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The voice actors bear the brunt in bringing these characters to life, including the nasty principal Mr. Krupp (Ed Helms) whose unibrow becomes hairier each time he catches the troublemakers, and mad scientist Professor Poopypants (Nick Kroll), an Einstein clone trying to wipe out everyone’s sense of humour.

The big grey concrete slab they call Jerome Horwitz Elementary School has depressive students regularly hiding in their lockers to avoid Mr. Krupp, whose misanthropic tyranny is a result of his own loneliness (a cliché, but it’s nice that the film fleshes out the villains). In this universe, school is cruel – a literal prison with no arts programs whatsoever – and George and Harold see it as their public duty to pull pranks on the regular to make their schoolmates smile.

When a cereal-box “hypno ring” allows George and Harold to turn their angry principal into their comic-book creation, “Captain Underpants,” with a mere snap of the fingers, the duo can’t help but take advantage of their magic trick. Eventually, though, they have to rein in their boisterous, dimwitted superhero in order to conquer the nefarious Poopypants.

Poopypants isn’t the only one without a sense of humour. For two decades now, teachers, librarians, and parents have had their own knickers in a twist over the series’ toilet humour, improper spelling, and naughty behaviour. But George and Harold are just the latest in a long line of fictional boy characters acting out of sheer boredom – from Bart Simpson to Huckleberry Finn – and misunderstood by humourless adults who seem to have forgotten their own childhoods.