Captain Underpants
Captain Underpants is an American illustrated children's novel series and multimedia franchise by American author and illustrator Dav Pilkey. The series revolves around two fourth graders, George Beard and Harold Hutchins, living in Piqua, Ohio, and Captain Underpants, an aptly named superhero from one of the boys' homemade comic books, who accidentally becomes real when George and Harold hypnotize their cruel, bossy, and ill-tempered principal, Mr. Krupp. From the third book onwards, Mr. Krupp also possesses superhuman strength, durability and flight as a result of drinking alien "Extra-Strength Super Power Juice".
Currently, the series includes 12 books, two activity books, colored versions, and 15 spin-offs. As of 2014, the series has been translated into more than 20 languages, with more than 80 million books sold worldwide, including over 50 million in the United States.
DreamWorks Animation acquired the rights to the series to make an animated feature film adaptation, Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie, which was released on June 2, 2017, to positive reviews, followed by a television series, The Epic Tales of Captain Underpants, which aired on Netflix from July 13, 2018 to December 4, 2020, also to positive reviews.
After the main series concluded with the twelfth novel, Captain Underpants and the Sensational Saga of Sir Stinks-A-Lot, in 2015, a spin-off series titled Dog Man was released the following year in 2016. The spin-off series has 13 books so far. A 14th book, titled "Big Jim Believes" is scheduled to release on November 11 2025 while a film adaptation of the series produced by DreamWorks Animation was released on January 31, 2025.