I'm Bad!

The winning team behind I Stink! and I'm Dirty! trade garbage trucks and bulldozers for another machine-size marauder: a green-and-blue T. rex with an attitude. “Are you bad?” taunts the Tyrannosaur, uncannily eye-to-eye with the audience. “I'm really bad... Got rip-'em-up claws. Got bite-'em-up fangs. Bad breath? Yeaaahhhhhhh.” At first, the T. rex fills the full-bleed, tropical spreads in a riot of orange, purple and yellow. A proud bully, he shows off “a swivel neck for watchin' my back,” then whips around to confront the reader again: “Did you just call me Baby Arms? Long as yours, pal.” Despite his posturing, this T. rex is a little defensive, and although he stalks prey, he never catches anything. When he throws a weepy tantrum (“I need chow right now... owowow”), a vertical gatefold pictures a much larger T. rex towering over him. “Mom?! I wasn't crying,” he chirps as she supplies a dead lizard (“Awright—takeout!”). The McMullans play their cards just right—kids will love the joke of the tough guy who still needs his mother. Ages 4–8. (May)