Captain Underpants and the Wrath of the Wicked Wedgie Woman
Dav Pilkey
 George and Harold's teacher Ms. Ribble is planning on retiring at the end of the school year. She forces everyone to make happy retirement cards for her. George and Harold make a Captain Underpants comic book in which Ms. Ribble is the villain "Wedgie Woman" instead, and are sent to Mr. Krupp's office. Once there, Miss Anthrope (the school secretary) makes the boys run some errands by letting them pass out the "Friday Memo" (a weekly newsletter that shows the events of the upcoming week) to the entire school while she goes out for lunch. Instead, they create several humorous changes to the schedule. They make Monday a No School Day due to "lack of Interest" They make Tuesday a "Wear your pyjamas and pick your nose day" Wedesday becomes a Chaotic day (girls drawing mustaches with primate marker and wear an expired egg-salad sandwich on their heads), They make Thursday a "Food Fighting Day" at the cafeteria and on Friday they make the clothing for picture day a bumblebee costume and whoever has funny faces gets free pizza. They later run into their principal, Mr Krupp, and convince him to sign a blank card, claiming it's for Ms Ribble. Later on, when Mr. Krupp catches them changing letters on a sign and finds out about their comic book that they made about Ms. Ribble, he puts them in detention. Harold defiantly says they won't give Ms. Ribble her card. Mr. Krupp seizes the card and says he'll give it to her personally. Harold secretly smiles at how effective his use of reverse psychology was (George says he has to try it some time) and at how Ms. Ribble will react when she sees the card. Mr. Krupp gives Ms. Ribble the card, it is revealed that Harold wrote in the card, making it look like a marriage proposal from Mr. Krupp to Ms. Ribble. Miss Anthope assumes Ms. Ribble agrees and arranges a wedding, hosting it on Saturday in the school auditorium. Mr. Krupp is too shocked and anxious by this to admit that he doesn't want to marry her, is subsequently unable to say anything except for gibberish and remains indifferent to the following chaotic school week resulting from George and Harold's version of the Friday Memo. At the wedding, George and Harold have no tricks planned . On the altar, just before they get married, Ms. Ribble breaks up with Mr. Krupp, saying she couldn't marry him because he has a funny-looking nose (the joke is that the two of them have identical noses). Mr. Krupp is furious and says he never wanted to marry her anyway, explaining that it was just a trick of George and Harold's. Ms. Ribble goes berserk and tries to attack the boys, but they luckily escape, Ms. Ribble winding up destroying the wedding and having the cake land on her head. When school restarts, Ms. Ribble privately tells them that she has dropped their B's and C's to F's and G's (a G is the only grade lower than an F; in Harold's opinion, there is no such thing as a G in the grading system), so they have to stay back in fourth grade. George suggests they use the 3-D Hypno ring, which George had kept all along. Harold at first objects to the idea, stating it might get them into trouble like the last time they used it on Mr.Krupp in book 1, but soon agrees. The following morning, they use the ring on her, but before George and Harolds' terms are revealed, the reader is taken to the dialogue of a local newscast, which reveals that the police are shutting down the company that made the ring, because of the ring's effect on women: When the ring is used on women, a mental blunder occurs, causing them to do the opposite of what they are told. George and Harold, as an afterthought, tell Ms. Ribble not to do anything crazy, like turn into Wedgie Woman. That night, when George and Harold have returned to their treehouse to spend the night and to celebrate by watching a japanese monster movie to celebrate, Ms. Ribble declares herself to be Wedgie Woman and attacks George and Harold there. Though Ms. Ribble thinks she's Wedgie Woman, she does not have any powers, so Harold and George easily defeat her. She trips and knocks a container of super-power juice (from book 3) off the shelf, and it accidentally spills into her hair and brain, giving her super-powered intelligence and hair, forms into several tiny hands, which can extend great distances, ideal for giving someone a wedgie and holding them hostage in midair. Wedgie Woman kidnaps the boys and brings them back to her house and uses her super-powered intelligence to build robot copies of the two boys, Robo-George and Harold 2000. The robots are equipped with Spray Starch to take away Captain Underpants's powers (as George and Harold wrote in their comic book for Ms. Ribble). Once they hear the word "Tra-la-la!", they will spray the spray starch. The robots pose as George and Harold, except the two of them behave perfectly. When Mr. Krupp snaps (literally) at Harold 2000, he turns himself into Captain Underpants. He thinks that the robots are the real George and Harold and ask them to help (he states that he's surprised that they are larger and can fly). He is defeated by the two robots and their spray starch. Meanwhile, George and Harold are watching the action on Wedgie Woman's TV (built with a fish tank and an electric toothbrush). Wedgie Woman ties them to adjacent chairs and sets a trap for them involving a candle and a hatchet (When the candle burns through the rope, the hatchet will fall on and kill them). Fortunately, the hatchet simply cuts through the ropes, freeing them (Ironically, Harold had just remarked that "that kind of thing only happens in really lame adventure novels".) Wedgie Woman then gives wedgies to all the police officers in town and hangs them from traffic signs, aided by her two robots, which have expanded to gigantic size. George and Harold find Captain Underpants, hung on a lamp post by Robo George and Harold 2000. He is convinced the spray starch took away his powers (it didn't) thanks to the placebo effect (mistakenly called the placenta effect by George and Harold). The two decide to go to the newest store to buy fabric softener, only to find out that the shop sells everything but fabric softener (in fact, the building's name is, "Everything EXCEPT Fabric Softener"). George and Harold then decide to make a comic book about how Captain Underpants was born in a planet called Underpanty World, and how the Wedgie Warlords sprayed the planet with spray starch. The king attempts to save them with a magic amulet, but he accidentally drops it and his baby son eats it. The king and queen save their son, stretching his underpants far behind, and lets go, sending him to earth, where he is found by two elderly people. One night, he has a dream where he sees his old parents, who tell him that he has a magic amulet inside him, and all he has to do is to say the words - "I summon the power of Underpantyworld!”, and he would be free (the story has a large similarity to the story of Superman). Captain Underpants reads the comic, says the words, and regains his powers. He then defeats the two robots. At the showdown between Captain Underpants and Wedgie Woman, Harold retrieves the 3-D Hypno ring, whereas George shouts (rather loudly) to Harold that he's going to get rid of his box of extra-strength spray starch. Hearing this, Wedgie Woman steals all the bottles in the box and sprays them everywhere. When the smoke clears, everyone is bald (except Captain Underpants, who was already bald). The box didn't contain extra-strength spray starch; it contained hair remover and George used reverse psychology to get Wedgie Woman to use it. With her hair gone, Wedgie Woman can no longer harm anyone. The boys hypnotize Ms. Ribble, and by using reverse reverse psychology (they tell her to do the opposite of everything they want her to do), they get her to lose her superpowers, forget everything that happened in the last few weeks, become the nicest teacher in the history of the school, and bake fresh cookies for the class every day. As a result, she becomes a lot more bearable. The story ends with Captain Underpants flying out of the school, George and Harold clinging onto his cape (mainly because when Ms. Ribble told her students the cookies were a "snap" to make, she snapped her fingers).