In 1997, author Dav Pilkey would publish what would quickly become the breakout hit of his career, The Adventures of Captain Underpants. A kid-friendly send-up of the superhero genre, the book followed the daily adventures of best friends George Beard and Harold Hutchins, a pair of mischievous fourth graders who loved to pull pranks at their elementary school, especially if it came at the expense of their lousy teachers. When their notoriously cruel principal Mr. Krupp threatens to enact the most severe punishment imaginable on them, the two manage to get out of it by using a hypno-ring to coerce Mr. Krupp into believing that he is the hero of their self-produced comic book series, Captain Underpants, an underwear-themed superhero who’s “faster than a speeding waistband, more powerful than boxer shorts, and who can leap tall buildings without getting a wedgie”. Unfortunately, this ends up working a bit too well and Mr. Krupp starts going around trying to fight for “truth, justice, and all that is pre-shrunk and cottony” despite not having any actual superpowers, thus resulting in George and Harold having to go after him to keep him safe, especially once they start coming across actual supervillains like a bunch of sentient toilets and a mad genius with the unfortunate name of Pippy P. Poopypants.
Upon its release, the book quickly became a huge hit with
readers, ultimately going on to spawn a franchise consisting of 12 mainline
installments and multiple spin-offs that have collectively sold over 80 million
copies worldwide. Granted, all this success has also come with a bunch of
controversies, namely because of the books being some of the most consistently
banned books in public libraries due to their juvenile sense of humor and
anti-authoritarian nature, but that hasn’t stopped them from becoming beloved staples
of the literary journeys of those who grew up with them. In 2017, the series was
adapted into film by DreamWorks Animation, who had been looking to purchase the
film rights to them ever since their debut in 1997. Eventually securing said
rights in 2011, Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie, which was
notably the last DreamWorks film produced under the 20th Century Fox
banner after the studio was purchased by Universal the year prior, opted to be
an amalgamation of the books (utilizing the origin story of the first
installment and the main antagonist of the fourth, for example) rather than a
straightforward adaptation of the first book. Upon its release, the film became
both a critical and commercial hit, earning over $125 million worldwide. And in
the eyes of Captain Underpants fans, the film was one of the most
surprisingly faithful ‘book-to-film’ adaptations ever made, flawlessly replicating
the artistic and narrative spirit of the books and even managing to adapt
seemingly uncinematic aspects of the books to screen such as the ‘Flip-O-Rama’
segments where readers were encouraged to rapidly flip two pages back and forth
to simulate action sequences.
One year prior to the film’s release, Dav Pilkey launched
his next book series, Dog Man. Another spin-off of the Captain
Underpants series, Dog Man is presented as the in-universe first
comic series that George and Harold created together after they had first met
in kindergarten (which, fun fact, was referenced as early as the original novel
in 1997 as this was a character that Pilkey had conceived when he was in second
grade). Following the conclusion of the mainline Captain Underpants series,
the two rediscover their old Dog Man comics and decide to relaunch the
series. Like the Captain Underpants books, the Dog Man books have
been hugely successful critically and commercially, currently standing at 13
installments (with a 14th set to release later this year) with every
installment being amongst the best-selling children’s books of their respective
release years. And in 2020, DreamWorks began the process of bringing Pilkey’s
latest hit series to the big screen, which brings us to this year’s Dog Man.
Directorial duties for this one go to Peter Hastings, who has only directed one
film prior (that being the… ‘infamous’ adaptation of Disney’s Country Bear
Jamboree theme park attraction) but has had plenty of experience in both
the world of animation, producing the likes of hit shows like Animaniacs,
and the works of Dav Pilkey as he was one of the show-runners of the Captain
Underpants film’s Netflix series spin-off The Epic Tales of Captain
Underpants. With all this in mind, it should come as no surprise that, like
its cinematic predecessor, Dog Man is another entertainingly goofy yet wholly
sincere and genuinely faithful adaptation of Dav Pilkey’s beloved literary works.
In the bustling metropolis that is OK City, the local Police
Chief (voiced by Lil Rel Howery) and his officers are constantly threatened by
the inventions of the notorious evildoer Petey the Cat (voiced by Pete
Davidson). The only two that have consistently been able to successfully thwart
his plans are Officer Knight (voiced by director Peter Hastings), a highly
decorated yet admittedly quite dimwitted police officer, and his loyal canine
companion Greg (also voiced by director Peter Hastings), who’s clearly shown to
be the smarter one of the two despite being a dog. Unfortunately, the duo end
up getting critically injured when they’re unable to defuse one of Petey’s bombs,
with Officer Knight suffering significant head injuries and Greg sustaining serious
bodily injuries. As a way of saving them both, a pair of surgeons swiftly decide
to transplant Greg’s head onto Officer Knight’s body, with the ensuing experiment
resulting in the creation of a half-dog/half-human hybrid, Dog Man. Almost
immediately, Dog Man becomes a beloved hero in the eyes of the people of OK
City as he continues his ongoing crusade against Petey the Cat, who continues
to enact all sorts of devious plans to take down his arch-nemesis, which
includes everything from resurrecting one of Dog Man’s old foes, Flippy the
Fish (voiced by Ricky Gervais) to creating his own clone, Li’l Petey (voiced by
Lucas Hopkins Calderon) who, to Petey’s disappointment, turns out to be not
quite as villainous as he is.
Now the first thing I should note about this film is that,
despite everything that I’ve mentioned about its source material’s roots and
connections to the Captain Underpants series, the film itself is not
presented as the in-universe spin-off that it technically is. There’s no
framing device that establishes it as the creation of George and Harold and the
only major connection that it does share with Captain Underpants is a
blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo from the creators themselves. There’s not even a
Flip-O-Rama sequence in this film despite the Dog Man books having them just
like in the Captain Underpants books as that concept has been a staple
of Dav Pilkey’s work since its debut in the original Captain Underpants novel.
And yet, as neat as it would’ve been to see this film attempt to properly
connect itself to the Captain Underpants series, I also recognize that
it’s ultimately not that necessary for it to do so. Regardless of
how much it does or doesn’t try to be a spin-off of its cinematic predecessor, Dog
Man the film dutifully follows in the footsteps of the 2017 Captain
Underpants film by being a highly respectful adaptation of its source
material that faithfully adapts it not by being a direct 1:1 adaptation of its
first installment but by seamlessly combining key story elements of multiple books
into a singular narrative (Flippy the Fish? He’s the villain of the second book,
Dog Man: Unleashed. Li’l Petey? He was introduced in Book 3, Dog Man:
A Tale of Two Kittens.). All the while, the film also does a great job in
capturing Pilkey’s well-established narrative sensibilities, resulting in a pleasantly
light-hearted family-friendly comedy that’s unabashedly goofy. And while many
of Pilkey’s biggest critics have often derided his work as being nothing more
than a series of immature toilet jokes, I believe that, in doing so, they overlook
the more subtly brilliant aspects of his writing, like his penchant for cleverly
self-aware humor and simple yet delightfully wacky running gags.
Case in point, while Dog Man is a largely comedic endeavor,
it’ll also take you by surprise by how it manages to throw in some genuinely heartfelt
story beats. Much of this comes from the introduction of Li’l Petey who, as
established earlier, doesn’t possess the same villainous tendencies that Petey
has. Li’l Petey ends up forming a friendship with Dog Man over the course of
the film, which then leads to Petey gradually starting to act less like a
villain which, yes, is another way in which the film honors the books, where
Petey turns into a hero by the end of the fifth book, Dog Man: Lord of the
Fleas. The Captain Underpants film also had its fair share of
heartfelt moments, which helps to exemplify why both these films, for as silly
as they are, also have such a wholesome vibe to them while never having any
moments that feel cynical or mean-spirited. Like Captain Underpants, Dog
Man’s animation wasn’t an in-studio job (here, it was handled by Jellyfish
Pictures whereas its predecessor was made by Mikros Image and Technicolor
Animation Productions) but it still does a great job in replicating Pilkey’s trademark
comic art style to make it all look like a comic book coming to life on-screen.
Meanwhile, the film boasts a fun voice cast to play the franchise’s eclectic
cast of characters, including Lil Rel Howery as Dog Man’s perpetually exasperated
police chief, Isla Fisher as OK City’s most dedicated news reporter Sarah Hatoff,
and Pete Davidson gleefully hamming it up as Petey.
I didn’t exactly imply it all that much throughout this
review but I’m very much a part of the generation that grew up with the Captain
Underpants books. Back in a time when I wasn’t fully aware of how
controversial they were amongst certain groups (for, to be perfectly blunt, hilariously
overblown reasons), I was thoroughly enthralled by their goofy yet subtly clever
sense of humor and hugely entertaining stories that I’m confident were essential
in me developing my love for the superhero genre back before I truly got into the
likes of Marvel and DC. I eventually stopped reading the series regularly after
its eighth installment, Captain Underpants and the Preposterous Plight of
the Purple Potty People, partially due to it leading to a six-year gap between
book releases (albeit for the completely valid reason of Pilkey stepping away
from writing to take care of his father David before he passed away in 2008) but
mainly for the more standardized reason that applies to anything you enjoyed as
a kid as I simply grew out of the series’ target demographic. However, that
didn’t stop me from going to see the Captain Underpants film in 2017
which, ironically, was also the first DreamWorks Animation film that I’d seen
in theaters in nearly a decade for… well, the exact same reason why I stopped
reading the books. And for me, the result was not only one of DreamWorks’ best
films but also one of my favorite films of that year. Despite not having read
the books in quite a few years, I was pleasantly delighted by how surprisingly
faithful the film was in adapting them to the screen even if that was largely done
by way of it combining different story beats from multiple books in the series.
No joke, I damn near cheered in the theater when the film managed to pull off an
incredibly successful cinematic rendition of the series’ trademark ‘Flip-o-Rama’
segments.
Conversely, I do not have any sort of history with the Dog
Man book series as it didn’t start coming out until 2016. This would’ve
been a much different story had this new film been an adaptation of the Captain
Underpants series’ original spin-off, The Adventures of Super Diaper
Baby, another in-universe comic by George and Harold about a newborn named
Billy Hoskins who gains Captain Underpants’ super-powers, or a different Dav
Pilkey series named Ricky Ricotta’s Mighty Robot, in which the titular mouse
Ricky Ricotta befriends a giant robot as they team up to fight all sorts of
intergalactic antagonists. Nevertheless, my nostalgia for the Captain
Underpants series was ultimately enough to compel me to check out Dog
Man’s film adaptation, and while I can’t say that it’s ‘as good’ as the
2017 Captain Underpants film (nor is it one of DreamWorks’ best, for that
matter), it’s also one of those films that I’d argue is almost impossible to
dislike. Not only does it do a fantastic job of being devotedly faithful to its
source material but its wholly uncynical nature makes it a refreshingly
positive animated flick that candidly wears its heart on its sleeve. As such,
it’s clear that this film will be a smash hit with fans of the Dog Man series,
undoubtedly destined to become a regular rewatch for the generation that will
grow up with it, while still managing to appeal to older audiences who most likely
aren’t familiar with the source material with its wacky sense of humor and
vibrant animation. But perhaps best of all, this film’s success will assuredly make
it another exemplary testament as to why Dav Pilkey continues to be an
indisputable icon in the world of children’s literature.
Rating: 4/5
