Eleven years after the “Shrek 2” spinoff “Puss in Boots,” the sassy Spanish feline voiced by Antonio Banderas has returned for another fairy-tale-busting adventure, directed by Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado, and written by Paul Fischer (with a story by Tommy Swerdlow and Tom Wheeler). Crawford, Mercado and Fischer all worked on the Dreamworks Animation favorites “Trolls” and “The Croods: A New Age,” and the trio bring a similar “chaotic good” energy to “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish,” which remixes a new set of familiar nursery rhymes and beloved children’s fables to entertaining ends.
Our titular tabby is living a swashbuckler’s life, swilling leche, singing songs, saving towns, raking in the adoration and accolades, when he dies his eighth death, landing him on his ninth, and final, life. Spooked by a visit from the grim-reaping Big Bad Wolf (Wagner Moura), Puss decides to hangs up his hat and boots and head for retirement in the home of a crazy cat lady, Mama Luna (Da’Vine Joy Randolph).
But he can’t escape adventure, and soon Puss is caught up in the quest for a magical wish, which is in the possession of a greedy, pie-producing hoarder of enchanted trinkets, Little Jack Horner (John Mulaney). Remember him, with the Christmas pie and the plum on his thumb? Jack, now quite big, is also pursued by Goldilocks (Florence Pugh) and her cockney crime syndicate family of bears (Ray Winstone, Olivia Colman, Samson Kayo), who want the wish to make things “just right,” of course.
