It’s hard to believe that something as iconic as Shrek was once a risky bet. Its quality was evident when it shook the world of animation 25 years ago, but in an era dominated by Disney and its family-friendly fairy tales, it began as the outlier. That wouldn’t last long: it won the first-ever Academy Award for Best Animated Film, establishing a rivalry between DreamWorks Animation and Disney that persists to this day. It essentially made it cool to poke fun at the latter, and given how untouchable Disney was at the time, that’s a feat in itself.
Shrek would go on to spearhead a new school of irreverent, post-ironic storytelling. Its first sequel, Shrek 2, doubled down on the original’s magic, and even though most consider that the peak of the franchise, it was far from the end. The Shrek saga still has some gas in the tank, even after two decades and change — and an insistence that its fourth film, Shrek Forever After, would be “the final chapter.” Like so many recently revived franchises, Shrek and his brood aren’t quite ready to close the book. So in 2027, 17 years after their last adventure, they’ll be back for another, decidedly darker one.
