Gotta say, when Jacksfilms teased his Shrek 3 is the worst Shrek video, I was nervous, because Shrek 3 isnât the worst. Itâs not really that good of a movie by any means, but itâs quite a bit better than Shrek 4. But Iâm gonna share my thoughts on the video anyway, in completely nonchronological order.
Jack starts the video off by saying that Shrek 3 is superfluous and yeah, thatâs true. Arthur, Merlin and all the rest of the cast donât feature at all in parts of Shrek 4 youâd expect them to be, so no characters are really retained and none of the events are acknowledged in 4. But then Shrek 4 is even more superfluous, thanks to the fact that most all of the film erases itself from existence after it happened. Shrek is the only character for whom something is different.Â
Shrek 3 at least gives us Fergus, Farkle and Felicia, and I disagree with Jackâs sentiment that you could cut out Shrek 3 and just have the baby montage in Shrek 4 and thatâd be enough. I think the development Shrek goes through in 3 in order to come to terms with the idea of being a father is vital to his character in a world where he has kids, else the parenthood doesnât really seem significant at all. Shrek 3 also established Shrek as having had an abusive father, which plays into his doubt of how good an ogre parent could truly be. Itâs an interesting thing to do with the character, and one of the things I actually appreciate in Shrek 3. Remove the Shrek 3 angle, and Shrek as a father isnât a concept we find remotely interesting.
Another of Jackâs sentiments I disagree with is the notion that using Charming as the villain was lazy, and that Rumpelstiltskin was a much better villain. I think using Charming as the villain was actually the opposite of lazy. As, well, charming as he is in Shrek 2, we donât really get to see him do too much. Seeing himself try to take charge of his situation in 3, and actually succeed at getting the villains on his side was, again, charming. Plus, he has a lot of good comedic moments in 3. 3 expands on the character of Charming, I donât see how it could be lazy in that aspect. Rumpelstiltskinâs not that bad, but heâs kind of just worse than every other villain. He has some funny moments here and there, and he takes the narrative in a decently interesting albeit somewhat poorly executed direction, but thereâs not that much to his actual character. His motives arenât really any more complicated than âIâm the big bad!â and while thatâs true of the very first villain, Farquaad, Farquaad at least had charm and wit to him, as well as a more interesting character in general than Rumpelstiltskin ever gets.
Too many characters in 3 is a sentiment Iâm mixed on. I donât mind the princesses that much, Shrekâs always had some likeable and quirky characters that donât really mean much in the grand scheme of things. The big bad wolf isnât being praised for his wonderfully written character arc because he doesnât have one, but we like him anyway. The princesses should be okay by this same logic, but then theyâre all sort of⌠meh. Cinderella is forgettable as hell and has no personality to speak of, the joke with Sleeping Beauty got old fast, and Rapunzel is hard to care for too. Her betraying the rest of the gang to be with Charming wasnât an interesting angle for either character, and kind of detracts from the otherwise all great Charming in this movie. Snow White is the only one I really liked because she was sassy and I liked her style, but she still pales in comparison to the likes of Pinocchio or Gingy.
Arthur is⌠an interesting character. I donât really think he himself is all that interesting or funny, and he honestly doesnât provide Shrek with much development either, even if the narrative tries to make it look like he did. And yet, Arthur takes on such a prominent role in the movie. The thing about Arthur is that he plays into the aforementioned superfluous nature of this film. The film would change if you removed him, yeah, because heâs supposed to become King of Far Far Away in place of Shrek, but he still manages to feel inconsequential, perhaps because heâs never acknowledged outside of this film. Arthurâs kinda just forgettable, and the way the narrative shifts around him, and his two scenes of large public speeches, they feel just feel unnatural, failing to be heartwarming like theyâre so obviously supposed to be.
I liked Merlin though, he was a funny take on the actual character of Merlin and he had some of the best lines in the film, lines which Shrek provided even funnier replies to. So I can appreciate Merlin in that regard.
So yeah, Shrek 3âs characters arenât the best, but theyâre leagues above Shrek 4âs. As I mentioned before, Rumpelstiltskin isnât all that great, but heâs not the only one. One of the main opposing threats in Shrek 4 is the Pied Piper, who has absolutely no character to speak of and no charm or likeable aspects either. All of the ogres in the Resistance are the most forgettable characters in the franchise, even Gwen, the high school girl that Arthur had a crush on in Shrek 3, is more memorable than these bastards.
The main draw in Shrek 4 is that because of the alternate universe setting, we can see characters we know and love taken in entirely new directions, but this concept is woefully underutilised.
Donkey isnât different. At all. His personality and character are the exact same, with the only difference being that heâs weirded out by the fact that Shrek knows him, even though he sees Shrek as a stranger. But thatâs not character, thatâs just whatâs to be expected of this setting.
Puss is pretty bad too. Heâs also the same character but heâs a little more lax and a lot more fat. Thatâs it. His new personality is that heâs sort of mellow.
Fiona is the only character for whom they actually try something with in this alternate universe concept, because her personality in this new setting is actually different. Fiona effectively got sick of waiting to be rescued and escaped from the tower herself and, sick of the discrimination she faces in her ogre form and that ogres all over face in general, she takes on the role of leader of the Resistance. But this huge leadership role isnât really great for her character. Fiona is bossy and commanding, sure, but not an expert military tactician. We know sheâs a fighter, and Shrek 3 demonstrates that she can even be a fairly strategic one at that, but large scale military operations? There isnât enough going on that really indicates sheâd be so capable. Even if we are to believe that she was that capable though, it doesnât really mean anything anyway. All of these ogres are so impossibly hard to care for that Fionaâs efforts are hard to care for just by extension. We see these nameless ogres being used as literal slaves at one point, but we donât feel sorry for them, we just donât care. Farquaad saying âitâs hideousâ in reference to Shrek is a line that feels more discriminatory than literal slavery, all because Shrek 1 actually made us care about our ogres. Plus, the dynamic between Shrek and Resistance!Fiona doesnât really work at all, especially compared to the relationship that Shrek develops with the real Fiona in Shrek 1. Sheâs just too drastically different for it to work, and their relationship isnât really developed in a natural and believable way. When Resistance!Fiona falls in love with Shrek, it doesnât make us as an audience feel happy that weâre getting closer to the true timeline, it just feels shallow and uninteresting, lazy even.
But still, even with Fiona being a pretty different and cool in concept albeit worse than the original character version of herself in this setting, it doesnât mean anything. Itâs literally a âwhat if?â scenario. When the movie ends with Shrek returning to his original timeline, the real Fiona hasnât changed â sheâs had literally no development this entire film. Nobody other than Shrek has, and Iâm mixed on his development, though Iâd need to rewatch 4 to comment more on that particular topic.
Also, 4âs so full of weird little details that I donât really understand. Fionaâs parents sign away Far Far Away to Rumpelstiltskin so that Fionaâs curse is broken, meaning Rumpelstiltskin gets the kingdom. Expectantly enough, the kingdom turns to shit, but then, the degree to which it turns to shit just seems unrealistic. The world in Shrek 4 is less like The Elder Scrolls and more like Fallout, and I really donât get how it got that bad. Shrekâs swamp is a dead tree in a dead wood thatâs in completely flat terrain. The swamp shouldnât look great obviously, Shrek was never there to really turn it into a home, but how did the entire wood die out? There are other unanswered questions too. How did Rumpelstiltskinâs witches manage to capture Dragon? Why does Rumpelstiltskin command these witches anyway? How can Rumpelstiltskinâs contracts fuck with the spacetime continuum? Whatâs with the fucking ear trumpet thing? Why the fuck did they genuinely pull the ârearrange the big letters in the contract and make some origami to show a new contractâ thing? It wasnât a new contract, for the record, but you know. I could go on, but Iâve been at this for over an hour and a half and I think you get the point.
Jacksfilms stated in his video that Shrek 3 is garbage and should be stricken from Shrek canon, a notion I mostly disagree with. Jacksfilms stated in his video that Shrek 4 is an underrated classic, a notion I disagree with even more than the first statement. I know that Jackâs a comedian obviously, and the video was full of jokes, but as he made clear in his daily vlog series on jackisanerd, this video actually has some truth to it. This video has joking aspects, but itâs clear enough that his opinions are legitimate. And I think theyâre wrong.
 TL;DR Shrek 3 > Shrek 4 and Jacksfilms is an idiot.
