Kirkus Reviews
A zippy graphic-novel series opener featuring two comically bumbling reptile detectives. As agents of SUIT (Special Undercover Investigation Team) with customized VESTs (Very Exciting Spy Technology) boasting the latest gadgetry, the bright green InvestiGators Mango and Brash receive their newest assignment. The reptilian duo must go undercover at the Batter Down bakery to find missing mustachioed Chef Gustavo and his secret recipes. Before long, the pair find themselves embroiled in a strange and busy plot with a scientist chicken, a rabid were-helicopter, an escape-artist dinosaur, and radioactive cracker dough. Despite the great number of disparate threads, Green manages to tie up most neatly, leaving just enough intrigue for subsequent adventures. Nearly every panel has a joke, including puns ("gator done!"), poop jokes, and pop-culture references (eagle-eyed older readers will certainly pick up on the 1980s song references), promising to make even the most stone-faced readers dissolve into giggles. Green's art is as vibrant as an overturned box of crayons an d as highly spirited as a Saturday-morning cartoon. Fast pacing and imaginative plotting (smattered with an explosion here, a dance number there) propel the action through a whimsical world in which a diverse cast of humans live alongside anthropomorphized reptiles and dinosaurs. With its rampant good-natured goofiness and its unrelenting fizz and pep, this feels like a sugar rush manifested as a graphic novel. Silly and inventive fast-paced fun. (Graphic fantasy. 7-10) Copyright Kirkus 2019 Kirkus/BPI Communications. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Reviews
In this sophomore romp, the silly investi-gators take to the sewers to once again save their city. Mango and Brash, the utility vest–sporting A- (for alligator) Team of the Special Undercover Investigation Team, are on the case to locate a rogue robot that received an accidentally transmitted code giving it the ability to combine two things (which is great in the case of the wheels and shoes that make rollerskates but suboptimal in the case of broccoli candy). Also seeking this bot is their foe Crackerdile, an ex–S.U.I.T. agent who's been turned into a crumbly cracker. Crackerdile hopes to use the bot to combine himself with something less brittle. When the city floods, Brash and Mango are blamed and demoted, and S.U.I.T. assigns B-Team badgers Bongo and Marsha to the case. Green's second entry in his ongoing graphic series is as fun and fast-paced as predecessor InvestiGators (2020), with its recognizable candy-colored art and high-octane punning. Young readers who like their humor dialed up to the max should feel right at home here with breezy bathroom humor, chuckle-causing wordplay (puns and goofy acronyms abound), and snort-inducing names including Bill Plungerman the plumber and a reporter called Cici Boringstories. Even for those unfamiliar with this series, this installment makes for a fine jumping-in point, and it should certainly whet appetites for the next proposed volume. Human characters display a variety of skin tones. A surefire crowd pleaser. (Graphic fantasy. 7-10) Copyright Kirkus 2020 Kirkus/BPI Communications. All rights reserved.
Publishers Weekly Reviews
World-famous cupcake maker Gustavo Mustachio hasn't been seen in two weeks, and Mango and Brash, two alligators—wearing V.E.S.T. (Very Exciting Spy Technology) for their work with S.U.I.T. (Special Undercover Investigation Teams)—are dispatched to Gustavo's bakery, Batter Down, to find out more. Brash is level-headed, buoyant Mango can't resist puns and wordplay ("We're alligators. SNAPPY is what we do best!"), and both dive into toilets and travel through city sewers in service of the case. As the head scientist at the Science Factory across town prepares to announce a great discovery, a mysterious customer delivers a giant birthday cake from Batter Down, leading to the Science Factory's explosion and adding another facet to the mystery. Helicopters, many-armed gadgets, and wild schemes proliferate this graphic novel series opener as origin stories explain characters' behavior (and occasionally slow the story's frenetic pace). In high-intensity colors, straightforward panel artwork by Green (
SLJ Express Reviews