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Fiona and Shrek's relationship is pretty much the same as it is in the first and second movie - with the exception that both of them are women. But the one thing I'd like to point out is how changing Shrek to a woman changes the weight of her influence on Fiona. We know from the movie that Fiona struggles with accepting her ogre form, since a Princess is not supposed to be an ogre, she says. You could say that an ogre is not lady-like at all. Fiona worries about fitting into the standarts of what a Princess is suppossed to be like, and then meets miss Shrek - a lady who doesn't fit a single one of those standarts and doesn't want to. Hiding a part of yourself that you've been taught to be ashamed of your whole life and then seeing a woman who is open and proud about it - that's gotta count for something. Miss Shrek is such a good example of accepting oneself.

Now. On the other hand. We have a lady who meets every single one of the societal standarts of what a Princess is supposed to be like. You could even say she IS the standart.

Out of all the characters the most attention was directed towards Princess Charming so far. She went through the most changes from the original so I'll be talking about her the most next.

Princess Charming's relationship with her mom

Just like Fiona was told that she is to be rescued by The Princess, Princess Charming was told that she is to rescue Fiona. She was going through vigirous training to be able to fight a dragon. She was studying all the royal etiquette and going to the royal congresses to get a feel for that life-style. And her whole life she was trying really hard to make her mom proud.

The Fairy Godmother loved her daughter dearly, she spoiled her with expensive gifts whenever she could, Goddess knows she had the money. But her whole future depended on Charming's performance with Fiona, so she asked for A LOT from her in return. She was strict and not really emotionally availible, since she believed that would make the Princess weak.

The Fairy Godmother was the one who put all the beauty standarts beliefs in Princess Charming's head. Like I said: The Godmother's whole future depended solely on whether or not her daughter was able to charm Fiona, so not a single thing was allowed to be anything than perfect. Sadly, it's a rather popular painful subject among daughters, as I've come to know: mothers caring much more about their daughters appearances, than their mental well-being.

As a result, Charming grew up to be appearance-obsessed and constantly looking for her mom's approval. But in the end she never fulfilled her one destiny and never got her mother's approval.

How did Shrek The Third plot change?

DRASTICALLY.

First and foremost: no surprise pregnancy plot-point, horay!!! The main conflict is just Fiona being ready and wanting daughters and miss Shrek being scared of that.

With that out of the way, imagine: your whole life you work towards this ONE thing that is supposed to be your destiny, you hold yourself to the strickest standarts, you deny yourself pleasures for the sake of your overall goal, you go far and beyond to reach the peak of your performance.

And then this OGRESS - the one thing that is the absolute opposite of all the beauty standarts that have been plaguing your brain for years - shows up and rips it all away from you. AND SHE GETS IT ALL FOR THE WAY THAT SHE NATURALLY IS!

Of course she resents her.

I gotta say: Princess Charming is a lot more competent than her male counter-part in Shrek The Third for reasons we've discussed earlier. She didn't get everything handed to her on a silver platter, so she has some handy life-skills to begin with. She ran a business together with her mom for a minute there, promoting the products with her own face, so she knows how to sell an idea and organise the crowd. That's why she had no problem convincing all the villains to rebel.

But when she tries to come up with a plan of attack though? That's where she runs into problems and that's when miss Captain Hook shows up. She tears apart Charming's plan and teaches her how it's actually done. The two start to form a bond and Princess Charming starts to see a mother-figure in Captain Hook. Maybe she can make THIS mother-figure proud?

I like thinking about the time Princess Charming and the crew spend together getting prepared for the rebellion. For example I imagine that Charming bonds with The Witches. They would try to teach Princess Charming how to fly a broom, but she would be afraid of heights, so she would fly at the back of the broom grabbing onto the driving witch for dear life.

And I like thinking about Rapunzel and Charming's relationship.

When Princess Charming gives her little speech at The Poison Apple, Rapunzel is also there. Unhappy with her life, trying to forget her sorrows, she became a frequent customer there. See, just like Fiona and Princess Charming, Rapunzel was destined to get an arranged marriage. Fiona was lucky enough to escape that parental pressure and marry the love of her life, and Rapunzel envies her for it. I think that's why she betrays her in the first place.

Princess Charming and Rapunzel have a lot in common so they start talking and gradually fall in love. Rapunzel would be at every secret rebellion meeting at the poison apple and observe everything Princess Charming does with eyes full of love. She would be the spy and bring the latest news from the castle and promise The Princess that they are gonna show them all what they're worth. And then she would become worried for her love, afraid that she's gonna lose her, try to turn back and convince Princess Charming to do the same. Rapunzel would be the one to visit Fiona and other princesses in their cell and "accidentally" help them out, hoping that mercy on her loved one would be the payback when everything goes south.

Why would it go south? Well, because the more Princess Charming spends time with Rapunzel, the less interested she becomes in the whole rebellion thing. Gradually she realizes that it was never the thing SHE herself wanted, but it was the thing that her mother has inflicted on her. But you can't turn the rebellion back, so she, yet again, has to continue keeping up appearances.

Yet others start to notice that she's become softer - like letting Artie- THE ONE TRUE HEIR TO THE THRONE - go, instead of cutting her head of? What's that about?? The villains start talking about Princess Charming amongst themselves and their opinions towards her start to change. That's why it was so easy to convince them to give up on her in the end.

But the final nail in the coffin of Princess Charming's obedience of parental and societal pressures is her cutting her hair off - the main selling point of her charm.

Princess Charming and Rapunzel's hair

If you all remember, Rapunzel turns out to be bald at the end of Shrek The Third. Judging by the quality of this movie's story, I tend to believe that it's just a throw away joke at the expense of the character with no real meaning behind it. But I wanna see the meaning, so I've thought of something.

In the original fairytale The Sorceress, which locked Rapunzel in a tower, cuts off her hair when she finds out that Rapunzel has been seeing a prince. In our story The Sorceress is a mother figure to Rapunzel and her locking Rapunzel away is a form of overprotection. When the rebellion takes place and it is revealed that Rapunzel has ran away from her arranged marriage with Princess Charming, The Sorceresses curse comes to fruition and all of her hair dissappears.

Now for my favourite part: in order to support her darling, Princess Charming cuts off her hair. First, with intention to make a wig for Rapunzel, since both of them are still trying to keep up appearances and expectations put upon them by society. But later, when both of them escape - yes, they stage their deaths and run away together - they live their best lives together as two short-haired queens.

Phew. Ok. That's enough for one post.

THE END!