Wakka Wakka is back with a new puppet musical, about the adventures of a boy and a dodo bird in the underworld. Compared to the 24-year-old company’s past shows, what most stands out about “Dead as a Dodo,” if anything, is its title.

“Made in China,” for example, was one of the most memorable works of theater I’ve ever seen,  equal parts surreal fantasy, barbed political satire, bawdy romantic comedy, and hilariously inventive visual spectacle.  “Dead as a Dodo” is also a surreal fantasy, but there is nothing barbed or bawdy or hilarious about it – although there is some morbid humor, and I suppose its lack of political or puppet-pornographic content makes it more suitable for children (ages 7 and up.) There is some visual spectacle and inventive creatures, but they’re often difficult to make out, because everything is dark. I mean literally dark, but the story, such as it is, also begins as a dark one. 

Both the boy and the dodo start out as skeletons, and not healthy ones. Early on, the boy sings:

So I’m missing an arm 
And my ribs are all broken
I’ve lost half my teeth
And my skull is cracked-open 
Yes I’m falling apart 
And I’m close to the end 
still I’ve gotta take heart 
Because I’ve got a friend and my friend is a dodo 

 They spend their time searching for new bones to replace the broken ones, but they have little luck, because the underworld is ruled by the Bone King, who hoards bones. Early on, we see him using a skull as a bowling ball. His daughter the Bone Princess, uses skulls for a drum set, during which her father joins her with a bone guitar.

The Bone King gets a line that implies a past apocalypse (“The surface is dead. Everything is artificial. Nothing lives anymore. “) but nothing more is made of this. And in any case, things start looking up. 

The dodo suddenly starts growing feathers, and eventually speaks, and ultimately (spoiler alert) the dodo gets a happy ending, fully feathered, roosting on the surface with a new chick, evidently no longer extinct. I missed how this happened – I’m fairly certainly they don’t explain it – but in any case, before the ending, the boy and the dodo set out on a series of encounters. They meet a gondolieri on the River Styx, a mammoth, a monster, a neon whale, some scavengers, rock creatures, devilish goats, the Fantastic Mr. Fox. Over the course of the 80 minutes of “Dead as a Dodo,”  Wakka Wakka’s puppeteers, dressed in black outfits that sparkle, bring all these creatures to life – or is it death? 

Dead as a Dodo is at the Baruch Performing Arts Center through January 19 as part of the Under the Radar festival.