When an evil feline plants a ticking time bomb, a heroic cop and his dog companion venture out to stop the dastardly cat’s plans. However, things take a turn for the worse when the pair fail to diffuse the bomb and ultimately end gravely injured.
In 2016, American cartoonist and author Dav Pilkey created the #1 best selling graphic novel and launched an entire series around it, Dog Man. The Dog Man novel series is one of Pilkey’s most successful books having sold over 60 million copies. Since its first release, it has been translated into 47 different languages, according to Porter Anderson, editor in chief, in an article on publishingperspectives.com. During an interview, Teevin Nguyen, junior at Greenway high school, said, “Dog Man is a simple children’s book, it taught good premises to be good and do the right thing.”
The first book reveals how the renowned Dog Man came to exist from an evil plan by the antagonist Petey and his plot to get rid of Greg the dog and Knight the cop, two companions who ultimately form the iconic hero. From then on, Dog Man became known as one of the best crime fighters in his town, having the best parts of both the companions conjoined.
The new Dog Man movie, produced by Dreamworks Animations and Universal Pictures, released Jan. 31, on Friday. Voice actors include Peter Hastings, voice of Dog Man, Officer Knight, and Greg the Dog; Pete Davidson, voice of Petey; Lil Rel Howery, voice of Chief; Isla Fisher, voice of Sarah Hatoff; Ricky Gervais, voice of Flippy the Fish; and Lucas Hopkins Calderon, voice of Li’l Petey. Peter Hastings is also the leading director for the film.
The movie assumed to be a box office hit within its few days upon release. Erik Childress, film critic, wrote in an article on Rotten Tomatoes“Its $36 million debut is enough to get it into the top 10 openings of January, beating the special edition of Star Wars ($35.9 million), The Devil Inside ($33.7 million), and The Green Hornet ($33.5 million).” The movie racked up a 6.6/10 on IMDb, 78% on the tomatometer and a 86% on the popcornmeter on Rotten Tomatoes, within its first few days.
Fans and critics exclaimed how well the design and character formatting followed the original style of the book. “The character animation leans into a bouncy, loose-limbed style…mirroring the playful aesthetic of the original books,” Caillou Pettis, professional film critic, said in an article under cailloupettismoviereviews.com.
Book to movie adaptations are not anything new within the film industry. According to octaneseating.com, more than 50% of Hollywood productions are adaptations of books. Some of the most notable and popular adaptations include the Harry Potter series, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, The Hunger Games series and much more. It’s no strange phenomenon for Hollywood to produce movies based on books. “Films adapted from books generate 53% more revenue than original screenplays,” newbookrecommendation.com said in an article. In spite of this, such adaptations may not always reach the audience’s expectations. “…adaptations aren’t usually done right and they usually ruin the experience…” Kiera Track, senior, said during an interview. Track noted the Dog Man adaptation was an exception. In spite of the reputation of book to movie adaptations, Dog Man proved to be a success and positively impacted audiences.
