Gooseblog: Goosebumps #41: Bad Hare Day

Alakazam! Alakazook! It's time to cover another Goosebumps book! Put on your best top hat, make sure there's nothing up your sleeve, and bring plenty of carrots. It's Bad Hare Day AKA Magical Mystery Snooze.

COVER STORY

This cover is Goofy. Really goofy. Granted, much like how Tim Jacobus had to try and make a hamster look scary, trying to make a rabbit scary does seem like a tough thing to execute. Or, you know, make a rabbit scary but not Watership Down scary. Even when I was scared by the book covers, this was always one I found to be an exception. From the rabbit's sinister looking eyes, the unnecessary warping that these later covers love so much, to the most damning thing, that goofy ass jaw and teeth. It doesn't even make sense. How does it close its mouth? Does it get a really bad case of slackjaw? What is going on here? In the end, it really doesn't work as a scary cover, and certainly doesn't sell you on this book.

STORY

Magic enthusiast Tim Swanson is our lead for this book. He's a massive fan of magic with dreams of being a professional magician like his hero Amaz-O. He like to hold his own magic shows for his friends. Too bad for him he has a bratty little sister named Ginny who likes to just spoil all the secrets. Unlike the other bratty siblings, this is a bratty sibling that knows Karate, which means not only does Tim's act get messed with, but he gets a kick to the gut for his troubles. He threatens to tell on her, but she retorts by threatening to give him a paralyzing chop to the neck.

After School, Tim walks home with his best friend Foz (holy crap, the nicknames are getting worse!), but stops at Malik's Magic Shoppe. It's where Tim buys all of his magic stuff. Malik gives Tim two free passes to Amaz-O's upcoming magic show, then shows him one of his latest items. A large wooden box with a mini-guillotine. Foz accidentally pulls a lever which chops off Foz's hand! No, wait, it's all slight of hand, literally, as Foz is perfectly fine. He still has a crummy nickname, but he's fine. The two kids head home, realizing that their parents will never let them go to Amaz-O's show since it's so late at night. The next day, Tim tries a magic trick with Foz's sister's rabbit, only to almost lose it, and allowing for Ginny to get another one-up on him. Also Tim, being an idiot, tells Ginny about the free passes, meaning that he has to take her or else she'll tattle. So, with no other choice, the two kids sneak out to Midnight Mansion, where the magic show is being held.

The Amaz-O show goes pretty well, he does tricks like pull doves out of his hat, and this strange one where he threads a bunch of needles by shoving a bunch in his mouth, and managing to get them all on a string. He eventually needs a volunteer from the audience. Tim volunteers, since it's a chance to work with his hero. It's a disappearing trick where Tim is placed in a box that spins around until it makes him vanish. Of course the trick is there's a trapdoor that sends him into a hidden room. However, the show ends and Amaz-O never shows up to let Tim out. Instead Tim finds a way out himself, and runs into Amaz-O and a rabbit. He tries to talk to Amaz-O, but he just hears "Go Away, Punk!" instead. Tim heads home, but not before stealing Amaz-O's magic kit, like all good people would.

Tim and Ginny head home, and that night he peeks into the kit. He tries on Amaz-O's jacket, only to find live snakes inside it. No, wait, they're just mechanical snakes that look real. Tim later shows Foz and Ginny the contents of the kit and tries to perform the different acts, only with them continuing to get worse and worse. He tries a red ball under the cup trick which just leads to hundreds of red balls popping up everywhere. Like a clown orgy hit and they all forgot their red noses. Doves fly out of the hat, more snakes start slithering. And the magic wand that came with the kit doesn't seem to work. Things get so bad that the kids literally have to leave the attic while it's in disarray. I'd say the parents would be concerned, but these are Goosebumps parents after all, the biggest idiots in bookdom.

Instead of leaving well enough alone, the kids just go outside instead. Ginny looks into the magic kit and sees a carrot, and takes a bite out of it. This causes her to turn into a rabbit, which was something that Tim had been threatening to do to her all book due to her being such a brat. Tim's in a panic because this would be a thing that the Goosebumps parents would actually be concerned about. He tries to get her to eat the carrot again, but that doesn't do anything. He then finds a piece of paper with a spell, but it's conveniently windy enough to blow the paper out of his hands, so Tim and Foz chase after it, only for it to get ruined in a stream. Honestly, given what we've seen so far in these books, that was probably a spell that brought dummies to life. And then you'd have to be their sex slaves.

With no other alternative, Tim and Foz take Ginny to Midnight Mansion, hoping to find Amaz-O. They sneak in and find Amazo standing silently at a wall. When they grab him, he collapses in a heap. Amaz-O is just a large puppet. They hear a voice telling them to leave, and they soon learn it's coming from a rabbit. The rabbit is the real Amaz-O! He tells Tim and Foz that he used to be human, but a rival sorcerer cast a spell that turned him into a rabbit. A rabbit that can somehow manipulate a human sized dummy. Tim pleads with Amaz-O to fix Ginny, but the rabbit says he can't. By which he means that this is a temporary spell and she'll be better in an hour or so.

TWIST ENDING

Amaz-O then looks to Tim, offering him a permanent spot in the magic act. Tim, being starstruck and an idiot, easily agrees. And we end the book with Tim, now transformed into a rabbit, being used in the magic act instead of Amaz-O. But he doesn't care, he's in show business! And and Idiot! Eh, I guess it's a better living than being constantly karate chopped by Ginny.

CONCLUSION

Bad Hare Day is mediocre at best. They do give us some interesting stuff with magic, particularly during Amaz-O's act, and the stuff with the snakes does lead to one decent scare in the book. But that's really the highlight of a really dull book. Tim's okay as a lead, Ginny is one of the most annoying sibling characters in a long time (almost Tara from Cuckoo Clock of Doom bad), and Foz is... also a character. The story flows well enough, but there's not much that feels engaging or makes you want to keep going. Even the twist, which you could see coming a mile away really doesn't feel all that impactful. Oh look, Stine turned a kid into an animal again. At least it didn't derail the book this time, I'll give him that one. This one became more of a fast-forward book for me. One that I read from front to back, but one that I finished quick enough that it never really left me with anything to care about. It's not in the absolute worst of the series, and maybe I'm more in the latter and this is a more beloved one by others, but it's not one I'd go back to any time soon. Bad Hare Day gets a C-.