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From Kirkus

May 1, 2024
Dog Man takes on AI in his latest adventure. Guess who wins. Since AI is built on predictive models, it hasn't got a chance in the Pilkeyverse. The story gleefully whipsaws readers from Chief and Nurse Lady's nuptials (not an eye will be dry after Li'l Petey and Molly's rendition of the traditional wedding theme) to Dog Man's encounter with a skunk (his subsequent tomato-juice bath turns him red, leading to his new Supa Buddy incarnation as the Scarlet Shedder) to Dog Man's imprisonment for the crime of "moral turpitude" to Dr. Scum's evil plot to "crush the world" with an army of AI robots to Petey's poignant flashbacks to his childhood experience with homelessness. Add in some truly inspired Flip-O-Rama sequences and many terrible jokes, and it's clear that Pilkey's in top form here. In between gales of helpless laughter, readers will engage with serious themes. The author leverages the silliness to explore the algorithm's dark side with the AI robots' plot to "distract, divide, [and] dominate" humanity, using stratagems readers may well recognize from real life. Hilariously, the robots' dialogue is rendered in a pixelated typeface straight from 1980s computing, undermining their boasts that they're "SMARTER... / ...FASTER... / ...and STRONGER than" humans. A concluding page of thoughtful notes provides some additional context (and defines turpitude). Human characters are racially diverse; Dr. Scum is a sickly green. Wise foolishness from the master. (dramatis personae) (Graphic adventure. 8-12)

COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

From Horn Book

July 1, 2018
Color by Jose Garibaldi. In this fourth Dog Man graphic novel, fifth graders George and Harold spoof Steinbeck's East of Eden to humorously explore themes of paternal rejection, inherited depravity, and free will; the canine superhero, an action-movie set, and a mechanized hot-dog army all factor in. With Pilkey's customary light touch and child-emulating cartooning style, this hilarious parody is pure genius. "Flip-o-ramas" and drawing instructions included.

(Copyright 2018 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

From Horn Book

July 1, 2017
Color by Jose Garibaldi. With his endearing (if frustratingly dog-like) behavior, the canine-human-hybrid hero (Dog Man) returns to help his police colleagues protect their city from unlikely villains. Pilkey's humor and child-emulating cartoon style, which will be familiar to his Captain Underpants fans, does not disappoint readers of this second installment, and abundant "flip-o-ramas" and other extra features add excitement.

(Copyright 2017 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

From School Library Journal

January 1, 2017

Gr 1-4-Readers who enjoyed Dog Man will be pleased to see Pilkey deliver the same blend of over-the-top plot turns and hilariously irreverent humor. This time, the title character (the result of medical surgery that fused a canine and a policeman after an accident) is tasked with buying his boss, the police chief, a birthday present. When the pet he purchases turns out to be an evil fish, wacky high jinks ensue. And there's more trouble on the horizon. Angry that a mysterious stranger is framing him for robbery, Dog Man's nemesis, Petey the cat, escapes from prison to clear his name. Meanwhile, the decoy that Petey uses to make his getaway, a flat paper cat, comes to life. Once again, Dog Man must put things right, relying on his keen ability to fight crime while also attempting to stifle some of his canine urges. Pilkey uses the premise that the comic has been penned by George and Harold, two elementary school students, and the artwork and story are delightfully childlike. The illustrations have been rendered with a thick-lined scrawl and simple shapes, and intentional misspellings and errors are sprinkled throughout. While the sentence structure is simple and concise, Pilkey displays a sense of sophistication, including clever puns and wordplay, as well as a clear mastery of sequential art, making this an ideal option for both reluctant and more advanced readers. VERDICT An entertainingly zany addition to graphic novel collections; for series fans and newcomers alike.-Mahnaz Dar, School Library Journal

Copyright 2017 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

From Booklist

January 1, 2017
Grades 1-3 Make no bones about it: being the world's greatest cop is tough work. Thankfully for Dog Man, the chief's birthday is almost here, which means a party! Dog Man is in charge of getting the chief a pet fish for a present, but he wreaks such havoc at the pet storeall those bones and balls were irresistible, after allthat the salesman gives him an evil fish with world-dominating aspirations. Meanwhile, criminal cat Petey inadvertently makes an even more dastardly paper version of himself, which proceeds to bring a T. rex skeleton to life. Who will save everyone from this madness? Dog Man, of course (but only if he can stop chasing balls and rolling around in stinky dead fish). Pilkey's unmistakable brand of humor is gleefully on display in this follow-up to Dog Man (2016), and the scribbled, childlike cartoon art is the perfect complement. The frenetic plot, full of treasure chests, mountain escapes, jailbreaks, magic ploys, potty humor, and over-the-top reactions, will have magnetic appeal for kids.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

From Booklist

Starred review from August 1, 2016
Grades 1-3 *Starred Review* A policeman and his police dog fail to defuse a bomb, and the ensuing explosion kills the officer's head and the dog's body. The solution? Graft the dog's head onto the man's body to create the world's greatest cop. Dog Man upends a plot to replace the police chief with an evil robot, saves the city when a gangster cat erases words from all the books, turning everyone hopelessly stupid, and stands up to a revolutionary army of hot dogs. If this all sounds like it springs from the mind of an unhinged first grader, that is, in fact, the central conceit. From the doodle-scratch art and jumbled panel borders to crossed-out words with simulated grammar and spelling lapses to the generous helpings of potty humor, the book feels like a frantic message of delirious imagination from one child to another. In truth, it's the work of Pilkey who, in the relentless style of his own Captain Underpants series, has again fired an arrow of joy straight at the fevered childhood psyche of millions of readers. And as with the good captain, this will prove a groaning burden for many adults and an utter, unfettered delight for kids.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

From School Library Journal

Starred review from July 1, 2016

Gr 1-4-Part canine, part human, Dog Man is a crime-fighting sensation. He fights crime, sniffs out wrongdoing, and battles his doglike tendencies. His nemesis is Petey, a cat who cooks up devilish plans in his secret lab. The pages are filled with bold lines and colorful artwork that has a childlike feel and will delight readers. In an author's note, Pilkey explains that Dog Man is based on a character he created back in second grade, when he longed for silly books, and states that he hopes his title will help children associate reading with fun and even inspire some to craft their own stories. The text contains intentional grammatical errors, so readers should be prepared for misspellings. Panels that feature instructions on how to draw will motivate budding artists. VERDICT A riotously funny and original addition for all elementary school collections.-Lisa Gieskes, Richland County Public Library, Columbia, SC

Copyright 2016 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

From Kirkus

June 15, 2016
What do you get from sewing the head of a smart dog onto the body of a tough police officer? A new superhero from the incorrigible creator of Captain Underpants.Finding a stack of old Dog Man comics that got them in trouble back in first grade, George and Harold decide to craft a set of new(ish) adventures with (more or less) improved art and spelling. These begin with an origin tale ("A Hero Is Unleashed"), go on to a fiendish attempt to replace the chief of police with a "Robo Chief" and then a temporarily successful scheme to make everyone stupid by erasing all the words from every book ("Book 'Em, Dog Man"), and finish off with a sort of attempted alien invasion evocatively titled "Weenie Wars: The Franks Awaken." In each, Dog Man squares off against baddies (including superinventor/archnemesis Petey the cat) and saves the day with a clever notion. With occasional pauses for Flip-O-Rama featurettes, the tales are all framed in brightly colored sequential panels with hand-lettered dialogue ("How do you feel, old friend?" "Ruff!") and narrative. The figures are studiously diverse, with police officers of both genders on view and George, the chief, and several other members of the supporting cast colored in various shades of brown. Pilkey closes as customary with drawing exercises, plus a promise that the canine crusader will be further unleashed in a sequel. What a wag. (Graphic fantasy. 7-9)

COPYRIGHT(2016) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

From Publisher's Weekly

Starred review from May 16, 2016
Dog Man, “a brand-new crime-fighting sensation” created by surgically attaching the head of a police dog to the body of a policeman, gets his own full-color adventure in this terrifically funny spin-off comic from Pilkey (the character’s origins were previously revealed in Captain Underpants and the Terrifying Return of Tippy Tinkletrousers). Dog Man doesn’t play by the rules, whether it’s the rules about being housebroken or the ones about not giving the police chief slobbery dog kisses. But desperate times require maverick behavior: Petey the cat, one of the loopiest villains in children literature, has four chapters’ worth of evil plots aimed at taking Dog Man down—from destroying all books to make the world “supa dumb” (a tactic that will be familiar to those who read Pilkey’s contribution to Comics Squad: Recess!) to unleashing a “weenie-lution” of oversensitive living hot dogs (“We’re not cute, either! We’re gangsta!” insists their very touchy leader). Jose Garibaldi’s coloring makes every page of this superlative police procedural spoof look as sharp as it is silly, and readers (of any age) will be giggling from start to finish. Ages 7–up.

From Kirkus

Recasting Dog Man and his feline ward, Li'l Petey, as costumed superheroes, Pilkey looks East of Eden in this follow-up to Tale of Two Kitties (2017).The Steinbeck novel's Cain/Abel motif gets some play here, as Petey, "world's evilest cat" and cloned Li'l Petey's original, tries assiduously to tempt his angelic counterpart over to the dark side only to be met, ultimately at least, by Li'l Petey's "Thou mayest." (There are also occasional direct quotes from the novel.) But inner struggles between good and evil assume distinctly subordinate roles to riotous outer ones, as Petey repurposes robots built for a movie about the exploits of Dog Man--"the thinking man's Rin Tin Tin"--while leading a general rush to the studio's costume department for appropriate good guy/bad guy outfits in preparation for the climactic battle. During said battle and along the way Pilkey tucks in multiple Flip-O-Rama inserts as well as general gags. He lists no fewer than nine ways to ask "who cut the cheese?" and includes both punny chapter titles ("The Bark Knight Rises") and nods to Hamilton and Mary Poppins. The cartoon art, neatly and brightly colored by Garibaldi, is both as easy to read as the snappy dialogue and properly endowed with outsized sound effects, figures displaying a range of skin colors, and glimpses of underwear (even on robots).More trampling in the vineyards of the Literary Classics section, with results that will tickle fancies high and low. (drawing instructions) (Graphic science fiction. 7-10)

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