Shrek the Third
The Shrek franchise has dulled slightly with each subsequent outing following its razor-sharp debut six years ago, but there's still plenty of prickly humor to go round in
Shrek the Third.
With King Harold on the way to that great water lily in the sky, Shrek sets off with Donkey and Puss in Boots to recruit Fiona's cousin Artie Pendragon (read: Arthur) to take the throne Shrek does not want. When he gets to Worcestershire Academy, he finds a loser constantly picked on by Lancelot, Guinevere and the other kids. Clearly, if Artie is to be king he'll need to have the same lesson in self-acceptance Shrek seems to have trouble grasping. Shrek's current bout with self-doubt comes from nightmares about fathering a litter of little ogres.
Meanwhile, Prince Charming, who has been subjugated to Dinner Theater performances in which he recreates his role in Shrek 2, has returned to Far Far Away with just about every fairytale villain in tow to help him usurp the throne. But he'll have to deal with Fiona and her crew of fighting princesses (Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel and Cinderella) before he can prepare for Shrek's return and get his dramatic revenge.
Having already skewered Disney specifically and Hollywood in general in the first two films, respectively, the third outing uses fairytales and legends as a springboard to the same kind of pop culture jokes and parodies that are the core of the franchise. Shrek the Third distinctly contains more unfunny moments than its predecessors, which rarely had any, but the laughs are still plentiful. Some of it treads over old ground, while other parts boil over with imagination (the Gingerbread Man's life flashing before his eyes is one of the funniest bits in the whole series).
The loss of Andrew Adamson as director is evident as the new directors try extra hard to be a little too clever, but the addition of a lot of recognizable voice talent in many of the smaller parts really helps some of the gags come to life more effectively than they otherwise might. It may not be on par with its two forerunners, but Shrek the Third leaves you feeling fully entertained—a brisk, light parody of everything sacred in the land of pop culture, once upon a time, and far far away.