The inspiration for Super Diaper Baby came mostly from my love of comic books. As a kid, I never read comics very much, but I really enjoyed making them (check out The Adventures of Water Man to see some examples of the comics I made as a kid).
When I began writing the Captain Underpants books, I modeled George and Harold after myself as a kid. So naturally, they both loved to make comic books, too. It’s always fun for me to try to incorporate George and Harold’s silly comics into their adventures. The comics are fun to make, and fun to draw, too.
When I was making Captain Underpants and the Wrath of the Wicked Wedgie Woman (which contains three comics by George and Harold), I began to imagine how much fun it would be to do an entire book of comics. At first, I wanted to do a collection of short, unrelated comic stories by George and Harold. I wrote down a bunch of ideas and titles. But Super Diaper Baby didn’t really appear until I began to draw sketches.
This was my very first drawing of Super Diaper Baby.
I started with a round head, and then began sketching out other characters… like a flying dog, and an evil piece of poop. This sketch was the beginning of everything. I liked the way the baby looked so much, that I immediately decided to do a whole book about him.
