Our canine superhero returns in DOG MAN: THE SCARLET SHEDDER, the suspenseful and hilarious twelfth graphic novel in the #1 worldwide bestselling series by award-winning author and illustrator Dav Pilkey!
P.U.! Dog Man got sprayed by a skunk! After being dunked in tomato juice, the stink is gone but the scarlet red color remains. Now exiled, this spunky superhero must struggle to save the citizens who shunned him! Will the ends justify the means for Petey, who's reluctantly pulled back into a life of crime in order to help Dog Man? And who will step forward when an all-new, never-before-seen villain unleashes an army of A.I. robots?
David "Dav" Pilkey (b. March 4, 1966), is a popular children's author and artist. Pilkey is best known as the author and illustrator of the Captain Underpants book series. He lives near Seattle, Washington with his wife, Sayuri.
truly the best piece of literature i’ve ever picked up. touching on subjects like social media and the increase in artificial intelligence, as well as the modern justice system. the art in this is just phenomenal. a book i think everyone should read.
I will always love Dogman because it was the first series I willingly read in my I-do-not-like-to-read era. I always get excited when a new book comes out, and this one did not disappoint.
I read it all in one sitting. As usual, in this 12th novel of the series, Dogman brought all of the humor and goofiness it always does. I loved the theme of this book being about AI taking over, as now, with the ever-expanding knowledge and improving computers, robots taking over is becoming a more popular topic irl.
I just thought I would add this because it's funny. But I didn't realize (after the character literally being in 10 of the books) that 80-HD is a pun on ADHD, a disorder that I (as well as the author) have. The irony is that that is probably the reason I didn't notice the pun for so long.
Anyway, enjoy life, wear sunscreen, and read books.
This book was an absolute blast to read! It was a great story, hilarious from cover to cover, packed full of action, and ended with a very wholesome moral.
The first half of the this book is ridiculously funny and rife with wonderful flip-o-ramas. I read this one on an airplane so many people were able to witness (judge?) the glee of an adult reading Dog Man. The AI bad guy stuff was culturally on point (and I loved Pilkey’s explanation of source material at the end) but it wasn’t as poignant or funny as some of Dog Man’s previous plot lines. (The literature parodies are my favorites.) Since the lessons of AI are TBD, the ambiguity and lack of closure may have been Pilkey’s point. I have to add that my kids loved the superhero glow-up the Supa Buddies got in this book.
Another late-period Dog Man book. It's up to #12 now, as long as the Captain Underpants series! I doubt Pilkey going to wind it down as long as people like me keep buying them - he dominates the children's best-seller lists more decisively than Taylor Swift dominates the music rankings - but it does feel like it's spinning its wheels. I mean, it's mostly enjoyable! My son continues to love it, and he finds lots of parts to laugh out loud at or to ask me to re-read the next day. The mix of literary references, toilet humor, and absurdist kid stuff is fun for me, too. And while most of the art is intentionally simplistic, there are a few times when Pilkey breaks from the conceit that a fictional 5th grader drew it and really turns out solid superhero action. But the character development isn't what it used to be. There was a time (maybe books 2-6?) when it was about people truly facing what it means to be a good person in a world where bad stuff happens, and their decision to find joy and do good felt hard-won. Now, every book follows the same formula: Petey has a crisis, then he hears a one-sentence platitude, and he spends a chapter applying that to his life. Then it ends with everyone smiling. And beyond that... I'm not sure what's going on with Pilkey's social commentary. This one was probably supposed to be about how people retreat to their phones and ignore the world around them, which is a fair worry! But it was presented as AI robots taking over the world and doing our jobs for us. What it actually said was that people are so lazy that they would take more recreation time if technology took care of our chores. But... wouldn't that be a good thing? In reality, the worry we're facing now is that our positions are more precarious, AI could take our livelihoods, and we're more stressed out. People deserve time to relax and not be shamed for it, and a society that let everyone share the rewards of our increased productivity would be a better one than we have. If someone enjoys taking selfies, then let them!
Children's graphic novel, book 12 in a series. I have read the whole Dog Man series with my son over the last year or so and so we eagerly put this one on hold. While the story was still enjoyable, it was a bi dark and foreboding as an adult reader. The title comes from Dog Man's unfortunate bath in tomato sauce after a run-in with a skunk he was stained red and became 'The scarlet shedder." With Chief on his honeymoon, one of the underling cops takes advantage of the opportunity to arrest Dog Man on made-up charges. Dr. Scum offers Dog Man his freedom if Petey will come work with him at the AI robot factory. So robot Dog-Man is in jail while real Dog Man hides out with Lil Petey, 80-HD, and Molly the tadpole. Petey resigns himself to his fate as a bad guy, until he has flashbacks of his mother saying "We can't control the wind, but we can adjust our sails." Of course Dr. Scum creates the AI robots anyway, a battle ensues, and most of the members of society are quite obliviously playing on their phones in the meantime.
Dav Pilkey impresses me with the multiple layers of his stories. I really feel like they could be discussed and analyzed in a book club or English class. On the surface they're a fun story about these animals, but there's so much underneath. I admit I was guilty of writing off Captain Underpants, which admittedly is not as deep as the Cat Kid or Dog Man books. But overall I feel Pilkey has a very keen eye when it comes to analyzing human behavior and truly writes for all ages.
Read this with my son. Fun and funny book for school age readers! We had a lot of laughs and the message was really great and relevant to today’s technical world.
My son demanded we buy this as soon as it was released. We started it immediately as our bedtime read and finished it in record time. I think we've read them all now, so we're moving on to the Cat Kid books next.
Callums review - I loved the end with the big robot. I liked when Dr Scum came back. Dr Scum is only in Dog man 1 and 7. It was a very exciting book! The new super buddies were a very big change from the old ones which I liked. There were also four super buddies instead of 3. This is one of my favourite dog man's !
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.