Retromorphs??: Vegemorphs: The Fungus Among Us

 
Remember when I used to cover Animorphs? I really need to get back into that. But until then, I'll have to settle with covering the bizarre parody book that I had no clue existed until a couple years ago. I've covered parody books for Goosebumps in the bizarre Gooflumps books, and they didn't do a strong enough job being parodies that felt in the spirit of the books they lampooned. Can this be the case? Let's look at Vegemorphs: The Fungus Among Us. 

COVER STORY

This cover is fine. It feels enough like a spoof on Animorphs covers, but lacks the more photo realistic look that made those covers more engaging and disturbing. Apparently there were plans to go closer to the design of the original covers, but was scrapped. 

STORY

So, right off the bat we get an intro similar to those from the Animorphs books where the protagonist tells us that they can't reveal their real names, or where they live, because the evil fungus known as the Jerkks might find out. Our narrator is our Jake stand-in named Kyle, but he insists no to use his real name, so he's Kale. He's a vegemorph. He has friends similar to that of the Animorphs books, Carrot, Tomato, his cousin Radish and Olive, a girl he pines for. But, by chapter two, the author, the cleverly named Leif E. Green, already gives up on the code name shtick and tells us that Tomato is Tommy, the Marco of the group, Carrot is Cary, the Tobias, Radish is Randi, the Rachel, and Olive is Olivia, the Cassie. 

They hang out at a bingo parlor, but not because they're indy wrestlers, but because it's to stop from being assaulted with apple cores by a group called the Buff Bunch. The kids leave the bingo parlor and head home, cutting through a place called Withers' Field. Suddenly, they see a giant flying saucer shaped like a mushroom. They gag from the mushroom smell, but suddenly notice something exiting the ship, a giant walking piece of broccoli. This is Prince Brassica of the vegetable kingdom, a race of sentient super vegetables (well, more sentient than normal vegetables). 

Prince Brassica and his kind have lived underground on Earth for a while, as they've been chased by fungus creatures known as Jerkks. The Jerkks go from planet to planet, making everything rot, including the creatures who inhabit it. This now includes Earth. They're also parasites that can control humans too, just like Yeerks do. Prince Brassica gives the kids the power to fight back against the Jerkks by giving them the power to morph into vegetables. The kids, particularly Tommy, , don't get how being vegetables will help them fight this war, but Prince Brassica tells them that being vegetables will help them communicate with the super vegetables and be undetected by the Jerkks. 

How does the morphing work? They have to smell the vegetable they choose to morph and it'll keep their DNA inside of them. The object, instead of being a cube, is a bottle of salad dressing that Kale has to get. Kyle goes down a series of tunnels and finds it in a fridge, takes it back up and the kids all hold the bottle, gaining the power of vegetable morphing. A gimmick that the Vegemorphs have over the Animorphs is that they can turn others into vegetables too by talking really boring and monotone while picturing the vegetable in their mind. So, that's a plus, I guess? Also, the time limit is apparently you can't go past recommended cooking time or you'll be trapped forever as a vegetable.

The Jerkks soon arrive. The first are these slender creatures that have an eye on a tentacle named Trichophyton, proficient in giving people athlete's foot. Like Hork-Bajir, they were a peaceful race that got taken over by the Jerkks. Then we get our Visser Three in a form of a giant piece of broccoli named Fun Gus. He can morph into any vegetable too. We get a similar situation where Prince Brassica, much like Elfangor, gets killed. The kids run for it and eventually make it home without being caught.

The next day, Kyle wakes up to see Cary as a giant carrot. Kyle thinks it's a dream, but Cary insists it's not and that morphing vegetable is a thrill. He then morphs all the way into a regular sized carrot, who then asks Kyle to spread some salad dressing on him. Okay, I think this has gone from parody book to fetish porn. Kyle runs into his brother Bryce, who is feeling flu-ish, but not fully controlled I guess. He sees carrot Cary and throws him in the vegetable bin. After he leaves to go to Farmer Withers' field, Kyle gets Cary out of the bin as it's almost time to demorph or he'll be stuck, I guess? But Cary's too cold, so he has to be run under the sink to get nice and warm-Okay, I'm definitely reading a fetish book.

The kids suspect that Bryce is a Jerkk due to having fungus related illness, in this case athlete's foot. Same with Farmer Withers, owner of the field, who has strep throat. You know, maybe this was not the year to cover a story about flu-like symptoms. That night, after dodging eating vegetables, the rest of the group learn how to morph into different vegetables while almost being caught by Bryce a bunch more times. They later go out to morph some more, but get caught by a bully named Biff and his friends. They want to learn how to morph vegetables too, so the kids talk about boring stuff, which turns Biff and the others into celery stalks. 

The next day, the Vegemorphs head to a restaurant called Veggie Village, where they see that Biff and his friends have morphed fully into celery, so I guess they're dead now kinda? Prince Brassica shows up with his family, yeah, he's still alive to warn the kids that things are getting worse. Everyone in town is getting infected with athlete's foot and rashes but don't seem to care. This is a result of meetings known as The Snoring where the strongest Jerkks, Rubrum Jerrks, take over. This is the now or never moment for the Vegemorphs if they want to slow down this invasion.

Prince Brassica and the others morph into giant carrots, kale, tomatoes, radishes and olives and get ready to fight. They commandeer some trucks and drive to the field where the Jerkks have most of the people under control, making them look like the Angry Video Game Nerd for some reason. They manage to destroy most of the Jerks, but Cary gets hit with the fungus and it seems like he's dead. The next day, Kyle wakes up to learn that everyone's okay, though his brother still has some rubrum issues. He then sees Cary, who's trapped in carrot form, but still alive. The book ends with Prince Brassica informing Kyle that the battle is far from over.

CONCLUSION

Vegemorphs, as a parody of Animorphs, particularly that of the first book, is a really well done parody. The author clearly read the first book to get the flow of how the story works. And it does hit many of the beats of that first book. From the first encounter with Elfangor, getting the morphing powers, Visser Three and the Yeerks attacking, Tobias' first morph, Tom being a controller, the sharing, and the final battle. On that note it works better than Gooflumps at being a parody. At being a good book though... not so much. The plot is very messy and doesn't flow even half as well as you'd hope. There's a lot of vegetable puns, as expected, and very few hit all that well. It tries for gross out humor, but at least doesn't feel as annoyingly gross as Gooflumps at least. And despite the premise, the book was just kind of boring. Feeling like the concept was great, but the execution just ultimately didn't work as well as hoped. In the end, this is a mixed bag of a book. Solid as a spoof,  but messy as an actual interesting story. It's a stale salad of a story.