Review Detail

Two-Headed Chicken: Beak to the Future

Middle Grade Fiction 3190

The Butterfly Effect in Action

October 15, 2023 (Updated: June 03, 2026)

Overall rating

3.5

Plot

3.0

Characters

3.0

Writing Style

4.0

Illustrations/Photos (if applicable)

4.0

The Two-Headed Chicken is back, and ready to travel in time. Using the AstroCap, they travel back into the Timestream (also referred to as "Tammy") to visit prehistory. They have been warned about the Butterfly Effect, but tell a knock knock joke when they travel back in time, therefore changing the world. They are now a duckter cuckoo, and spend a great deal of time trying to change the world and get back to the way they were. The AstroCap's 45 second charging time makes for some narrow escapes as they encounter some of their old nemeses, including Kernel Antler (who looks like a crocodile). They also get stuck in a time loop (or do they?), meet Emily Dickinson, enter a role playing game called The Magical Gathering of Dragons in Dungeons, and even fight book banners! Eventually, they are restored to their original incarnations, and use a book of poetry to inspire a young artist named Tom Anklebarker, or something like that, to create a comic book with a two-headed chicken in it.

Good Points

Like the first book in the series, this is a frenetic goof fest of crazy adventures and silly conflicts, illustrated in a hyperactive style. There are close up photographs of brocolli to illustrate the time stream, Victorian clip art and sepia toned pages with information about Bangerter's Marvelous Time Cap, and a lot of brightly colored comic style illustrations that are heavy on bright blue, purple, red and yellow.

I especially appreciated the fact that on one of the activity pages, it is mentioned that if the reader has a library book, there are printable pages at twoheadedchicken.com, but the site didn't seem to have activity pages.

Not surprisingly, Angleberger gives a shout out to Daniel Pinkwater's work like the 1982 The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death, and this certainly embraces that stream of conscious style, replete with random characters, sight gags, and self referential jokes. This graphic novel would definitely be a good way to warm up younger readers for eventually picking up Pinkwater's 2007 The Neddiad: How Neddie Took the Train, Went to Hollywood, and Saved Civilization (Neddie & Friends, #1).

Readers who love Dav Pilkey's work or Green's Investigators will appreciate the frenzied art and nonstop jokes as the Two-Headed Chicken travels through the chronoverse getting into trouble. Things work out in the end, but who knows when further opportunities to POOOOOZB might occur!