“Reprimand reprimand reprimand!”

I was a big fan of the 1954 creature feature Them! when I was a little kid, so whenever I see something involving giant ants, I have to give it a taste. Sadly the cover for this one falsely advertises a terrifying tale of running from big-jawed bugs. It’s actually a whimsical sci-fi adventure in the style of a Hanna Barberra cartoon. I liked those as a kid, too, so it could be worse.

You are a young computer whiz in the employ of Zondo Quest Group II who lives in a spherical apartment that can holographically change itself to any environment you want. Off to a great start, but I’m left wondering what happened to Zondo Quest Group I. Presumably they made a wrong choice in another book and died spectacularly.

A few chapters in I started to realize something: not a lot of choices have been offered in this choice book. I went five or six chapters in before I finally got to a place where I could influence the narrative, but on the plus side, this was largely due to the story’s worldbuilding. You get sprinkled with a lot of world details in this CYOA volume, about snooty martians and weird space tech and cranky robot supervisors and gelatin-filled office chairs and the Zimbabwe Adventure Academy Part Deux. I actually didn’t mind the immersion so much.

Until they mentioned the evil-for-the-sake-of-it villain, the Evil Power Master.

I’ll repeat that: the Evil. Power. Master.

I’ve heard some cringy bad guy names in my time. So far that one takes the cake.

Regrettably, as I said before, we don’t run and hide from giant voracious ants. We get shrunken down to meet with highly intelligent ants who just wanna be space nerds like everyone else. It’s this Evil Power Master who’s come out of left field to do harm to the galaxy, seemingly just for kicks. Honestly, the story doesn’t even need this guy. The idea of exploring a tiny underground ant colony is a cool enough premise to carry a story like this, whether it takes the kitschey sci-fi route or the creature feature route. The Zamboni Job Brigade doesn’t need the generic supervillain at all. He kinda drags the story down with his stupid name and stupider, nebulous plans for galactic conquest/destruction/whatever.

This is the guy. The Evil Power Master, as rendered by Jason Millet.

As you’ve probably already noticed, the artwork in this book is amazing.

In fact, the artwork is the highlight of the book. Every illustration looks like it belongs in a vintage pulp comic, or maybe one of the better installments of Interplanetary Spy.

There are times when it misses, though, but not because of the drawing quality. More like “hilarious misinterpretation.” One chapter describes the martian dude smiling at his friend as he waves goodbye, while the accompanying illustration is a closeup of said four-eyed martian leering at the reader like he’s about to kill them in their sleep.

Another chapter describes the ants forming a ladder with their bodies for a non-ant character to climb, described as an “ant-ladder”. The illustration shows the dude climbing a literal ladder! I guess those mistakes happen when you’re paid to crank out art for a children’s book overnight.

Prisoner of the Ant People is a bit of a miss overall, but if you’re into whimsical sci-fi tales, it might be right up your alley. The title and cover suggest a perilous adventure where you’re at the mercy of killer ants, but the actuality is much tamer than that, and really feels like two or three stories stapled together to make a complete book. The sci-fi elements are kind of fun, and they do pull you into the world of the story. And the art always rocks, even when the artist didn’t quite get the memo about what he was supposed to be drawing.

A more appropriate title might have been Zanzibar Space Squad and the Ant People or something kooky like that, with a cover image depicting an ant-man doing science on a space computer. Maybe add an angry robot supervisor in the background having a fit.