<P> Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie is a 2017 American computer - animated superhero comedy film based on the children's novel series of the same name by Dav Pilkey . It was produced by DreamWorks Animation, and Mikros Image Montreal with Technicolor Animation Productions provided animation . It was directed by David Soren from a screenplay by Nicholas Stoller, and stars the voices of Kevin Hart, Ed Helms, Thomas Middleditch, Nick Kroll, Jordan Peele, and Kristen Schaal . The plot follows two imaginative elementary school pranksters named George Beard and Harold Hutchins (voiced by Hart and Middleditch) who hypnotize their mean - spirited principal, Mr. Krupp (voiced by Helms), into thinking he is Captain Underpants, a superhero who fights crime while wearing only underwear and a cape, and the main protagonist of George and Harold's comic books . </P> <P> Captain Underpants premiered on May 21, 2017, at the Regency Village Theater in Los Angeles, and was released in the United States on June 2, 2017, in 3D and 2D . The film received generally positive reviews from critics and has grossed $125 million worldwide against a budget of $38 million, making it the lowest - budgeted computer - animated feature of DreamWorks Animation's history . This was the last DreamWorks Animation film to be distributed by 20th Century Fox . With the film's release in Saudi Arabia paired with The Emoji Movie on January 13, 2018, both became the first films to be given official public screenings in the country in 35 years after the removal of Saudi Arabia's cinema ban . </P> <P> In the city of Piqua, Ohio, two fourth - grade friends and next - door neighbors named George Beard (Kevin Hart) and Harold Hutchins (Thomas Middleditch) are the pranksters at their school, Jerome Horwitz Elementary School . They excessively prank the cruel teachers, with many of these pranks directed at their "evil" principal, Mr. Benjamin "Benny" Krupp (Ed Helms), putting the two at odds with him . The duo also create comic books about a superhero named Captain Underpants, a character who has superpowers and wears underwear and a cape . They sell these to their schoolmates through a comic company called Treehouse Comix Inc., located in their treehouse . George and Harold's pranks come to an apparent end after they're caught tampering with a toilet invention, the Turbo Toilet 2000, made by the school's local snitch and intellectual, Melvin Sneedly (Jordan Peele), on video . Because of this, Mr. Krupp has no choice but to annihilate their friendship by putting them into separate classes . </P> <P> To prevent this, George hypnotizes Mr. Krupp with a 3D Hypno Ring he received out of a box of Frosted Sugar Doodles . The boys see that Mr. Krupp bears an odd resemblance to Captain Underpants without his toupee and command him to be Captain Underpants . The boys soon learn the severity of their actions when "Captain Underpants" begins causing problems around Piqua . To prevent these issues, the boys take him to their treehouse, where they discover that they can turn Captain Underpants back into Mr. Krupp by splashing water on him and can turn him back into Captain Underpants by snapping their fingers . Believing that Mr. Krupp will continue trying to separate them, they decide to settle with Captain Underpants but insist that he be dressed up as Mr. Krupp under the pretense of a "secret identity," to which Captain Underpants agrees . His sudden personality change even manages to attract the attention (and affection) of the school's shy lunch lady, Edith (Kristen Schaal). </P>

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