Shrek is a beloved franchise. Filled to the brim with great characters, cool locations, various fairy-tale cameos and a soundtrack that could well be considered the greatest in the history of film. The 2001 original spawned three sequels. While the second is one of the greatest films of all time, the 3rd and 4th have been met with far more hostility.
Across the four-film nine-year franchise, they bump into their fair share of continuity errors. Whether these are animation errors or cross-film inconsistencies, we’ve covered the ten biggest blunders the Shrek universe has provided.
Disappearing Dragon Chain
Dragon is introduced as a scary villain, and the quickest way to die if one happens to be undertaking a certain princess-saving quest. Her red scales and fire breath make her one of the scariest parts of the first film. Despite this, she ends up being the most benevolent character in the series, marrying Donkey and raising their strange hybrid children.
When Dragon arrives for the wedding at the end of Shrek 1, her chain isn’t around her neck when Donkey first summons her. A couple of seconds later, it appears and Shrek uses it to climb onto her, before disappearing again when its necessity for the plot is over.
The Arrow Incident
Shrek is a big, powerful guy. You can’t expect him to feel everything that ever happens around him, but, in fairness, you’d expect him to feel an arrow impaling his butt. Fiona shouts this to Shrek when she is finished taking down the Merry Men, but the arrow only appears when she says it. Before that, there was nothing there at all, and no one could have done anything in the time between, because Fiona had knocked them all out. Also, a couple of seconds after that when Donkey passes out, the leaves by his head appear and disappear based on the shot.
The Parking Valet Runs Too Far
It must be pretty hard being an ogre if you’re a people person. Everyone runs away screaming, which is sort of what Shrek likes. When he and Donkey arrive at Duloc, the valet sees Shrek, does a bit of a double-take and sprints off through the queuing area.
When his obstacle course is shown from above, he has four roped-off rows to get through, but when the camera changes to show him from behind, he runs those four rows and still has another two to get through.
Shrek’s Quick Change
During Shrek 2, Shrek takes a potion that changes him into human form, and Donkey into a magnificent steed. Obviously, as he was an ogre just a couple of minutes earlier, Shrek was still very much dressed up in his massive ogre clothes, so he took a new well-fitting costume from a man in a carriage. This should have worked both ways, however, meaning when Shrek changed back to an ogre, his new clothes should have been way too small. Instead, he just magically changes back to his normal outfit.
Fiona’s Changing Ring
The first time we see Fiona’s ring, it is sparkly and golden. Not long later, it turns into a slightly less-impressive silver. Even later than that, it appears to have some sort of blue jewel inside, before returning to its plain silver once more.
It seems very impractical for the Shrek creators not to have made a model for the ring, allowing it to remain looking exactly the same in every shot, not appear differently almost every time it’s on-screen.
Vanishing Spoon
One of the hardest to watch moments in the second Shrek film comes when Shrek himself swallows a spoon and immediately coughs it back up. This is a pretty important part of the incredibly awkward royal dinner, but the spoon is basically discarded straight away. When the shot changes, it isn’t on the table at all.
Dopey Tattoo
Shrek is known for its brilliant subtle details and references. You can look into the crowded shots of those standing in Shrek’s swamp to find characters from deep within the fairy-tale world; it’s heaven for those who live for references.
Snow White even has a tattoo of everyone’s favorite dwarf, Dopey, in a heart shape on her arm. When she summons creatures to attack later on in the film, the animators seem to have forgotten to keep this cool detail in, because the tattoo has gone. Unless she had it lasered off in the days between the scenes…?
Disappearing Contract
During the strange apocalyptic setting of Shrek 4, Shrek changes his mind about the weird world he has created and returns to his swamp in the hope of restarting his life. He looks at the contract Rumpelstiltskin had him sign while standing in his dried out swamp, but as soon as the witches fly by, the contract he was just looking at has completely disappeared.
The Dragon’s Keep Journey
One problem with setting up an alternate reality universe in Shrek 4 is the problem with keeping things consistent with what came before. It was established in Shrek 1 that both Shrek and Prince Charming took multiple days to reach Fiona in her tower. Conveniently, this journey time is able to become considerably shorter when Shrek only has one day until he disappears. He makes it in a lot less than one day, seemingly undermining the importance of this long journey in the first film, and creating a continuity problem between the two journeys.
The Far Far Away Journey
Almost exactly the same thing happens with Shrek’s journey to Far Far Away during Shrek 4. One of the most iconic scenes from the second installment of the franchise is the incredibly long journey Shrek, Fiona, and Donkey make in a carriage shaped like an onion.
Just like the journey to the dragon’s keep, the final film in the franchise undermines how long this journey is, with a 24-hour clock seeming to suggest this multi-day journey was over in only about two hours. He might be in a parallel universe, but he hasn’t got a rocket.
