Dog Man: The Scarlet Shedder

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Dog Man: The Scarlet Shedder
Author	Dav Pilkey
Illustrator	Dav Pilkey
Published on	March 19, 2024
Publisher	Scholastic/Graphix
Publication order
Previous	Cat Kid Comic Club: Influencers (release order) Dog Man: Twenty Thousand Fleas Under the Sea (series)
Next	Dog Man: Big Jim Begins (release order/series)
Book Trailer

“	Can Dog Man stop the robot revolt?	”
–The book's blurb

Dog Man: The Scarlet Shedder is the 12th book in the Dog Man series by Dav Pilkey. It was released on March 19, 2024. The book was announced on August 10, 2023.

Synopsis

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?

Main Characters

• Dog Man - A dog-headed cop. In this book, he was sprayed by a skunk and splashed with tomato juice, which caused him to turn red. His new Supa Buddy Alter Ego is The Scarlet Shedder.
• Petey - A former villain who turned good because of Li'l Petey. He tries to help Dog Man as he decides to work with Dr. Scum at Robo-Time Industries.
• Li'l Petey - Petey's son who finds the good in many situations. He is best friends with Dog Man, 80-HD, and Molly. His new Supa Buddy Alter Ego is The Firecracker Kid.
• Molly - A psychokinetic baby frog/tadpole. Her main ability is to move things with her brain (telekinesis) and can irritate grownups. Her Supa Buddy alter ego, Mecha Molly remains the same from Dog Man: Mothering Heights.
• 80-HD - A robot created by Petey whose powers is creativity. His new Supa Buddy Alter Ego is Ninja Shark.
• Chief - The head chief of the cops and Dog Man's best friend. He's the husband of Nurse Lady.
• Nurse Lady - A nurse who's quick thinking saved Dog Man's life. She is Chief's wife.
• Dr. Scum - Known as the "mysterious new villain," but is not new. He teams up with his Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) robot clones and creates more of them, including Dog Man.
• Maude - One of the cops at the police station who is incredibly mean to Dog Man. She unfortunately becomes the chief while Chief is gone.

Other Characters

• Sarah Hatoff - an Australian journalist who reports the popularity of A.I. Robots in the city.
• Yolay Caprese - An Italian actress who attended the wedding.
• The Baby Frogs (Raine, Corky, Starla, Summer, Pedro, Gilbert, Curly, Frida, Drake, Billie, K.T., Rico, Wendy, El, Deb, Kip, Pink, Poppy, Kendrick, Naomi, Melvin) - Students of the Cat Kid Comic Club who are invited at the wedding.
• Flippy - the Baby Frogs' father and is also a part of the wedding guests.
• The Friendly Friends (Crunky, Bub, Ducky, Mike, Daryl, Uncle Larry) - a clique of friends who attended the wedding. Crunky and Bub are also former members of the F.L.E.A.S..
• Big Jim - Petey's friend who formerly lives in a sheltered home with him and his mother. He also went to the wedding in his Commander Cupcake alter-ego.
• Mayor - He is one of the wedding guests.
• Doctor - Another one of the wedding guests. He previously sewed Greg the Dog's head to Officer Knight's body to become Dog Man.
• Dippy - A cashier lady and is an attendee at a wedding.
• Milly - A cop and a nice friend to Dog Man who is also at a wedding.
• Judge - He officiates Chief and Nurse Lady's civil wedding. Li'l Petey and Molly calls him "Judgy Wudgy".
• The Skunk - This animal sprayed Dog Man at the wedding, causing him to become extremely smelly.
• Grace - Petey's mother who appears in his dream flashbacks.
• Petey's Dad/Grampa is indirectly mentioned by Petey in his dream flashbacks.

Chapter 1: The Best Dog Man

Chief announces to Dog Man that he and Nurse Lady were finally getting married. He tells Dog Man to not eat the ring, and they head off. Li'l Petey and Molly are going to sing the Bridal Chorus, but instead of singing the original version, they sing a potty humor version of it, annoying the Judge. The two put their rings on each other and are about to kiss. The baby frogs get grossed out by this, but Flippy tells them that there was no reason to, as it happens at every wedding. But, during the kiss, instead of kissing each other, Dog Man gets in the way, unknowingly kissing him, grossing out everybody in the City Hall. Nurse Lady and Chief are leaving for their honeymoon and Chief throws his hat, saying that whoever caught it would be Chief for the day. However, Maude catches the hat.

Chapter 2: Heeere, Kitty, Kitty, Kitty!

Dog Man was off chasing a skunk, and runs into Maude around a corner, making her smelly, too. The Judge is yelling at everyone to get out, but Dog Man runs inside and breaks the supporting pillars, causing the City Hall crumble and tear down. The Judge and Maude decide to blame Dog Man for everything. Dog Man is picked up by 80-HD so he can be washed and put in hiding, while the skunk sprays Maude and the Judge.

Chapter 3: The Tomato Juice Solution

That night, 80-HD, Molly, Petey, and Lil' Petey give Dog Man a bath in tomato juice to try and get the skunk smell off of him, but it doesn't work. It just dyes Dog Man red.

Meanwhile, an Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) robot that looks like Dr. Scum but with red eyes, threw a brick at the window, then breaks into the Everything Except Fabric Softener store at night to steal a cartload of robot supplies. He takes them to Robo-Time Industries which where the recurring villain, Dr. Scum is going to build something evil.

Chapter 4: A Buncha Stuff That Happened Next

Dog Man is getting washed by Supa 'Puter, as the machine made a special shampoo made out of hydrogen peroxide and baking soda. Even though Dog Man doesn't smell anymore, the tomato juice didn't wash off of him. Supa' Putter states that he soaked in the tomato juice longer than he was supposed to. Suddenly, the doorbell rings, and Li'l Petey, Dog Man, and 80-HD go to answer it. But Dog Man is greeted by Maude, the Judge, and a net, trapping him in it and taking him to court and they even confiscated their original Supa Buddies costumes from 80-HD.

Chapter 5: The Man With A Plan

Maude takes Dog Man to the station to get his mugshot taken, right after that, he goes to jail while other people state that he is a turpitude. Li'l Petey wants to fight back and make more costumes. But then, an oddly familiar-looking villain comes out of nowhere saying that it will never work. Petey asks who the villain is. The villain said he was Dr. Scum. Li'l Petey asks why he was not in jail, so Dr. Scum tells his story.

While Dr. Scum was being taken to jail, they happened to walk by his factory, Robo-Time Industries. Dr. Scum thought of a plan. He told the police he had to use the bathroom. The police officer unlocks the handcuffs and tells Dr. Scum to hurry back. Dr. Scum runs in his factory to unveil his newest invention: the A.I. Buddy. Dr. Scum powered the Robo-Replica of him, and kicked him outside, to go to jail in his place.

Li'l Petey asks if he really did go to the bathroom, but it wasn't the point. Dr. Scum, Petey, Li'l Petey, and 80-HD went to the factory. Dr. Scum said that they can switch Dog Man with a Robo-Replica of him. He took off a head of one of the A.I. Buddy, created a Dog Man head and placed it on the body. He powers it on and paints the A.I. Buddy red. Petey asks why he's helping them. Dr. Scum said he will use A.I. Buddies to crush the whole world. He needs Petey's help, but Petey refused to join him, because he is now a good guy. Dr. Scum said that if he doesn't join him, they'll leave to Dog Man for Infinity, making Li'l Petey tear up.

Chapter 6: The Big Switcheroo

Soon, Milly and the other cop are driving a cop truck. He wishes that they didn't have to take Dog Man to the jail, taking an infinity to be locked, while in dog years, it's shorter than the regular infinity. The truck stopped at "Free Insults" stall to pass this to take two insults to Li'l Petey and Molly. The kids started warming up giving insults like telling them to do meaningless activities and name calling. Petey and 80-HD sneaked at the pine trees. 80-HD opens the metal bars at the truck, swaps Dog Man with an A.I. buddy version of him and closes it. The cops stopped their insults, hearing them that they are worst and doesn't make sense, leaving them feeling insulted. The truck leaves the road. Li'l Petey and Molly rushes to Dog Man, Petey and 80-HD and are reunited.

As they flew through the skies, Li'l Petey has the best day ever, while Petey thought about the contract he signed to Dr. Scum. He's afraid to work with him, making him never becoming a good guy again.

A few minutes later, the truck stops at Dude Jail, bringing the A.I. version of Dog Man inside the jail's prison and Milly promises to see him in dog infinity.

Chapter 7: The Bot With A Plot

The truck departed, leaving the Dog Man A.I. Robot inside. He turns around and the Dr. Scum A.I. Robot, along with the angry muscular inmates showed up. The Dr. Scum A.I. Robot tells the Dog Man A.I. Robot that he is new and has a replaceable head. He follows him to explain what happened ever since he came into the jail.

Dr. Scum reveals that he had been bullied by other prisoners inside that were bigger and stronger than him. He then shows the Dog Man A.I. Robot that he had created a plan called the 3 D's, Distract, Divide, and Dominate. The Dog Man A.I. Robot had stopped being chased by the bullies and showed him a bunny shadow puppet using a light on his left eye. The bully then asks the Dr. Scum A.I. Robot to do it again, to which he agrees to do so and shows another bunny shadow puppet. The bully then tells the others about the bunnies, and when they look, they start to love bunnies. Then, the Dr. Scum A.I. Robot tells the Dog Man A.I. Robot that he told some of the prison inmates that pink bunnies are the best, and tells another bit of prison inmates that purple bunnies are better than pink bunnies. Soon, the prison inmates started fighting. The Dr. Scum A.I. Robot tells the Dog Man A.I. Robot that with his help, the two will escape jail and be unstoppable, before laughing maniacally.

Meanwhile, Maude and the judge put up a poster saying that Chief is wanted for turpitudishness while saying that once Chief comes back from his honeymoon, Maude will arrest him on the spot. And with Maude and the judge's power, the two would be unstoppable before the two of them laugh. In another scene, Dr. Scum says that once Petey comes, they will bring an army of A.I. Buddies before saying that soon he shall be unstoppable and does an evil laugh.

Chapter 8: Petey's Dream

Meanwhile, Dog Man, Li'l Petey, Petey, Molly, and 80-HD arrives at Dog Man's House. Dog Man, Li'l Petey, Molly and 80-HD are playing, while Petey sat on a chair, looking sad. Molly asked Petey (She calls him "Wally" but Petey corrected his name) about his problem that he's going to work with Dr. Scum. The children try to comfort him but it's already evening, so Petey told Molly to go home, while Li'l Petey has to go to bed. Petey goes upstairs and falls asleep.

In Petey's dream, young Petey wakes up in the hospital. Grace greets him and asks him if his tail feels better, when Petey tells her it doesn't hurt as much. He then asks her if his dad had come, and she responds that he hadn't yet, but she had called him and left about fifty thousand messages. This makes Petey have hope that his dad would be arriving soon.

All of a sudden, Petey wakes up because Li'l Petey had just came into the room and asks him if he was dreaming about him, to which Petey denies and says he was dreaming about himself when he was younger, before getting interrupted by Li’l Petey, who asks if they can watch a movie, to which Petey tells him no and tells him to go back to bed. Li'l Petey, annoyed, goes back into his room as Petey goes back to sleep.

Young Petey and Grace had just gotten out of the hospital and to their house. Grace notices an eviction fee on the door, meaning that they must move. Petey then asks where they would live now, and Grace tells him that she's heard of a place that should be perfect. On the bus to Bedford Falls, Petey asks his mom if dad is going to live with them, and Grace sadly says she didn't think so.

Chapter 9: Tanks for Nothing

The next morning, Petey is seen putting on a tie. Li'l Petey asks if he can go to work with him, but Petey tells him no and that he needs to stay and make sure Dog Man doesn't leave as he's supposed to be in jail and that if anyone sees him, they'll all be in trouble.

As Petey leaves for work, Li'l Petey tells 80-HD and Dog Man that it looks like a job for the new and improved Supa Buddies as he calls Molly, which flies to Dog Man's House in her mecha suit as Petey walks to Robo-Time Industries.

When Petey opens the door and says hello, Dr. Scum responds by saying that he’s just in time and that he might want to hold onto something as he presses a button to turn the factory into a tank. Petey asks what was happening, and Dr. Scum replies saying that his factory was too small for an army of A.I. Buddies, so he needs something of Petey’s, his lab. As the building comes toward the lab, Petey shouts and says it's not even finished yet, but Dr. Scum takes the factory and makes it join together, and saying it's finished. Petey tells him angrily that that wasn't a part of the deal, to which Dr. Scum tells him he's altering the deal and that Petey should pray he doesn't alter it any further.

Chapter 10: Multiple Singularity

Sarah Hatoff reports on the popularity of A.I. buddies. She again confuses Dr. Scum for a new guy. Scum shows her how personal the robots are; the factory scans a person's face 3D prints a replica of their face. The A.I. goes to do their jobs, while they do ''important stuff'' like playing games, endless scrolling, doing duck lips, and taking selfies. Meanwhile, both A.I. robots of Dr. Scum and Dog Man utilize pink and purple spray paint to stir a fight with the prison inmates over the bunnies. Painted on opposing sides, the inmates then destroy the supporting pillar and the jail collapses, allowing them to escape.

Chapter 11: The Infiltration

Sarah and Dr. Scum are in a plane seeing all the A.I. Sarah spots Maude and the Judge with binoculars, calls for a stop, and finds out they are joining in on the fun, so they can do ''important stuff'' like social media and cat videos. A.I. has now dominated society. Sarah calls out of the new and improved Supa Buddies, who are located in a Dog Man's house, across a retro-kitsch styled den, down a long hallway, in an elevator, up to the top floor, in a grand ballroom. Li'l Petey, Molly and 80-HD are working. When complete, Li'l Petey uses his new Lightning Mittens, but all of a sudden, it destroys Dog Man's roof. Molly likes how dangerous they are, so the two continued to make a shark-inspired costume for 80-HD.

Chapter 12: Robo Revolt

The A.I. robots of Dog Man and Dr. Scum climb a hill and pronounce how much better A.I. is better than people; smarter, faster and stronger. During this revolutionary speech, A.I. Dog Man transforms, and A.I. overthrows the people they were serving. All the A.I. robots come together and fuse with A.I Dog Man, making a gigantic robot. The real Dr. Scum watches from his factory and calls on Petey to make more robots- triple their production and reprogram new robots to resist the resistance. They will not go down without a fight.

Chapter 13: Big Fight

When desperate times call for spectacular acts of bravery and heroics, the new Supa Buddies suit up with presence of mind to meet their fate. Dog Man uses his bone with rotor blades that allows him to fly, while Li'l Petey declares the Supa Buddies to "Power Up". Out of Dog Man's house flies Molly in her mecha suit, Li'l Petey becomes The Firecracker Kid, 80-HD as Ninja Shark, and Dog Man is The Scarlet Shedder. They fly over to the giant A.I. robot, where they will attack the byte brain. The robot flicks Molly across the globe with a giant finger. She fells down by a forest and rearranges the sign "Forrest Dairy" to "Sorry I Farted" before flying back. Meanwhile, Li'l Petey is using his new gloves and 80-HD is biting the appendages. He is flung through the buildings but is not hurt. Dog Man sprinkles the Exploding Bugs can on the A.I. but then, Sarah is seen in danger. The Supa Buddies fly over, but the claw she was trapped in traps the Supa Buddies. All of our heroes lost their powers, and Sarah Hatoff is revealed to be A.I. Dr. Scum in disguise.

Chapter 14: Petey Dreams Again

Petey is working tirelessly in the factory and rotating the hands of a clock, Exhausted, he falls into a conveyor belt and slides through some working gears. He hits his head and resumes his dream.

He and his Mom arrive at Happy Home Shelter and check in. Petey is disappointed by the room, and it doesn't have the things he once had. Grace is about to tell Petey the truth, but Little Jim suddenly appears in the doorway and comes in to admire their big apartment. Grace asks Little Jim where his parents were, and Little Jim responds that they were ''in Heaven''. This upsets Grace, but Little Jim reassures her that he isn't sad. He struggles with the quote his mother used to say; "We can't control the wind, but we can control our sails". Grace welcomes him into her family, hugging both the kids.

Petey wakes up to Dr. Scum yelling at him, but he happily walks out the door.

Chapter 15: Petey Adjusts His Sails

Dr. Scum follows Petey out to his plane, and Petey gets in. Dr. Scum says he cannot quit, but Petey turns on the propeller and shreds their contract. Petey flies past the giant hand holding the Supa Buddies, and into the nose of the A.I. giant. He uses his tie to lasso the switch and turn it off. The force field turns off, and Molly revs up her chainsaw, cutting of the fingers of the robot. A.I Scum tries to ask for sensible actions, but Li'l Petey responds by using his Lighting Gloves to blow up the whole robot and exploded.

Dr. Scum shows up and melts down, complaining that he is not a new villain, that he was the mastermind behind it. A cop shows up and arrests him, since he confessed. Sarah reports on the end of the disaster. She hopes everyone learned a lesson, but everyone is still into their phones. Chief and Nurse Lady return from their honeymoon, as he takes back his hat from Maude, who is using her phone with the Judge. He asked what happened recently during the fight.

Chapter 16: Bedtime for Buddies

Molly points out the "Wally" (Petey) is back, but Petey is happy to see Li'l Petey, his son, so he ignores it. It was not necessary, according to him, to cut off the fingers. Molly, Dog Man, 80-HD and Petey and Li'l Petey go back to Dog Man's house for pizza and ice cream. Petey is angry but calms down because it is not about what happened to him today, but how he reacted to it, thinking about his mother and how he is a good guy now. Everyone hugs Petey as they walk off at nighttime.

Trivia

• The book title is based off the 1850 book The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne.
• The book was supposed to release in Australia on March 2024, but delayed to April 1st, 2024 due to religious holidays. However, the book is pushed back to release on its main release date.
• Scholastic didn't have a cover reveal announcement for this book, however the cover showed up first on the Scholastic, Planet Pilkey and Dav Pilkey's Epic Comic Club websites and Dog Man Books Facebook Fan Page.
• The book is dedicated to Kazu Kibuishi and his family, likely because he finished the Amulet series earlier this year.
• Li’l Petey and Molly sings the Bridal March in D Major. It is composed by Richard Wagner in 1850 and is commonly used in weddings.
• When Judge trips at the stairs and the new city hall was destroyed, he said "Look What You Made Me Do!" to Maude. This is a reference to Taylor Swift's song of the same name, which is included in her album Reputation released in 2017.
• In the jail that Dog Mans's A.I. Buddy was sent to, the prisoner's eyes look like normal vertical lines when they are first seen, but they have sclera in the Blip-O-Rama and afterwards. This could be a mistake by Dav.
• Dr. Scum shows Sarah where everyone is using their their phones in one chapter. One of them is playing Super Mario Bros. on a Tablet.
• Page 183 has music for 80-HD, dressed as a shark. This may be the music from Jaws, because he bites the appendage soon after.
• Molly cutting off the Giant A.I. robot of Dog Man's fingers references how in Taxi Driver (1976) protagonist Travis Bickle shoots off the fingers of the guy in the brothel.
• There are some references to Captain Underpants, another book series by Dav Pilkey:
  • An Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) robot of a Dr. Scum look-alike went to Everything Except Fabric Softener store to get robot supplies. This establishment first appears in Captain Underpants and the Wrath of the Wicked Wedgie Woman and is used as a running gag in some volumes.
  • Mecha Molly fell down at the forest that has the sign "Forrest Dairy". She swapped the letters that forms into "Sorry I Farted". George and Harold likes to switch letters in signs to make funny statements.
  • The conflict resolution of "Ka-BOOM!" recalls back to how the books resolved; "to make a long story short".
• It is never revealed how long Dog Man will be red, but he will have to remain that way to address that in the future.
  • In Dog Man: Big Jim Begins, his red stain is gone, however his Scarlet Shredder costume remains the color.
• This book is regarded as more standalone compared to other books in the series. There is no overarching story connecting it to the series aside from select character development.
• This is the first book in the series that does not have a How-to-Draw Section, although it has moved to Power Up! Magazine.

Goofs and Errors

• In the final whole-page panel at the end of the book, Petey has an evil expression in the reflection in the water.
• In the jail that Dog Man's A.I. Buddy was sent to, the prisoner's eyes look like normal vertical lines when they are first seen.

Notes

• Turpitude means "wickedness" or "shamefulness".
• Bedford Falls is a fictional city and is also a reference to the movie "It's A Wonderful Life", directed by Frank Capra in 1946. The location is first mentioned by Flippy in Cat Kid Comic Club: Collaborations.
• In Chapter 12, the giant Dog Man A.I. robot is designed and drawn by hand during the time Dav Pilkey wrote and illustrate this book, but contains visual inconsistencies using references from generative A.I. artworks that reflects continuity errors, such as amount of fingers or wordart that is not understandable by people.
• The speech from the A.I. Robot of Dr. Scum in pages 165-169 is based from actual threats created by OpenAI's GPT-3 (Generative Pre-trained Transformer 3).
• When Sarah turns out that Dr. Scum is disguising her, she mentions that they are putting everyone in the People's Zoo. It is referenced by Philip K. Dick's A.I. robot that proposes to keep humans warm and safe in a people zoo that many people believes it's a joke.  
• The futuristic machines in Chapter 14: Petey Dreams Again (Pages 190-191) are based from the silent films Metropolis by Fritz Lang in 1927 and Modern Times by Charlie Chaplin in 1936.
• During Petey's dream flashback in Chapter 14: Petey Dreams Again, Little Jim mentions country music singer Dolly Parton's quote: "We can't control the wind, but we can adjust our sails." It is also referenced in the following Chapter 15: Petey Adjusts His Sails.
• The Power Up! Magazine is an exclusive magazine for independent bookstores in the US, Canada and UK during the release week of Dog Man: The Scarlet Shedder. It contains activities, including how-to-draws that are moved here. The digital version was supposed to be released on June 1, 2024 on the Planet Pilkey website, however, it was delayed to August 16, 2024.

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