A little bit of "Meet the Parents", a little bit of "Aladdin" and the first "Shrek", but it's still good......

Rating: 8/10 (30 July 2016)

The impending doom on sequels' is that they inevitably lack the element of surprise and can hardly wow the audience with the same intensity than the original.
But this is a double edged-sword because the more successful the first opus is, the more attractive the immediate sequel will be to herds of fans eager to see their beloved characters again. A sequel suffer by comparison only if the level is beneath the original's, otherwise, it is seen as a faithful continuation, style-wise, fun-wise, characterization-wise and quality-wise. I guess it's fair to say that "Shrek 2" belongs to that category of sequels and the opening gags make you quickly understand the movie will be swimming in safe waters as far as entertainment goes, and you only wish that it will manage to give you something you don't see coming. After all, as I said in the first film's review, Shrek, Fiona and Donkey are so multi-layered characters that "Shrek" wasn't a movie enough to use up all their potential.
Many questions deserved answers, how about Fiona's parents, the very people who locked her in the tower so a Prince Charming would cure her from the spell and then she would come back? How about the very prince Charming whom Shrek stole the thunder, why not making a character out of him, one who'd cross the forests and deserts, climbs the highest tower only to find her gone, and with quite a hilarious replacement, that I won't spoil. In fact, the reason to be of the sequel can be reduced to one simple question: how about the hackneyed concept of 'And They Lived Happily Ever After'? Since "Shrek" was a parody of fairy tales, it made all the more sense to question the most formulaic aspect of fairy tales, the ending! And since "Shrek"s magnificent ending opened more doors than it closed, I doubt the brainstorming session on the sequel's themes lasted very long.
So, the set is tone with Charming (Rupert Everett) realizing he was stepped over by nothing but an ogre, and the two ogres enjoying a nice honeymoon, and the first big laugh comes from a parody of "From Here to Eternity" and a very naughty take on Disney. The honeymoon lasts the time of the "Accidentally in Love" song and when our greenish couple is back home, they have two visits: Donkey (who else?) as obnoxious and oblivious to his obnoxiousness as ever and representatives of the Royal Family, which means from Shrek's standpoint, his in-laws. And what can be more annoying than traveling to the Kingdom of Far Far Away, with the Donkey shouting "Are we there yet" every 2,5 milliseconds. The film almost affords the luxury to make a joke out of boredom and I asked myself, where this was going, not without concern, with the perspective of meeting the in-laws, I was waiting for the gags with the 'are we there yet?' question in mind.
Anyway, the discovery of Far Far Away, which is like a fairy-tale version of Beverly Hills is one of the film's delights, and it is intelligently enhanced by the choice of the background music "Funky Town". The rest of the story is less funky as the King (John Cleese) and the Queen (Julie Andrews) try to restrain their emotions, and the laughs that come from the confrontation between the King and Shrek are fun but on a very adult way, even by the film's standards. So, we get to a brief but perceptible part where gags tend to rarefy and the film gets too dramatic for its own good, just the time to present the villainous Godmother (Jennifer Saunders) who happens to be the mother of Prince Charming. The film gets back to its trademark zaniness once a character makes his entrance: Puss in Boots, a cross between Garfield and Zorro and who else than Antonio Banderas to voice him in a self-parodying performance (there's a lot of things borrowed from his Mariachi).
Any experienced movie buff will look at the cat as a gratuitous addition in order to spice up the story, and you know what, it's true but who cares? The animators are much aware about it so even the Donkey says "the part of the annoying animal sidekick has been taken". He's half right, except the cat isn't just a sidekick, he's the character for which the sequel is remembered, he's a great source of gags, because he's both funny when acting like a Zorro (the accent, the mannerisms) and even funnier when acting like a real cat: purring, coughing hairballs and having that sad face that make anyone go 'Aaaaaw'. It all comes to any rating of "Shrek" gets 1 or 2 points more thanks to the cat.
And that was a salutary addition because the story, as exciting as it was, was getting slow before the cat came and after, felt like a reverse recycling of the first movie, this time, Shrek turns into a human version of the prince Charming (and so does Donkey who finally gets a taste of what being a noble steed is like) and together, they pull a sort of "Prince Ali" on Fiona, before the Godmother pulls a Jafar in a climax that owes its excitement to the music that plays in the background, and the involvement of all the characters that made the first film such a delight: the three pigs, the Gingerbread guy, Pinocchio and the wolf.
So, with all its reference to the first film, to modern classics, to adult humor (in a kids-friendly way) "Shrek 2" is a solid continuation to the original one. Maybe "Shrek 2" shouldn't be compared to the original but to all the second opuses of successful series' starters, and on that level, it is a great one.