George and Harold link up in kindergarten to reduce a quartet of vicious bullies to giggling insanity with a relentless series of pranks involving shaving cream, spiders, effeminate spoof text messages and friendship bracelets. Cut to five years previous, in a prequel to the whole series. The villain sets off after George and Harold, who are in juvie (“not much different from our old school…except that they have library books here.”).
There, he witnesses fellow inmate Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) escape in a giant Robo-Suit (later reduced to time-traveling trousers). To start, in an alternate ending to the previous episode, Principal Krupp ends up in prison (“…a lot like being a student at Jerome Horwitz Elementary School, except that the prison had better funding”). Not that there aren’t pranks and envelope-pushing quips aplenty. Sure signs that the creative wells are running dry at last, the Captain’s ninth, overstuffed outing both recycles a villain (see Book 4) and offers trendy anti-bullying wish fulfillment. Lang is dark-skinned, and other characters have a range of skin tones and fur colors. Colorful, cartoon-style illustrations are eye-catching and playful, and the setting is portrayed in vibrant detail. Readers are encouraged to consider who is deemed a hero and why. Animal rights activism forms the core of this story, with rescue of and advocacy for various types of animals in peril. Evolving friendships are a main component, but that plot thread feels left open for resolution in future installments.
This series opener blends the drama of realistic fiction with the action of superhero stories and ties it all together with a heaping amount of humor. Lang moonlights as the Mousetress, one of the city’s supervillains…who maybe isn’t such a villain after all. Lang has a whopping 217 cats! These are not normal cats either: They have surprising skills and interests, such as computer hacking and martial arts. Lang in her building offers Katie a job catsitting, it’s the perfect opportunity to raise camp funds. Katie wants to go to camp with her friends instead of spending another summer at home in New York City, but money is an obstacle. A summer job unexpectedly leads to heroic hijinks-with the assistance of many, many cats.
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