Nonstop lunar lunacy.
A band of young geniuses blast off for the Moon on a mission that rapidly morphs into an attempt to prevent the alien YAKs from destroying an entire plane of reality.
De la Cruz continues to braid together two storylines of equal heft in this middle volume. In one strand, her young Octos, brought together at the Octagon Valley Institute by the eccentric Onasander Octagon, struggle with conflicting loyalties and resentments; some explore not-entirely-welcome new superpowers, while others jealously await their own powers (if any) to manifest. In another, they battle the malign YAKs over the fate of the multiverse. With her authorial tongue firmly in cheek, de la Cruz often writes chapter headers like “Game of Thorns,” and the book’s title is entirely accurate, thanks to a gooey mishap with a high-tech Object-Shifter. Amid all the squabbling, fretting, and hesitant bonding, the young heroes arrive on our nearest astronomical neighbor just in time to infiltrate a YAK summer camp and compete in the Cosmic Games, which are designed around their individual personality traits. By the end, the destruction of the universe is at least delayed, and if the omniscient narrator leaves a few mysteries unanswered (such as what YAK stands for: “Young Angry Kittens? Yellow Amoeba Karts?”), a closing teaser offers a chance of resolution. A masterful opening recap includes references to the cast’s previously established racial and cultural diversity.
Nonstop lunar lunacy. (Adventure. 9-12)Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9781368083751
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel.
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.
Not that there aren’t pranks and envelope-pushing quips aplenty. 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”). There, he witnesses fellow inmate Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) escape in a giant Robo-Suit (later reduced to time-traveling trousers). 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.”). Cut to five years previous, in a prequel to the whole series. 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. Pilkey tucks both topical jokes and bathroom humor into the cartoon art, and ups the narrative’s lexical ante with terms like “pharmaceuticals” and “theatrical flair.” Unfortunately, the bullies’ sad fates force Krupp to resign, so he’s not around to save the Earth from being destroyed later on by Talking Toilets and other invaders…
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-545-17534-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
Series fans, at least, will take this outing (and clear evidence of more to come) in stride.
Zipping back and forth in time atop outsized robo–bell bottoms, mad inventor Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) legs his way to center stage in this slightly less-labored continuation of episode 9.
The action commences after a rambling recap and a warning not to laugh or smile on pain of being forced to read Sarah Plain and Tall. Pilkey first sends his peevish protagonist back a short while to save the Earth (destroyed in the previous episode), then on to various prehistoric eras in pursuit of George, Harold and the Captain. It’s all pretty much an excuse for many butt jokes, dashes of off-color humor (“Tippy pressed the button on his Freezy-Beam 4000, causing it to rise from the depths of his Robo-Pants”), a lengthy wordless comic and two tussles in “Flip-o-rama.” Still, the chase kicks off an ice age, the extinction of the dinosaurs and the Big Bang (here the Big “Ka-Bloosh!”). It ends with a harrowing glimpse of what George and Harold would become if they decided to go straight. The author also chucks in a poopy-doo-doo song with musical notation (credited to Albert P. Einstein) and plenty of ink-and-wash cartoon illustrations to crank up the ongoing frenzy.
Series fans, at least, will take this outing (and clear evidence of more to come) in stride. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Jan. 15, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-545-17536-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 12, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2013
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