On February 27th, Dreamworks released a short teaser video for the fifth movie in the Shrek franchise and announced the returning cast.
It is impossible to overstate how much of an impact Shrek has brought to cinema, comedy and animation as a whole. The original film back in 2001 started Dreamworks Animation’s infamous rise to fame, popularized 3D animation which was still a new concept at the time, and displayed how an animated family film can appeal to both adult and child audiences with their humour. The franchise was beloved online for it’s surprisingly mature themes despite being a kids movie and the overall absurdity of the character of Shrek himself, he’s an ogre that has layers, what’s not to love about him? He’s an over the top, grumpy, sarcastic, short tempered monster with a soft spot.
The franchise went through multiple movies, shorts and a popular spinoff series of the character Puss In Boots. However, after the 4th film in 2010, Shrek Forever After, Dreamworks closed the storybook. The 4th film didn’t perform to their expectations and wasn’t received well by critics, despite it now being loved by many. After many years of dormancy within the franchise, in 2022 Dreamworks released Puss In Boots: The Last Wish. A film that was a return to form for the Shrek franchise, it featured mature humour and jokes, a mature theme relating to death and mortality with an absolutely stunning art and animation style inspired by Spider-Man Into The Spiderverse. The film was praised by many and was nominated for Best Animated Film at The Oscars 2022.
At the end of the film, it featured a short post credit scene featuring the three main protagonists, Puss, Kitty SoftPaws and Perrito, stealing a ship and sailing off into the distance. Puss explains that they’re off on another adventure… and to see some “old friends”. As this happens, the camera pans to reveal the familiar kingdom Far Far Away, the home of Princess Fiona and her husband Shrek. Revealing that, yes indeed, Shrek 5 was happening.
The internet and many old fans of the franchise were in hysterics, the fact that after nearly 15 years of absence, Shrek would finally be getting another movie! Due to the expectations that Puss In Boots had created, many people expected the fifth movie to be on the same level, if not better, than the previous fourth movie… But the hype died down after Dreamworks made an announcement of who was producing the movie: Chris Meladandri.
In case there’s any confusion, Chris Meledandri is infamous amongst the animation industry for the amount of success he had with his own animation studio, Illumination. Meledandri is known as the creator of the Minions and the Despicable Me franchise. Although Despicable Me is still loved to this day, the negative precedent the movies had on animation as a whole cannot be ignored. The movies focused more on promoting the marketability of the Minions rather than creating an interesting and enjoyable story, reducing it to Tom And Jerry-esque shenanigans involving the gibberish speaking and banana loving characters. To hear a man like Chris Meledandri was involved with the production of this franchise was worrying. Many became convinced that the movie would try to be more “modern” or “funny” by introducing modern concepts like TikTok and meme culture like movies made by Illumination had and it wasn’t hard to disagree with that viewpoint. Needless to say, whether people liked it or not, Shrek 5 was happening.
Recently, a full on teaser was released for the film, revealing the animation style, the returning cast and release date for the film. The teaser shows off new designs for Shrek, Donkey, Fiona, Pinnochio and The Magic Mirror, as well as introducing Shrek’s daughter Felicia, who was a baby in the third and fourth movie, grown as a teenager. The teaser shows off Shrek scrolling through the magic mirror like a phone and getting disturbed by the cursed meme images of him displayed on it. Comedically asking “Who even makes this stuff”? The teaser ends with the reveal of the returning cast, Mike Myers, Cameron Diaz, Eddie Murphy and a newcomer to the franchise, Zendaya, who would be playing Shrek’s daughter.
Needless to say, the reception of the teaser has been overwhelmingly mixed. Many people who hated it criticized the “brain rot” meta humour displayed in the trailer referencing the many memes made of Shrek during these many years, much of the negativity came from the designs of the characters. Fans criticized the kid friendly and almost corporate look of the characters, comparing them to how many Illumination characters were designed, much of the critique came towards Shrek’s design. Due to how iconic the original character was, it’s hard to accept and get used to the many changes to his design. However, many other people were indifferent to the teaser and changes, they even praised how the changes made the titular characters much more expressive than their original designs.
Overall, despite the backlash of the designs, many fans were left worried about the overall quality of the film. If the teaser was just a snippet of the type of humour that would be used in the film, it was unknown how much they would lean into it due to the inclusion of Shrek’s “Gen Z” daughter played by Zendaya of all people , or try to pander towards the older audience using nostalgia bait. All people can do now is cross their fingers and pray that this teaser isn’t what the whole film will be like, and wait for its release.
Shrek 5 releases on December 23rd 2026, with an official teaser trailer releasing soon.
