You would be hard pressed to find a franchise that has been as successful for DreamWorks as the Shrek franchise. While not quite the critical darlings of Kung Fu Panda or How To Train Your Dragon, I don’t think there is one that has been the most financially successful or as iconic. Despite the fact it’s last main installment came out over a decade ago, the series continues to be cherish and meme-ed to death years later. Although it’s been since 2010 since the last Shrek movie, there has been at least two spin-offs that have come out, first with the prequel that was the original Puss In Boots released in 2011 and the second being Puss In Boots: The Last Wish, releasing just in time this year for Christmas day. So why not take the time as we approach the final days of the holiday season/year to rank all six of these movies from worst to best? A disclaimer, I’m only including the films in the franchise and leaving out the shorts, tv specials, or the musical because that would just making this list more complicated than it should. Anyways, let’s do this.
6.) Shrek The Third (2007)
Often regarded as one of the biggest letdowns in movie franchise history, this is the installment that lacks the heart and creativity of it’s predecessors in favor of something more gag heavy, tonally inconsistent, and just plain soulless. Throw in a cold opening with a laughably out-of-place Live and Let Die track, a rather annoying new main character in Arthur, Shrek’s awkward parenthood/mid-life crisis arc, and a completely unengaging main villain in Prince Charming and you get quite an underwhelming experience. It has it’s moments such as the body-swap gag between Donkey and Puss (even if that ultimately goes no where) and the admittedly badass princess escape scene (which re-introduces the world to Zeppelin years before Thor: Ragnarok did) but this was when you could tell that this series was running on fumes and relying strictly on the name of it’s brand to make a quick buck.
5.) Shrek Forever After (2010)
The (to-date) final entry of the Shrek series is another bland and unneeded continuation of the franchise, even if it is an improvement over the last one. This attempts to take a page from the book of It’s A Wonderful Life to make this the culmination of the entire franchise up to this point, which ultimately exposes the lack of creative ideas they have left and sets everyone back to square one. Shrek’s arc is a repeat of his arc from the last one, he’s unsatisfied with his current life and wants to go back to the old one, and it somehow feels even more out-of-place/character than it did before, especially with the outburst he has at the beginning, which makes the movie’s ill-conceived character arc for Shrek fall apart in the first ten minutes. Still, the animation is stellar, Rumpelstiltskin is one of the better antagonists in the series, and has a handful of pay-off moments that might just satisfy long-time fans who grew up with the franchise. I suppose you can do worse but you can also do a whole lot better. Or at least be more memorable.
4.) Puss In Boots (2011)
Puss has always been a side character with unlimited potential for engaging stories of his own. While he mostly acts as comic relief in the Shrek movies, he still does have an interesting backstory of his own and an unique presence onscreen that you could see him carrying his own movie without the worry of not having enough Mike Myers or Eddie Murphy thrown into the mix. The first Shrek prequel/spin-off is able to display that quite well, with Antonio Banderas in the front seat this time with his Desperado-co star Salma Hayek’s Kitty Softpaws along side him, to tell a fun, engaging tale with plenty of creative, beautifully animated action sequences and feeling like it’s own self-contained story. Perhaps more could have been down with some of the other side characters, especially the villains, and it does have an unescapable sense of inconsequentiality to the whole thing but it’s definitely better than the last two Shrek movies.
3.) Shrek (2002)
The original DreamWorks hit that started it all back in 2002 still holds up gracefully! Being able to bring together the traditional fairytale characters and tropes while also doing something incredibly fresh, funny, and subversive with them. Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, and Cameron Diaz all fit their roles like a glove and help make their characters of Shrek, Donkey, and Fiona more iconic than they have any right to be. It also helps that song choices here are inspired, the pop cultures reference actually work well without it feeling pandering or obnoxious, and has an overall nice moral of never judging someone solely on their appearance. Some of the humor might be too adult/juvenile for some and Lord Farquaad is definitely not the most menacing bad guy ever but this still remains a timeless classic. It’s a shame though that certain folks out there only recognize this movie for it’s memes nowadays as they tend to forget that this is still a great movie overall.
2.) Puss In Boots: The Last Wish (2022)
An exciting, triumphing Part Two to go along with the other great Part Twos that DreamWorks animation has created with their filmography. I have a few grips such has as how the different tones can collided with each other at times and the very final scene is a bit of an eye roller, but there’s nothing major that could bring it down for me. The animation is spectacular, the characters are engaging, the set pieces are fun and inventive, the story goes into dark places you wouldn’t think a simple “kids” movie would go, and it teaches a very valuable lesson on how we should live our life to the fullest with the ones we love before it’s too late. This also has perhaps the most scary and intimating villain in not just Shrek but possibly any DreamWorks movie. Never in a million years would I guess that it would be frigging Puss in Boots of all characters that would be carrying this franchise for the past decade but I guess anything is possible.
1.) Shrek 2 (2004)
This is about as perfect as a sequel can get. Taking all the elements that made the original so good and somehow managing to make them even better here. The story is more engaging, the characters are more lovable and charming, the animation is more gorgeous, the voice work is more stellar, the set pieces are more creative, the fairytale/pop culture references are even better utilized, and the humor is much more funny this time around. Add in the wonderful presence of Antonino Bandera’s Puss in Boots, the Fairy Godmother as the main villain, and one of the best climaxes arguably in film history with an AMAZING usage of I Need A Hero and you got one beautifully done animated sequel. There are a handful of logic issues (Like how it takes forever for Shrek and company to get to Far Far Away but only takes Gingy, Pinnochio, and others like a couple of hours to get there) but when a sequel is this well-made, heartfelt, and absolutely HILARIOUS (The C.O.P.S. gag gets me EVERY time!), it’s impossible to care. It’s so whole and satisfying that the Shrek franchise could have stopped here and I would have been perfectly fine with it. Great comedy sequels are really hard to come by and this stands out as one of the very best!
There you have it! I’m unsure of what the future holds for this franchise or where else you can actually go with it. However, after the stellar reception that The Last Wish has gotten thus far along with the strong ratings/viewership this year with the Shrek movies on big streaming services such as Netflix, I wouldn’t be surprised if DreamWorks has something in the works for our favorite ogre and pussy cat in the near future. Until then, we can only cherish the great ones that have come from this series and ignore the not-so-great ones.
Happy Holidays everybody! Have a very, merry Christmas!
Adam's Blog 