Yes, Captain Underpants: The First Epic Novel Is Banned!

Dav Pilkey’s Captain Underpants series follows George Beard and Harold Hutchins, two fourth-graders who create a comic book about a superhero who fights crime in his underwear. Through a hypnotic accident, they turn their mean principal, Mr. Krupp, into the real Captain Underpants. The series has sold over 80 million copies, been translated into 28 languages, and inspired a DreamWorks animated film and Netflix series. It was also the #1 most challenged book in America in 2012 and 2013, and #13 on the ALA’s most challenged list for the decade.

The challenges are almost quaint. Parents complain about “potty humor,” “encouraging disruptive behavior,” and “teaching children to challenge authority.” In Naugatuck, Connecticut, a school superintendent tried to ban the series in 2001 because it caused “unruly behavior.” Riverside Unified in California restricted the books for similar reasons. The later book Captain Underpants and the Sensational Saga of Sir Stinks-A-Lot, which features a gay character, added LGBTQ+ content to the list of objections. Dav Pilkey, who was diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia as a child, has said the series was written for kids just like him, the ones who get in trouble and don’t fit the mold.

Why You Should Read This

Captain Underpants turned millions of reluctant readers into enthusiastic ones. Kids who wouldn’t touch a chapter book ripped through these in a single afternoon. That’s worth something. That’s worth a lot, actually.

The adults who object to this book are basically objecting to kids having fun. The humor is exactly what 8-year-olds find hilarious: toilet jokes, underpants, a principal who flies around in his underwear. Pilkey didn’t write these for English teachers. He wrote them for the kid sitting in the back of class doodling in the margins of his textbook, because Pilkey was that kid.

The “encourages disruptive behavior” complaint is the most honest one. George and Harold don’t listen to their principal. They create their own stories. They don’t wait for permission to be creative. Some adults find that threatening, which says more about the adults than it does about the books.