published The Underpants Zoo (Orchard Books, 2011) he is glad to enlighten readers with his review of rumble seat wear.

IT'S IMPORTANT FOR LIONS
TO APPEAR ROYAL AND GRAND.
CAMEL SAYS, "MINE KEEP
GETTING FILLED UP WITH SAND."

Zebra ("Do these stripes make my backside look too big?") varies the obvious pattern with polka-dotted panties; Octopus opts for duly dull drawers, but has to pull on four pairs at a time to cover whatever passes for his non-existent posterior; penguins prefer their underpants chilled and filled with icicles fresh from the freezer; and some of these unusual undies come with unwanted accessories:

IT MAY LOOK AS THOUGH ANTEATER
IS DOING SOME SILLY DANCE.
BUT LOOK CLOSELY AND YOU'LL SEE
HIS UNDERPANTS HAVE GOT ANTS!

Goofy animals in outrageous underpants, silly rhymes that get lots of giggles, and clever book design (the type is even set in Circus Mouse!) make this latest in the growing shelf of backside books a fun read for the emergent reader or the story circle set.

Short Subject: Bear in PINK Underwear by Todd H. Doodler

THE RED DEVILS MET AT THE FIELD, DRESSED IN THEIR RED UNIFORMS.

BEAR WAS WEARING HIS UNIFORM, AND HIS LUCKY TIGHTIE WHITIES.

BUT, WAIT A MINUTE!

THEY WEREN'T WHITE. THEY WERE....

PINK???

Even soccer stars have washing machine mishaps. Bear, tired and dirty from a hard game against the Blue Jays, forces himself to put his muddy uniform into the washer before he showers and gets set to chill after the game. But when he takes the laundry out, YIKES! His lucky tightie whities have had a close encounter with his Red Devils jersey and are now a lovely shade of-- PINK!

Soccer guys don't wear pink. He knows just what his opponents and his friends will say if he dares:

"PINK is for GIRLS!!"

But... they ARE his lucky briefs. Does Bear dare bare his bottom in public with his keister clad in pink underwear? Does he dare play without them?

Complete with a movable pull-tab device which gives readers a chance to bare Bear's secret right there on the cover, it's no surprise that Bear dares to cross the color line and take the field to score for his team in Todd H. Doodler's new second book in this series, Bear in Pink Underwear (Blue Apple Books, 2011). Fresh from the success of his Bear In Underwear, Doodler's simple text and elemental blackline and strong colored illustrations provide easy going for the emergent reader as well as storytime chuckles for the preschool set for whom the mere mention of underwear is a show stopper. BearWear may catch on everywhere!

The Case of the Disappeared Drawers: Charlie's Superhero Underpants by Paul Bright

ON A WILD AND WINDY DAY,
ROUND ABOUT THE END OF MAY,
A GREAT AND GUSTING GALE BLEW THE LAUNDRY CLEAN AWAY.

SOCKS AND SHIRTS, A WOOLLY HAT,
BUT FAR WORSE THAN ALL THAT
WAS YOUNG CHARLIE'S SUPERHERO UNDERPANTS.

Now, mind you, these are no prosaic underpants: Charlie has already proved their powers in many a daring deed of doughty duty. They are no tiresome whitie tighties either. They're yellow, with red trim and the word POW! on the front and KERZAP! OOF! and SPLAT! emblazoned on their backside.

What's a superhero to do without his nifty knickers?

Without his superhero underpants, Charlie's powers are impoverished, and when a preliminary search (by "boats and planes and satellites") fails, Charlie holds the requisite press conference and announces that he's off on a globetrotting geography tour to return his drawers to their proper derriere. First, it's over the English Channel by balloon, where he finds "a fine French fox" in possession of sister Sophie's socks. Other articles of family-wear are found on the Serengeti, the plateau of Peru, ("llamas in brother Ben's pajamas"), and the muddy Mississippi where a 'gator sports Gramps' woolly cap.

Finally the long trek takes him to Nepal, where he spots a giant shaggy Yeti with his nether parts jammed into Charlie's diminutive drawers, pictured humorously in Lee Wildish's breezy cartoon style in a vertical double-page spread. A trade is quickly made with the woolly hat for the special skivvies :

CHARLIE THANKED THE YETI, AND HE PULLED HIS PANTS UP TIGHT.

THEY HAD POW! ON THE FRONT SO HE HAD PUT THEM ON JUST RIGHT.

HE RAISED ONE ARM UP HIGH AND HE FLEW INTO THE SKY!

Paul Bright's newest, Charlie's Superhero Underpants (Good Books, 2010), offers zippy verse with a catchy internal rhyme scheme, and coupled with Wildish's clever cartooning, provides plenty of giggle fare for the picture book set, who are known to dote on earlier entries in the growing shelf of posterior lit. (For those who do dote on duff stuff, there is a roundup of recent rearward renderings listed in my May 22 review of Chicken Butt! here.)

Top Drawer(s): Dinosaurs Love Underpants by Claire Freedman

Dinosaurs were all wiped out,
A long way back in history.
No one knows quite how or why.
Now this book solves the mystery....

If ever a literary work called for "a willing suspension of disbelief," it's Clair Freedman's newest picture book treatise on the joys of underwear, Dinosaurs Love Underpants! (Aladdin, 2009).

It seems that dinosaurs are totally taken by the fashion statement of early cavemen.

It all began when cavemen
Felt embarrassed in the nude.

But clever cavemen came up with novel ways to cover their keisters. Just the sight of those burly Cro Magnons in their leopard skin skivvies soon has the dinos jockeying for just the same sort of can coverage. T. rex tries to squeeze her powerful posterior into a purloined pair of prehistoric panties, but finds these human undies a bit underwhelming. Stegosaurus is put off by itchy knickers made from woolly mammoth hide. Diplodocus finds his drawers positively pinchy for his dumptruck-sized derriere.

Still, while mankind's sparse population is being de-briefed, so to speak, there still are not enough dino drawers to go around, and a catastrophic caboose-covering free-for-all fight ends in the dinosaurs' effectively extinguishing their own species, leaving the cavemen, huddling modestly behind their temporary fig leaves safe to drape their duffs in whatever scraps remain as they build a decently re-briefed new world civilization.

So when you put your undies on,
Always treat them with great care.
Don't forget briefs saved mankind.
They're not just underwear!

It's a perfect storm of skivvy silliness, with illustrator Ben Cort's cartoon critters cavorting in their rear gear, the sort of tale that keeps the early elementary crowd giggling all the way through. Pair this one with Freedman's and Cort's earlier hit Aliens Love Underpants for a top-drawer treat. As Kirkus Reviews put it wryly, "Children may find Cort's cartoon pictures of big, grumpy-looking dinosaurs sporting undies loud with polka-dots and other patterns briefly (so to speak) amusing."