History Headscratchers / Shrek

** ''Headscratchers/Shrek1''
** ''Headscratchers/Shrek2''
** ''Headscratchers/ShrekTheThird''
** ''Headscratchers/ShrekForeverAfter''
** ''Headscratchers/PussInBoots2011''
** ''Headscratchers/PussInBootsTheLastWish''

* One of the princesses shown in the Magic Mirror for Farquaad to marry to be King is Cinderella. Why? She wasn’t born a princess. Did the filmmakers make her a biological princess? If not, if Farquaad chose Cinderella, wouldn’t they just be Lord and Lady of Duloc?
** A game on the DVD only allows you to rescue Fiona. Maybe Fiona technically is the ONLY eligible bachelorette. Snow White is probably out of the question too, since Farquad sent the Seven Dwarfs to Shreks swamp and THEY had her body. Snow White was also in love with a handsome prince. So a kiss from the vain and arrogant Farquad wouldn't do squat to wake her up. I can imagine the mirror saying "Oops, sorry! (Snow White or Cinderella) is out of the question. Pick again!"
*** Who is this "handsome prince" Snow White is in love with? It's not Prince Charming because he's paired up with Fiona and later Rapunzel.
*** Maybe there's more than one Prince Charming?

* Who in their right mind thought that the fairy who turned the onion into a carriage was the Fairy Godmother from Shrek 2? I thought it was obvious that it was one of Sleeping Beauty’s fairy godmothers.
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* Why is marrying a princess supposed to make Farquaad King of Duloc, not of the princess's kingdom?
** He's already the absolute ruler of Duloc, he just wants the status and/or validation of a royal title. Princesses and their husbands don't usually inherit their home kingdoms anyway.
** I'm still irked that Farquaad can't just declare himself king. I mean, is anybody going to complain? He's the highest authority around, answerable to nobody.
*** He's trying to realize his vision of a perfect kingdom. It's more about cementing his claim in his head than anyone else's.
*** If fairy tale land is anything like the real world DungAges in this regard, then as long as Duloc is not ruled by a king Duloc is a dependency of somewhere else's kingdom - possibly, but not necessarily Far Far Away itself. This means Farquaad can be omnipotent in his land (as the feudal lord he is) yet he has to pay taxes and can be drafted into the army of the king he's attached to as a vassal. The only way he can get rid of that and make Duloc an independent state is by being declared king of Duloc by his superior or by marrying a royal heir princess, thus gaining royal status himself in the process. This would explain also what happens to Duloc in the sequels: since Farquaad had no heirs when he died, his lands and title were (re)taken by his king and Duloc abolished as a distinct entity.
*** And overall, if an all-seeing magic mirror says that his only (if not easiest) way to officially become king is by marrying a princess, can he doubt it?
** I'm fairly certain that rule was made up on the spot by the magic mirror to save face (literally).
** A kingdom is ruled by a king. Otherwise, it's a manor (Lord), county (Count), Duchy (Duke), Principality (Prince) Queendom (Queen), or some other fancy title. The Mirror said it was technically not a perfect kingdom simply because it wasn't ruled by a king.
*** Does that mean that Duloc is technically a MANOR since it’s ruled by a LORD?
** Inheritance might not work the same way in this world as it does in the real world. (And even the real world features more than one set of rules for this.) For all we know, maybe in this world marrying a princess ''does'' make you king of your realm.
*** The answer ''maybe in this fictional world rules are different'' (which has become very common in headscratchers by the way) is AWizardDidIt. All universes work by established rules (often the same as the real world's) unless otherwise specified.
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* At the end of the first movie, why does Fiona turn into an ogre when she was born human?
** I always thought that she became an ogre because true love's form was about inner beauty so being an "ugly" ogre still made her beautiful not just to Shrek but in general.
** Because she takes "true love's true form." Her true love is Shrek.
** Or because she was born with the spell on her and everyone just assumed the spell worked the other way. She is half frog.

* What exactly was going on with Farquaad. I know in a satire a villain's motives can be two-dimensional, but I didn't get what was the ultimate goal. He tells Gingerbread Man that the fairy tale characters are a threat to his "perfect kingdom". No rationalization on that one. Everything is imperfect, but Farquaad picks on the fairy tale characters for some reason. So then we see scenes of fairy tale characters led off in chains, likely to prison camps and such. At least one character (Mama Bear) is put to death. Okay, it makes sense up until this point. Then we see that dozens of fairy tale folk have taken over Shrek's swamp, including Pinocchio, who was seen being handed over to the guards earlier. (I guess he could have escaped during Donkey's distraction, but they could have mentioned that at some point) The pigs say that Farquaad was ''evicting'' them, which contradicts what we've seen up to this point. So Shrek goes to Duloc to complain. He tells Farquaad that his swamp is full of fairy tale folk, and Farquaad wears a pleased smile and says "Is it?" This ''should'' be an indication that Shrek has unwittingly betrayed them to certain doom, but nothing comes of this. After Shrek returns his swamp is cleared out and the fairy tale folk aren't seen until the wedding at the end, where they happily celebrate their best friend Shrek, who, um, betrayed their hideout (or refugee camp, or whatever) to an evil dictator and then was only indirectly involved in said dictator's death. Was there some stuff cut out of the movie, or am I missing something?
** I just assumed that Farquaad put them in Shrek's swamp because he knows an Ogre lived there and assumed Shrek would eat them all.
** Shrek's swamp is a day-and-a-half walk from the ''citadel'' of Duloc. It seemed to me like the grin was "[[SmugSnake Is that so? Well, they're your problem now]]". MamaBear probably got killed in a scuffle or executed as an excuse to get Faarquad a new rug. I really don't know why the fairy-tale beings were celebrating Shrek as something like a friend, but maybe the dance party was supposed to be a non-canon thing like [[Series/AmericanIdol FFA Idol]], etc. or answering "WhatHappenedToTheMouse?" with "It didn't die, that's what happened", and the production team simply decided to take it as canon.
** Gonna try and answer the original question here- 'Why Farquaad picks on the fairy-tale creatures?/What does he mean by perfect world?'- I believe that he's pretty specist and to go one step farther in the 'why' department, something of an adherent to order. Humans follow natural, physical laws and can be governed pretty tidily (in fairy tales, anyway). DuLoc is highly ordered- everything is regular, and clean, and the introduction song at the info booth is all about how in DuLoc, you follow the rules. Creatures from fairy tales break natural rules. Animals talk, various things fly (donkeys, fairies, little boys), you have magic and witchcraft, and that's not going into accounting for all the different cultures of these different species. Human mindsets and customs make sense to Farquaad and he can impose order on people who, on a sheer biological/general cultural level, think as he does. He can't necessarily make a unicorn or ogre or witch follow his rules, he interprets that as a threat to his bastion of order, and so he goes on a crusade to get rid of the beings that threaten his way of life. Alternatively/in conjunction with that, he sees other creatures as subhuman, and when 'subhumans' get uppity about silly little things like 'equal rights' and whatnot, trouble always happens... *cough*
** They were all on Shrek's swamp because Farquaad dumped them there. When he says, "Is that so?" it doesn't mean he didn't know about it. Shrek is treated as a hero because all of the fairytale creatures were at the swamp under Farquaad's orders when they didn't want to be. By rescuing Fiona, Shrek freed them from the swamp. I don't know where they went afterward.
** In regards to Farquaad's motivations, it's pretty simple: he's a self-hating bigot and hypocrite. He can't accept who he is on the outside, so he "compensates" and persecutes other fairy tale creatures out of said bigotry and self-loathing.
** We see the fairy tale beings treat Shrek as a hero the instant he says he's going to get them out of his swamp because they don't like being there any more than he likes having them around. Consider also that Shrek is responsible for Lord Farquaad being eaten (not directly, yes, but it was because of his plan to stop the wedding). So from the fairy tale creatures' perspective, he heads off to get them living elsewhere and ends up killing the guy who seems to be the only one that cares about relocating them.
** It's pretty simple. Farquaad hates having the fairytale creatures in his perfect kingdom, so he has them all arrested and forcibly relocated to a random swamp outside his city, which just happens to be Shrek's. The creatures are pretty miserable about this whole situation, so when Shrek announces his intention to go to Lord Farquaad and demand their removal from the swamp, they cheer him on (obviously they missed the part where Shrek is not doing this for their sake and doesn't care what happens to them as long as they are taken somewhere else). Shrek shows up in Farquaad's castle, beats up his knights, and gets held at arrow point. Farquaad tells Shrek to go get Fiona for him (with the implied threat that he will be shot otherwise). When Shrek complains about his swamp, Farquaad sweetens the deal by telling him he'll relocate the fairytale creatures elsewhere if Shrek succeeds in bringing Fiona back. Shrek succeeds, and Farquaad keeps his word. We have no idea where the creatures were taken between the scene where Shrek returns and the ending credits, but since they show up at the credits we know that they were kept alive; probably relocate to some OTHER random miserable area away from Farquaad's kingdom.
** The captain of the guard mentioned a relocation area for the fairy tale creatures. I was always under the assumption that Shrek's swamp ''was'' that relocation area.
** To put the final nail in the coffin so to speak, when Pinocchio says that Lord Farquaad ''forced'' them to come there (so no, it is not their refuge, it's their place of exile essentially) what Shrek says ''specifically'' is-"Attention all...fairytale things, do not get comfortable, you're welcome is officially worn-out. I'm gonna go see this guy Farquaad right now and get you off of my land and back where you came from!" So, with that in mind, the fairytale creatures interpreted that literally, so they thought Shrek was going to go make Farquaad bring them all ''home'', and as a big scary ogre, he would likely succeed, not realizing that Shrek only said that out of ignorance of the actual situation, as they didn't explain ''why'' Farquaad sent them there. I assume Shrek didn't think about why Farquaad would send them there himself and was only concerned with getting his swamp back. The fact that the fairytale creatures might be put somewhere worse didn't occur to him, nor would he have cared, and he just said that because he assumed that they were just evicted from wherever they came from for no reason cared about. I'm guessing the fairy-tale creatures either never thought about how selfish Shrek's intentions were after the fact, or the more considerate side Shrek likely showed after the events of the film, and inadvertently getting rid of Farquaad outright, led to them being okay with it. As for Farquaad's racism, the above Tropers lay that out perfectly well.

* Shrek says Hold the Phone sometimes. Why does he say that? They're not invented.
** [[SchizoTech Whoever said that?]]
*** You may as well ask how everyone knows modern pop songs and other cultural references, like Starbucks. Shrek's world isn't 100% medieval fantasy, it's an AnachronismStew.

* Shrek's character seems to ping-pong back and forth all over the place. In the first movie, he ''hated'' being seen as nothing but "a big stupid, ugly ogre" and wished everyone could see him for his inner beauty. It was his entire motivation. But in the sequels, especially 3 and 4, he keeps going on and on about "Ogres don't do this," "Ogres don't do that," and "I just want to be a plain old ogre again." He switches from trying to defy the ogre stereotype to trying to aspire to it.
** Midlife crisis perhaps?
** Grass is greener? Looking for an excuse? Wants out?
** In the first movie Shrek didn't wish for people to see his inner beauty, at least not consciously. Being not accepted for who he is, he used his "ugly, man-eating beast" status as an advance to at least acquire quiet. He did hate lack of acceptance, but gaining it certainly was not his motivation in the first place. If he ever had a motivation that lasted throughout all the movies, it was "Let me be an ogre and enjoy it and stay away if you don't like it."

* Potential answer to the whole Dragon/Donkey pairing - a lot of dragons, especially D&D dragons and those based on them, can polymorph. Dragon has the same power but uses it rarely. In this case, she just polymorphed into a female donkey.
** If she could do that, she wouldn't be wearing her "collar" when she meets again with Donkey near the end of the movie.
*** She put it back on as a fashion accessory?
*** Not all shape-shifting works that way. She could be able to shift into say, a dog. But when she transforms the collar remains on her dragon body.
*** [[UsefulNotes/{{BDSM}} Let me introduce you]] to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collar_(BDSM) something]].

* In the first film, Gingerbread Man and Lord Farquaad discuss the Muffin Man. Who is "She"?
-->'''Gingy:''' Do you know... the Muffin Man?
-->'''Farquaad:''' The Muffin Man?
-->'''Gingy:''' The Muffin Man...
-->'''Farquaad:''' Oh yes, I know the Muffin Man... Who lives on Drury Lane?
-->'''Gingy:''' Well... she's married to... the Muffin Man.
-->'''Farquaad:''' The Muffin Man?!
-->'''Gingy:''' THE MUFFIN MAN!!
-->'''Farquaad:''' She's married to the Muffin Man...
** The Muffin Woman doy.
** Other than Rule of Funny, I'm sure Gingy was just trying to change the subject so Farquad would forget about locating more fairytale creatures.

* In Scared Shrekless, is anyone else bothered by the fact that we never hear Puss's story? I know we didn't hear Pinnochio's either, but Puss had the potential to be scary. Or is it just his voice making me think that? Either way, I would have loved to hear whatever the Shrek-verse's version of truly scary was in his accent.

* Why, exactly, was Fiona cursed to be an ogre at night? What is the origin of the curse? They don't just randomly exist in the fairytale world, they must be cast by a witch or [[TheFairFolk fairies]]. If it was Fairy Godmother's price for turning the king into a human, why did she create such an elaborate easy-to-meddle-with rescue plot when she could've just demanded that if the king and the queen get a daughter, she would wed his son in exchange? If Harold and Lillian managed to piss off a witch that cast the curse, why was she never mentioned in any of the movies?
** In the first film, Fiona DOES say "When I was a little girl, a witch cast a spell on me." She doesn't go into any further detail, but there is that.
*** It's quite possible that "a witch cast a spell on Fiona" is just something her parents came up with to explain things to her, and that the whole change in day and night was her natural state because of her father's origin.
*** This can be explained through WhatCouldHaveBeen. In the original script, Fiona was BORN an ogre to the late King and Queen of Duloc (who were human). They locked her away in the tower, lying that she was "such a rare beauty" she was kidnapped. They died, and an ambitious regent (implied but never confirmed to be Farquaad) took over the rule of Duloc. When Fiona was old enough to assume the throne, she escaped the tower and encountered a witch named Dama Fortuna (which means “Dame Fortune” or “Lady Luck), who is the "witch" Fiona mentions in the movie. Fortuna gives Fiona a potion (rather than casting a spell) to make her beautiful, but warns that she will change between her human and ogress forms (apparently randomly, no mention of "by night one way, by day another") until she finds true love. She was later whisked away by her dragon guardian and returned to the tower. So summa summarum: She wasn't cursed to be an ogre at night, she was already an ogre, and the "spell" the witch cast was to turn her human.
*** How can an OGRE be born to HUMAN parents? Is it like in Harry Potter, where if there are ancestors in a human family of a different species, then the child of the humans in that family will be a member of that different species, as in, if the royal family of Duloc has ogre ancestry, then that is why Fiona was born an ogre?
** The simplest explanation requires a little speculation: Lillian was not aware of Harold's deal with FGM, I don't even remember if it was confirmed she knew about him being a frog but even if she did, perhaps FGM being the transformation agent was secret. Thus, Harold and FGM came up with this little crazy scheme, perhaps involving FGM posing like a witch, perhaps having something to do with Harold's spell, perhaps none of these; since Lillian would probably protest Prince Charming going and marrying her daughter, also claiming the future position of king of FFA, just because.
** Going back to the theory that the curse was the FGM's doing as part of her deal with Harold, it may have been to prevent him from backing out of the arrangement and give him extra incentive to get Fiona with Charming.
** Maybe ogres in this 'Verse were descended from magically-altered frogs, in the first place. They ''do'' prefer to live in swamps, after all.
*** If that’s the case, would Shrek’s Great-Aunt Ruthie (revealed in Swamp Talk) have become a human to marry a human (like King Harold did?
** My guess is, Fiona was born an ogre because she's the offspring of a human and a frog: when Harold used the potion to woo Lilian, she didn't know he was not human. The Fairy God Mother was aware that the resulting child would be a hybrid, which was something Harold didn't know. When they discovered their daughter was turning into an ogre every night, the FGM pretended she was cursed and only a True Love's kiss could turn her human. She convinced Harold and Lilian to send their daughter to the keep, where her True Love would rescue her and kiss her.

* What would Charming have done if Farquaad actually ''had'' married Fiona? Forced Far Far Away into declaring war on Duloc?
** This one's simple - The Fairy Godmother would have bullied Farquaad into divorcing Fiona, just like she tried to bully Shrek into giving her up.
*** Farquaad declared after he learned of Fiona's curse that he would lock her back in the tower. Most likely that's what would have happened.
*** Don't remember if something to this effect was said on the site, but FGM bullying Farquaad off the bat probably wouldn't have been her first move. Knowing how materialistic he is, she would have probably bribed him. A kingdom, probably, and with her either her magic/connections (maybe both) as the richest being in Far Far Away, he probably would have snagged the "perfect queen" for himself.

* In the first movie, right after Fiona beats up the Merry Men, Shrek asks her where she learned her martial arts moves, and Fiona starts to say something like "When you live alone, you have to..." before being cut off. Um... this is an excellent question, and she didn't answer it. Where ''did'' she learn martial arts? Hasn't she been locked in the tower since she was a kid?
** Keep in mind her mother can headbutt through walls. She either learned before she was sent away and just kept practicing or else learned from books while she was alone in the tower and simply had enough natural talent to make it work.
** It does take a lot out of her though, and she does get delusional from all the hits.
** It’s very unlikely that Fiona was just left alone in a tower since she was a little girl. Otherwise, her behavior and language abilities would be those of a WildChild. Either she had people taking care of her and her education including frequent visits of her parents and private tutors, or she was sent to the tower when she was already an adolescent or even a young adult. She also seems to have a normal, loving, relationship with her parents which means she had to have a normal child-parent relationship growing up at least for a while, reinforcing that she was probably in at least her late teens when sent to the tower (which makes sense anyway, is not like they need a ten-year-old there waiting for another ten year old Charming to rescue her or even more creepy, some adult who would have to kiss her). That and the fact she had to be fed meant it impractical to have her there unless she was already close to the right age.

* It seems weird for Fiona to be ashamed of her nightly Ogress form and yet sympathize with Shrek who's unfairly judged for being an ogre. Being ashamed of being an ogre at night seems tantamount to thinking all ogres are ugly disgusting creatures. But she takes pity on a natural-born ogre who's been victimized by that same prejudice. Talk about hypocrisy.
** I suppose you could see it that way, but to Fiona, her own Ogre form is a mark of being cursed and being ugly to fellow humans. Fiona hearing Shrek explain how it feels to be an ogre by birth, and getting treated horribly for it, makes her realize he's pretty much just as miserable, if not more than she is for the way he looks. It's more like she sympathizes with him ''because'' the world tells Shrek he's horrible and ugly, and she believes that she's ugly by being an ogre. To her, it's more like they're ''both'' being viewed as horrible and ugly for something that isn't their fault, thus they're in the same boat. Fiona didn't ''choose'' to be ashamed of her ogre form, it's the world seeing it that way that bothers her, which would also explain her being fine with it once she has people who accept her for being in that form.

* Who's ruling Duloc now that Farquaad is dead?
** No one, it's a republic now.
** They probably found someone to rule it eventually (someone less egocentric than Farquaad, hopefully).
** This question has already been handled. Also, like the answerer far above said, the Halloween short ''Scared Shrekless'' reveals that Duloc is now a ghost town.
** Maybe the citizens of Duloc moved to Far far away instead.

* What was with the people in the audience of the wedding at the end of the first movie? They all start laughing when instructed to via cue cards when Lord Farquaad announces Shrek's love for Fiona...yet after he's eaten and the two profess their love themselves, everyone seems touched by it.
** When an about-to-be-king with an executioner and army of knights on the stage order you to laugh, I think you would try your hardest to laugh.
*** The laughter seems like it was forced so none of them thought it was funny, they just had no other choice.
** I always assumed that the people of Duloc have been raised to follow rules so much that they just did what the cue-cards say. It might explain Thelonius' changing the card to go "Awwww", as he knew that would add to the moment, and that they would just do it.
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* In the first movie, how is it that Human Fiona's dress still comfortably fits Ogre! Fiona without ClothingDamage, when the transformation seems to add maybe fifty pounds or so of diplomatically undefined girth to her frame?
** Magic?
** A better question might be, why are Shrek's clothes too big for him after he transforms into a human, requiring him to "borrow" some from a passing carriage, but Fiona's dress still seems to fit her just fine?
** She mostly wears her green dress. It might be magic to fit Fiona every time she transforms. That doesn't explain her wedding dress when she transforms in front of Shrek and Lord Farquaad though, but since it was fashioned fast (That very day) it was probably made from some cheap fabric that easily gets stretched but surprisingly gets little other damage.
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* How do the frog and snake balloons from the first film float? Do ogres breathe helium?
** Possibly. Shrek's farts are pungent enough to kill fish underwater, and he later tells Donkey that if he had farted, Donkey would be dead. I wouldn't be surprised if all of Shrek's, uh... "bodily gases" have an extremely high chemical makeup, due to ogres' extremely unconventional eating habits.
*** But the snake was blown by Fiona, not by Shrek...
*** Fiona is an ogre at night, so maybe some ogre biology is intact around the clock for her (including her ability to stomach rotisserie weed rats)
** Rule of Funny people. You may as well also question how Fiona can blow up birds with her singing. It's for comedy.
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* In the original ''Shrek'', Shrek is having a meal while all the Fairytale Creatures who were forced out of Duloc are setting up their camp... In front of Donkey, who was forced to stay outside. And Shrek only learns about this camp after his own home is invaded and he tries to kick them out. So why didn't Donkey, who's trying to become Shrek's friend at this point, say anything about the camp?
** Donkey was either so deep in sulking in loneliness to even notice (he has a rather short attention span), or he just didn't wanna bother Shrek since it's been too established that Shrek finds him too irritating to let him sleep in the house for the "one night only" stay.
** Also Donkey probably didn't think the whole swamp was Shrek's territory and may have assumed the others were neighbors or even just travelers.
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* Why did Shrek feel the need to try to socialize with people who constantly run away from him instead of trying to make friends with some other ogres, or even any of the fairytale creatures who lived among him, since they didn't treat him with any contempt? It's clear he enjoys the life of being an ogre, so why wouldn't he just hang out with some ogre buddies with the same hobbies and interests as him rather than shutting himself out from the world completely?
** It's implied that all ogres, in general, aren't very sociable, and live in solitary swamps as Shrek does (the ''only'' time we see ogres together is in the fourth movie, and they are leading a resistance, and Shrek remarks when they use their ears as horns, "I didn't know we could do that..." which implies further that Shrek never had contact with other ogres), and Shrek was comfortable where he was so he never thought/wanted to take the time to search for them. Essentially, Shrek tried to socialize with the people around him when he was likely a bit younger, and since they all treated him with contempt and fear, he assumed it was just his lot in life and made the best of it. It's what makes Shrek so sympathetic, he was treated badly and interpreted in the worst possible way...
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* In the first film, Shrek can kill fish with his flatulence. Later, when Donkey accuses him of farting, Shrek claims that if the fart were his, Donkey would be dead. However, in the second movie, Shrek farts in front of Donkey and Puss in Boots after drinking the Happily Ever After potion, and while smelly, neither of them seem to be phased by this. Was the deadliness of his flatulence retconned?
** You answer your question - in the second movie, it was ''after'' he drank the potion. Since the potion turns him human, it likely started working its magic. Perhaps the first thing the potion impacts is bodily functions. If I'm not mistaken, we never see Shrek break wind in ''The Third'' (I haven't seen the fourth movie), but if I had to guess, he's probably back to normal after the potion wears off in this regard.
** Alternatively, since Donkey and Puss weren't facing Shrek's backside (and weren't ''that'' physically close to him) when he farted, they therefore probably didn't feel any lethal effects, unlike the fish in the first film that was in Shrek's immediate vicinity.
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* Farquaad's height is the butt of several jokes in a movie about ''not'' judging somebody by their appearances. Granted, one could argue that Farquaad's villainy makes him easy to mock, but imagine the less tall viewers who probably felt conflicted by the mixed messages.
** It could be argued that this is part of the point. The satirical nature of the movie gives a second theme: Nobody's perfect. This could easily be a way to show that even "good guys" can be less than perfect people, along with other things like Donkey's annoying attitude, Fiona's stubbornness, and Shrek being a jerk.
** Also, they aren't judging Farquaad based on his appearance, since they've already met him and know the kind of person he is when they're making jokes about him - a bigot who banishes people he doesn't like onto another person's land and who risks the lives of his men by having them rescue a princess who ''he'' wants to marry.
** The only joke that they tell about Farquaad isn't about his height, it's if he's "compensating for something" when neither Shrek nor Donkey met him.
** Not true at all. The movie pokes fun at his height all the time, even if it's not characters making a joke themselves, and there's the whole bit where Shrek and Donkey say things like how men like him are in "''' short''' supply" while giggling.
*** If you go back and watch the movie, all of their comments on his size double as jabs at his character and moral standing: Shrek specifically says that men of Farquaad’s ''stature'' (which can refer to his reputation as well as his physical height) are in “short” supply, to which Donkey replies that some people think ''little'' of him because he’s an unlikable bigot. Then Fiona says neither of them could “measure up” to a “great ruler” like Farquaad, and Shrek quips that he’ll let her do the ''measuring'' of him (and his supposed greatness) when they meet the next day. And Shrek and Donkey start cracking these jokes after Fiona asks what Farquaad is like — they’re trying to forewarn her that he’s a jackass in addition to being short.
** Additionally, the movie may consider mocking Farquaad's height fair play because of how much he tries to deny it and how much it fuels his bigotry. Shrek and Fiona accept themselves for who they are, so they're celebrated, but if you met a person who spent their life miserable and denialistic about their body and demanding you value them on a pretense that shows off their insecurity, you'd probably want to get rude and give them a reality check. The jokes about Farquaad can be seen as hitting him where it hurts because ''he'' chose to make his height such a big deal and hurt others because of it. Short people aren't bad. But cruelly insecure people might earn thejokes they work too hard to deny.
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* By about halfway through the first movie (or maybe even a little earlier), Donkey had won Shrek over and had become a trusted friend. But it wasn't until near the very end of the film, after nearly everything had gone wrong (Fiona goes off to marry Farquaad due to her and Shrek's mutual misunderstanding, Shrek and Donkey's big blow-up) that Shrek stops being dismissive toward Donkey and treats him more as an equal partner. Why? Donkey, after initially being run off of Shrek's land, later returns to reassert his rights to half the booty under his aid and contributions. He refuses to let Shrek (who, mind you, is ENRAGED and miserable at this point) scare him off or intimidate him into backing down or giving up his rightful claim, even getting into a shoving match with the monster. Donkey them proceeds to give Shrek a classic "TheReasonYouSuck" speech that makes him come around. As it was at that point Donkey truly earned Shrek's respect, Shrek starts to treat Donkey decidedly differently than just an annoying tagalong or even pet, but as a true ally (aside from some good-natured ribbing, of course).
** Shrek being dismissive of Donkey had less to do with not respecting him yet and more to do with the ThirdActMisunderstanding that this movie made famous. The two of them got along fine during the scene at the windmill, but then Shrek overhears Donkey talking privately with Fiona and assumes their "hideous beast" line was referring to him. That's why he yelled at Donkey for supposedly stabbing him in the back (since Donkey had earlier said he didn't mind how Shrek looked) and why the two make up and become friends again once Donkey reveals Fiona ''wasn't'' talking about Shrek's appearance.
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* In the first film, Fiona says that when she's a baby a witch casts a spell upon her that turns her into an ogress each night, who was the witch? was it [[WesternAnimation/SleepingBeauty Maleficent]] herself?
** Nobody knows, there's been no other references to it and no information released. It's a throwaway line that has no real bearing on the rest of the story and thus has no other elaboration.
** Some speculate that it was the Fairy Godmother as an added incentive to get Harold to marry Fiona to Charming, but that's more WMG.
** I thought it was implied that it was one of the witches under the command of Rumpelstiltskin (who are his primary henchmen, as well as the main group of people he's living with, in ''Shrek Forever After'').
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* In ''Shrek 4-D'', why would Farquaad's Ghost want to marry Fiona, living or Ghost? She's permanently an Ogre, and he was repulsed by her Ogre-ness in life. His being a ghost shouldn't change his opinion on that.
** [[AFateWorseThanDeath Becoming the undead]][[DrivenToMadness does a number on your psyche.]]
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* Why does Rumpelstiltskin look so different between the third and fourth films?
** Maybe he used his contracts to change himself. Either that or they’re different Rumplestiltskins, maybe father and son.
** MagicPlasticSurgery with, y'know, real magic!
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* How do the producers manage to get the rights for Captain Hook? He's not in the public domain.
** Captain Hook is a character from the 1911 J.M. Barrie novel ''Peter and Wendy'' which was adapted from the 1904 play ''Peter Pan''. Although the play version is not in the U.S. public domain, the novel version is, and thus they were allowed to use him.
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* Why did Fiona think Shrek wouldn't love her as an ogre? ''He's'' an ogre. Does she think male ogres don't find females of their species attractive?
** A). Fiona didn't know all that much about ogres and what attracts them. B). She felt ashamed to be an ogre, as she was born a human, and thought this wasn't how she was supposed to look since she's a princess. C). When Shrek confronted her about what he heard between her and Donkey about "loving a hideous beast", she assumed he knew about her curse, and believed he, like everyone else, couldn't love her because of it.
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* At the end of Shrek 2 and in some of the spin-offs starring Puss in Boots, there are moments where he's near tears. But when this happens, why does he wipe his nose and not his eyes? Is that a cat behavior?
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* Farquaad's height is the butt of several jokes in a movie about ''not'' judging somebody by their appearances. Granted, one could argue that Farquaad's villainy makes him an AcceptableTarget, but imagine the less tall viewers who probably felt conflicted by the mixed messages.

* The later movies titles. ''Shrek 2'' makes sense and is simple. When the time comes for the third movie they decide not to call it ''Shrek 3'' for fear of confusion with the ''Shrek 3-D'' mini-movie. Um, who'd be that stupid? And now with the fourth movie, it's just getting worse.

** Gonna try and answer the original question here- 'Why Farquaad picks on the fairy-tale creatures?/What does he mean by perfect world?'- I believe that he's pretty specist and to go one step farther in the 'why' department, something of an adherent to order. Humans follow natural, physical laws and can be governed pretty tidily (in fairy tales, anyway). DuLoc is highly ordered- everything is regular, clean, and the introduction song at the info booth is all about how in DuLoc, you follow the rules. Creatures from fairy tales break natural rules. Animals talk, various things fly (donkeys, fairies, little boys), you have magic and witchcraft, and that's not going into accounting for all the different cultures of these different species. Human mindsets and customs make sense to Farquaad and he can impose order on people who, on a sheer biological/general cultural level, think as he does. He can't necessarily make a unicorn or ogre or witch follow his rules, he interprets that as a threat to his bastion of order, and so he goes on a crusade to get rid of the beings that threaten his way of life. Alternatively/in conjunction with that, he sees other creatures as subhuman, and when 'subhumans' get uppity about silly little things like 'equal rights' and whatnot, trouble always happens... *cough*

** To put the final nail in the coffin so to speak, when Pinocchio says that Lord Farquaad ''forced'' them to come there (so no, it is not their refuge, it's their place of exile essentially) what Shrek says ''specifically'' is-"Attention all...fairytale things, do not get comfortable, you're welcome is officially worn-out. I'm gonna go see this guy Farquaad right now and get you off of my land and back where you came from!" So, that in mind, the fairytale-creatures interpreted that literally, so they thought Shrek was going to go make Farquaad bring them all ''home'', and as a big scary ogre, he would likely succeed, not realizing that Shrek only said that out of ignorance of the actual situation, as they didn't explain ''why'' Farquaad sent them there. I assume Shrek didn't think about why Farquaad would send them there himself and was only concerned with getting his swamp back. The fact that the fairytale creatures might be put somewhere worse didn't occur to him, nor would he have cared, and he just said that because he assumed that they were just evicted from wherever they came from for no reason cared about. I'm guessing the fairy-tale creatures either never thought about how selfish Shrek's intentions were after the fact, or the more considerate side Shrek likely showed after the events of the film, and inadvertently getting rid of Farquaad outright, led to them being okay with it. As for Farquaad's racism, the above Tropers lay that out perfectly well.

* Shrek's character seems to ping-pong back and forth all over the place. In the first movie, he ''hated'' being seen as nothing but "a big stupid, ugly ogre" and wished everyone could see him for his inner beauty. It was his entire motivation. But in the sequels, especially 3 and 4, he keeps going on and on about "Ogres don't do this," "Ogres don't do that," "I just want to be a plain old ogre again." He switches from trying to defy the ogre stereotype to trying to aspire to it.

*** It's quite possible that "a witch cast a spell on Fiona" is just something her parents came up with to explain things to her, and that the whole change at day and night was her natural state because of her father's origin.

** It’s very unlikely that Fiona was just left alone in a tower since she was a little girl. Otherwise, her behavior and language abilities would be those of a WildChild. Either she had people taking care of her and her education including frequent visits of her parents and private tutors, or she was sent to the tower when she was already an adolescent or even a young adult. She also seems to have a normal, loving, relationship with her parents which means she had to have a normal child-parent relationship growing up at least for a while, re-inforcing that she was probably in at least her late teens when sent to the tower (which makes sense anyway, is not like they need a ten-year-old there waiting for another ten year old Charming to rescue her or even more creepy, some adult who would have to kiss her). That and the fact she had to be fed means it unpractical to have her there unless she was already close to the right age.

* It seems weird for Fiona to be ashamed of her nightly Ogress form and yet sympathize for Shrek who's unfairly judged for being an ogre. Being ashamed of being an ogre at night seems tantamount to thinking all ogres are ugly disgusting creatures. But she takes pity on a natural-born ogre who's been victimized by that same prejudice. Talk about hypocrisy.
** I suppose you could see it that way, but to Fiona, her own Ogre form is a mark of being cursed and being ugly to fellow humans. Fiona hearing Shrek explain how it feels to be an ogre by birth, and getting treated horribly for it, makes her realize he's pretty much just as miserable, if not more than she is for the way he looks. It's more like she sympathizes with him ''because'' the world tells Shrek he's horrible and ugly, and she believes that she's ugly by being an ogre. To her, it's more like they're ''both'' being viewed as horrible and ugly for something that isn't their fault, thus they're in the same boat. Fiona didn't ''choose'' to be ashamed of her ogre form, it's the world that seeing it that way that bothers her, which would also explain her being fine with it once she has people who accept her for being in that form.

** It's implied that all ogres, in general, aren't very sociable, and live in solitary swamps as Shrek does (the ''only'' time we see ogres together are in the fourth movie, and they are leading a resistance, and Shrek remarks when they use their ears as horns, "I didn't know we could do that..." which implies further that Shrek never had contact with other ogres), and Shrek was comfortable where he was so he never thought/wanted to take the time to search for them. Essentially, Shrek tried to socialize with the people around him when he was likely a bit younger, and since they all treated him with contempt and fear, he assumed it was just his lot in life and made the best of it. It's what makes Shrek so sympathetic, he was treated badly and interpreted in the worst possible way...

** Additionally, the movie may considee mocking Farquaad's height fair play because of how much he tries to deny it and how much it fuels his bigotry. Shrek and Fiona accept themselves for who they are, so they're celebrated, but if you met a person who spent their life miserable and denialistic about their body and demanding you value them on a pretense that shows off their insecurity, you'd probably want to get rude and give them a reality check. The jokes about Farquaad can be seen as hitting him where it hurts because ''he'' chose to make his height such a big deal and hurt others because of it. Short people aren't bad. But cruelly insecure people might earn thejokes they work too hard to deny.

* Why does Rumpelstiltskin look so different between the third and fourth film?

** My guess is, Fiona was born an ogre because she's the offspring of a human and a frog: when Harold used the potion to woo Vivian, she didn't know he was not human. The Fairy God Mother was aware that the resulting child would be a hybrid, which was something Harold didn't know. When they discovered their daughter was turning into an ogre every night, the FGM pretended she was cursed and only a True Love's kiss could turn her human. She convinced Harold and Vivian to send their daughter to the keep, where her True Love would rescue her and kiss her.

** It can be assumed from the opening of the fourth film that they heard the general proclamation that Fiona had been rescued, which just so happened to coincide with it being around the time that Charming was sent off to get her (why exactly Harold and Vivian decided they couldn't wait for her curse to be broken any longer at the exact time Charming was about to rescue her is kind of confusing). They didn't get any details beyond "a brave knight rescued and married her" as well as the knight's residence being about a day's trip outside Duloc, so they sent the welcoming party to ask around the area and find out where she and Shrek were.

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* Why didn't Shrek and Fiona tell her parents right away how Shrek rescued Fiona? Better yet, why didn't Fairy Godmother and Prince Charming find out about it?

* Shrek's character seems to ping-pong back and forth all over the place. In the first movie, he ''hated'' being seen as nothing but "a big stupid, ugly ogre" and wished everyone could see him for his inner beauty. It was his entire motivation. But in the sequels, especially 3 and 4, he keeps going on and on about "Ogres don't do this," "Ogres don't do that," "I just want to be a plain old ogre again." He switches from trying to defy the ogre stereotype to try to aspire to it.

** It’s very unlikely that Fiona was just left alone in a tower since she was a little girl. Otherwise, her behavior and language abilities would be those of a WildChild. Either she had people taking care of her and her education including frequent visits of her parents and private tutors, or she was sent to the tower when she was already an adolescent or even a young adult. She also seems to have a normal, loving, relationship with her parents which means she had to have a normal child-parent relationship growing up at least for a while, re-inforcing that she was probably in at least her late teens when sent to the tower (which makes sense anyway, is not like they need a ten-year-old there waiting for another ten year old Charming to rescue her or even more creepy, some adult who would have to kiss her). That and the fact she had to be feed means it unpractical to have her there unless she was already close to the right age.

** I suppose you could see it that way, but to Fiona, her own Ogre form is a mark of being cursed, and being ugly to fellow humans. Fiona hearing Shrek explain how it feels to be an ogre by birth, and getting treated horribly for it, makes her realize he's pretty much just as miserable, if not more, than she is for the way he looks. It's more like she sympathizes with him ''because'' the world tells Shrek he's horrible and ugly, and she believes that she's ugly by being an ogre. To her, it's more like they're ''both'' being viewed as horrible and ugly for something that isn't their fault, thus they're in the same boat. Fiona didn't ''choose'' to be ashamed of her ogre form, it's the world that seeing it that way that bothers her, which would also explain her being fine with it once she has people who accept her for being in that form.

** Shrek being dismissive of Donkey had less to do with not respecting him yet and more to do with the ThirdActMisunderstanding that this movie made famous. The two of them got along fine during the scene at the windmill, but then Shrek overhears Donkey talking privately with Fiona and assumes their "hideous beast" line was referring to him. That's why he yelled at Donkey for supposedly stabbing him in the back (since Donkey had earlier said he didn't mind how Shrek looked) and why the two makeup and become friends again once Donkey reveals Fiona ''wasn't'' talking about Shrek's appearance.

*** Who is this "handsome prince" Snow White is in love with? It's obviously not Prince Charming because he's paired up with Fiona and later Rapunzel.

* Why does Fiona always choose to remain an ogre? Even if she became accustomed to being one, it doesn't explain why she would prefer that form over the one she originally was. The films suggest she doesn't want Shrek to change who he is just for her, but she seems to be doing the same thing for him, so is it just a double-standard? Did people [[ExecutiveMeddling think a human/ogre relationship bordered too closely to bestiality?]] It almost feels like the SecondLawOfGenderBending is at hand here, but with form-shifting instead of gender-bending.
** Because her true love is Shrek, and she took love's true form. Basically, she's far better off as an ogre than a princess. She prefers it because Shrek changed her and made her truly happy, something she hadn't been for much of her life. It was what she was meant to be all along, in a sense. In the first film she's obviously ashamed of it because she thinks Farquaad is her true love, but at the start of the second film, she's clearly shown to love being an ogre and is genuinely unashamed of showing this to her parents. And yeah, it would be pretty uncomfortable, virtually a form of bestiality, if Fiona had stayed human. Especially since she'd be squashed to death during intercourse and even if Shrek did get her pregnant, she'd be forced to give birth to horrible human/ogre hybrids instead of the cute little ogre kids she has at the end of the third film. With Donkey and Dragon, the bizarre pairing and the unsolved mystery of how Donkey impregnated her (and the result being the birth of hybrid "Dronkeys") is clearly treated as a joke that isn't meant to be analysed, but as for Shrek, he's the main character and his romance with Fiona is the central storyline of the franchise, so for him it's different.

* Why is marrying a princess supposed to make Farquaad King of Duloc, not of the princess's own kingdom?

*** He's trying to realize his vision of a perfect kingdom. It's more about cementing his claim in his own head than anyone else's.
*** If fairy tale land is anything like the real world DungAges in this regard, then as long as Duloc is not ruled by a king Duloc is a dependency of somewhere else's kingdom - possibly, but not necessarily Far Far Away itself. This means Farquaad can be omnipotent in his own land (as the feudal lord he is) yet he has to pay taxes and can be drafted into the army of the king he's attached to as a vassal. The only way he can get rid of that and make Duloc an independent state is by being declared king of Duloc by his superior or by marrying a royal heir princess, thus gaining royal status himself in the process. This would explain also what happens to Duloc in the sequels: since Farquaad had no heirs when he died, his lands and title were (re)taken by his king and Duloc abolished as a distinct entity.
*** And overall, if an all-seeing magic mirror says that his only (if not easiest) way to officially become king is by marrying a princess, can he really doubt it?

** A kingdom is ruled by a king. Otherwise, its a manor (Lord), county (Count), Duchy (Duke), Principality (Prince) Queendom (Queen) or some other fancy title. The Mirror said it was technically not a perfect kingdom simply because it wasn't ruled by a king.

** Inheritance might not work the same way in this world as it does in the real world. (And even the real world features more than one set of rules for this.) For all we know, maybe in this world marrying a princess ''does'' make you king of your own realm.
*** The answer ''maybe in this fictional world rules are different'' (which has became very common in headscratchers by the way) is basically AWizardDidIt. All universes work by established rules (often the same as real world's) unless otherwise specified.

* The later movies titles. ''Shrek 2'' makes sense and is simple. When the time comes for the third movie they decide not to call it ''Shrek 3'' for fear of confusion with the ''Shrek 3-D'' mini movie. Um, who'd be that stupid? And now with the fourth movie it's just getting worse.

** I always thought it was to shake things up and seem more unique then just generic number titles.

* What exactly was going on with Farquaad. I know in a satire a villain's motives can be two-dimensional, but I didn't get what was the ultimate goal. He tells Gingerbread Man that the fairy tale characters are a threat to his "perfect kingdom". No rationalization on that one. Everything is imperfect, but Farquaad picks on the fairy tale characters for some reason. So then we see scenes of fairy tale characters led off in chains, likely to prison camps and such. At least one character (Mama Bear) is put to death. Okay, it makes sense up until this point. Then we see that dozens of fairy tale folk have taken over Shrek's swamp, including Pinocchio, who was clearly seen being handed over to the guards earlier. (I guess he could have escaped during Donkey's distraction, but they could have mentioned that at some point) The pigs say that Farquaad was ''evicting'' them, which contradicts what we've seen up to this point. So Shrek goes to Duloc to complain. He tells Farquaad that his swamp is full of fairy tale folk, and Farquaad wears a pleased smile and says "Is it?" This ''should'' be an indication that Shrek has unwittingly betrayed them to certain doom, but nothing comes of this. After Shrek returns his swamp is cleared out and the fairy tale folk aren't seen until the wedding at the end, where they happily celebrate their best friend Shrek, who, um, betrayed their hideout (or refugee camp, or whatever) to an evil dictator and then was only indirectly involved in said dictator's death. Was there some stuff cut out of the movie, or am I missing something?

** Shrek's swamp is a day-and-a-half walk from the ''citadel'' of Duloc. It seemed to me like the grin was "[[SmugSnake Is that so? Well, they're your problem now]]". MamaBear probably got killed in a scuffle or executed as an excuse to get Faarquad a new rug. I really don't know why the fairy-tale beings were celebrating Shrek as something like a friend, but maybe the dance party was supposed to be a non-canon thing like [[Series/AmericanIdol FFA Idol]] etc., or answering "WhatHappenedToTheMouse?" with "It didn't die, that's what happened", and the production team simply decided to take it as canon.
** Gonna try and answer the original question here- 'Why Farquaad picks on the fairy-tale creatures?/What does he mean by perfect world?'- I'm of the opinion that he's pretty speciest and to go one step farther in the 'why' department, something of an adherent to order. Humans follow natural, physical laws and can be governed pretty tidily (in fairy tales, anyway). DuLoc is highly ordered- everything is regular, clean, and the introduction song at the info booth is all about how in DuLoc, you follow the rules. Creatures from fairy tales break natural rules. Animals talk, various and sundry things fly (donkeys, fairies, little boys), you have magic and witchcraft, and that's not going into accounting for all the different cultures of these different species. Human mindsets and customs make sense to Farquaad and he can impose order on people who, on a sheer biological/general cultural level, thinks like he does. He can't necessarily make a unicorn or ogre or witch follow his rules, he interprets that as a threat to his bastion of order, and so he goes on a crusade to get rid of the beings that threaten his way of life. Alternatively/in conjunction with that, he sees other creatures as subhuman, and when 'subhumans' get uppity about silly little things like 'equal rights' and whatnot, trouble always happens... *cough*
** They were all on Shrek's swamp because Farquaad dumped them there. When he says, "Is that so?" it doesn't mean he didn't know about it. Shrek is treated as a hero because all of the fairytale creatures were at the swamp under Farquaad's orders when they didn't want to be. By rescuing Fiona, Shrek freed them from the swamp. I don't know where they went afterwards.

** We see the fairy tale beings treat Shrek as a hero the instant he says he's going to get them out of his swamp, because they don't like being there anymore than he likes having them around. Consider also that Shrek is responsible for Lord Farquaad being eaten (not directly, yes, but it was because of his plan to stop the wedding). So from the fairy tale creatures' perspective, he heads off to get them living elsewhere, and ends up killing the guy who seems to be the only one that actually cares about relocating them.
** It's pretty simple. Farquaad hates having the fairytale creatures in his perfect kingdom, so he has them all arrested and forcibly relocated to a random swamp outside his city, which just happens to be Shrek's. The creatures are pretty miserable about this whole situation, so when Shrek announces his intention to go to Lord Farquaad and demand their removal from the swamp, they cheer him on (obviously they missed the part where Shrek is not doing this for their sake, and doesn't care what happens to them as long as they are taken somewhere else). Shrek shows up in Farquaad's castle, beats up his knights, and gets held at arrow point. Farquaad tells Shrek to go get Fiona for him (with the implied threat that he will shot otherwise). When Shrek complains about his swamp, Farquaad sweetens the deal by telling him he'll relocate the fairytale creatures elsewhere if Shrek succeeds in bringing Fiona back. Shrek succeeds, and Farquaad keeps his word. We have no idea where the creatures where taken between the scene where Shrek returns and the ending credits, but since they show up at the credits we know that they were kept alive; probably relocate to some OTHER random miserable area away from Farquaad's kingdom.

** To put the final nail in the coffin so to speak, when Pinocchio says that Lord Farquaad ''forced'' them to come there (so no, it is not their refuge, it's their place of exile essentially) what Shrek says ''specifically'' is-"Attention all...fairytale things, do not get comfortable, you're welcome is officially worn-out. In fact, I'm gonna go see this guy Farquaad right now and get you off of my land and back where you came from!" So, that in mind, the fairytale-creatures interpreted that literally, so they thought Shrek was going to go make Farquaad bring them all ''home'', and as a big scary ogre, he would likely succeed, not realizing that Shrek only said that out of ignorance of the actual situation, as they didn't explain ''why'' Farquaad sent them there. I assume Shrek didn't think about why Farquaad would send them there himself, and was only concerned with getting his swamp back. The fact that the fairytale creatures might be put somewhere worse didn't occur to him, nor would he have cared, and he just said that because he assumed that they were just evicted from wherever they came from for no reason he cared about. I'm guessing the fairy-tale creatures either never thought about how selfish Shrek's intentions were after the fact, or the more considerate side Shrek likely showed after the events of the film, and inadvertently getting rid of Farquaad outright, led to them being okay with it. As for Farquaad's racism, the above Tropers lay that out perfectly well.

* Shrek says hold the Phone sometimes. Why does he say that? They're not invented.
** [[SchizoTech Who ever said that?]]

* Shrek's character really seems to ping-pong back and forth all over the place. In the first movie, he ''hated'' being seen as nothing but "a big stupid, ugly ogre" and wished everyone could see him for his inner beauty. It was his entire motivation. But in the sequels, especially 3 and 4, he keeps going on and on about "Ogres don't do this," "Ogres don't do that," "I just want to be a plain old ogre again." He switches from trying to defy the ogre stereotype to trying to aspire to it.

** In the first movie Shrek actually didn't wish for people to see his inner beauty, at least not consciously. Being not accepted for who he is, he used his "ugly, man-eating beast" status as advance to at least acquire peace and quiet. He did hate lack of acceptance, but gaining it certainly was not his motivation in the first place. If he ever had a motivation that lasted throughout all the movies, it was "Let me be an ogre and enjoy it and stay away if you don't like it."

* Potential answer to the whole Dragon/Donkey pairing - a lot of dragons, especially D&D dragons and those based off of them, have the ability to polymorph. Dragon has the same power, but uses it rarely. In this case, she just polymorphed into a female donkey.
** If she could do that, she wouldn't be wearing her "collar" when she meets again with donkey near the end of the movie.

*** Not all shape-shifing works that way. She could be able to shift into say, a dog. But when she transforms the collar remainds on her dragon body.

* In the first film, Gingerbread Man and Lord Farquaad have the discussion about the Muffin Man. Who is "She"?

* In Scared Shrekless, is anyone else bothered by the fact that we never hear Puss's story? i know we didn't hear Pinnochio's either, but Puss had the potential to be actually scary. Or is it just his voice making me think that? Either way, I would have loved to hear whatever the Shrek-verse's version of truly scary was in his accent.

* Why, exactly, was Fiona cursed to be an ogre at night? What is the origin of the curse? They don't just randomly exist in the fairytale world, they must be cast by a witch or [[TheFairFolk fairies]]. If it was Fairy Godmother's price for turning the king into human, why did she create such an elaborate easy-to-meddle-with rescue plot when she could've just demanded that if the king and the queen get a daughter, she would wed his son in exchange? If Harold and Lillian managed to piss off a witch that cast the curse, why was she never mentioned in any of the movies?

*** It's quite possible that "a witch cast a spell on Fiona" is just something her parents came up with to explain things to her, and that the whole changing at day and night was her natural state because of her father's origin.
*** This can be explained through WhatCouldHaveBeen. In the original script, Fiona was BORN an ogre to the late King and Queen of Duloc (who were human). They locked her away in the tower, lying that she was "such a rare beauty" she was kidnapped. They died, and an ambitious regent (implied but never confirmed to be Farquaad) took over rule of Duloc. When Fiona was old enough to assume the throne, she escaped the tower and encountered a witch named Dama Fortuna (which means “Dame Fortune” or “Lady Luck), who is the "witch" Fiona mentions in the movie. Fortuna gives Fiona a potion (rather than casting a spell) to make her beautiful, but warns that she will change between her human and ogress forms (apparently randomly, no mention of "by night one way, by day another") until she finds true love. She was later whisked away by her dragon guardian and returned to the tower. So summa summarum: She wasn't cursed to be an ogre at night, she was already an ogre, and the "spell" the witch cast was to turn her human.
*** How can an OGRE be born to HUMAN parents? Is it like in Harry Potter, where if there’s ancestors in a human family of a different species, then the child of the humans in that family will be a member of that different species, as in, if the royal family of Duloc has ogre ancestry, then that is why Fiona was born an ogre?
** The simplest explanation requires a little speculation: Lillian was not aware of Harold's deal with FGM, I don't even remember if it was confirmed she knew about him being a frog but even if she did, perhaps FGM being the transformation agent was secret. Thus, Harold and FGM came up with this little crazy scheme, perhaps involving FGM posing as a witch, perhaps having actually something to do with Harold's spell, perhaps none of these; since Lillian would probably protest Prince Charming going and marrying her daughter, also claiming the future position of king of FFA, just because.

** My guess is, Fiona was born an ogre because she's the offspring of a human and a frog: when Harold used the potion to woo Vivian, she didn't know he was not human. The Fairy God Mother was aware that the resulting child would be a hybrid, which was something Harold didn't know. When they discovered their daughter was turning into an ogre every night, the FGM pretended she was cursed and only a True Love's kiss could turn her human. She convinced Harold and Vivian to send their daughter to the keep, where her True Love would rescue her and give her the kiss.

* In the first movie, right after Fiona beats up the Merry Men, Shrek asks here where she learned her martial arts moves, and Fiona starts to say something like "When you live alone, you have to..." before being cut off. Um... this is an excellent question, and she didn't answer it. Where ''did'' she learn martial arts? Hasn't she been locked in the tower since she was a kid?

** It’s very unlikely that Fiona was just left alone in a tower since she was a little girl. Otherwise her behavior and language abilities would be those of a WildChild. Either she had people taking care of her and her education including frequent visits of her parents and private tutors, or she was sent to the tower when she was already an adolescent or even a young adult. She also seems to have a normal, loving, relationship with her parents which means she had to have a normal child-parent relationship growing up at least for a while, re-inforcing that she was probably in at least her late teens when sent to the tower (which makes sense anyway, is not like they need a ten year old there waiting for another ten year old Charming to rescue her or even more creepy, some adult who would have to kiss her). That and the fact she had to be feed means is unpractical to have her there unless she was already close to the right age.

* It seems weird for Fiona to be ashamed of her nightly Ogress form and yet sympathize for Shrek who's unfairly judged for being an ogre. Being ashamed of being an ogre at night seems tantamount to thinking all ogres are ugly disgusting creatures. But she takes pity on a natural-born ogre who's been victimized by that exact same prejudice. Talk about hypocrisy.

** No one, it's basically a republic now.

* What was with the people in the audience of the wedding at the end of the first movie? They all start laughing when instructed to via cue cards when Lord Farquaad announces Shrek's love for Fiona...yet after he's eaten and the two profess their love themselves, everyone seems really touched by it.

*** The laughter seems like it was forced so none of them really thought it was funny, they just had no other choice.
** I always assumed that the people of Duloc have been raised to follow rules so much that they literally just did what the cue-cards say. It might explain Thelonius' changing the card to go "Awwww", as he knew that would add to the moment, and that they would just do it.

* In the first movie, how is it that Human Fiona's dress still comfortably fits Ogre!Fiona without ClothingDamage, when the transformation seems to add maybe fifty pounds or so of diplomatically undefined girth to her frame?

** She mostly wears her green dress. It might be magic to fit Fiona every time she transforms. That doesn't explain her wedding dress when she transforms in front of Shrek and Lord Farquaad though, but since it was fashioned really fast (That very day) it was probably made from some cheap fabric that easily gets stretched but surprisingly gets little other damage.

*** But the snake was blowed by Fiona, not by Shrek...
*** Fiona is an ogre at night, so maybe some ogre biology is intact around the clock for her (including her ability to stomach rotissery weed rats)

* Why did Shrek feel the need to try to socialize with people who constantly run away from him instead of trying to make friends with some other ogres, or even any of the fairytale creatures who lived among him, since they didn't really treat him with any contempt? It's clear he enjoys the life of being an ogre, so why wouldn't he just hang out with some ogre buddies with the same hobbies and interests as him rather than shutting himself out from the world completely?
** It's implied that all ogres in general aren't very sociable, and live in solitary swamps like Shrek does (the ''only'' time we see ogres together are in the fourth movie, and they are leading a resistance, and Shrek remarks when they use their ears as horns, "I didn't know we could do that..." which implies further that Shrek never had contact with other ogres), and Shrek was comfortable where he was so he never thought/wanted to take the time to search for them. Essentially, Shrek tried to socialize with the people around him when he was likely a bit younger, and since they all treated him with contempt and fear, he assumed it was just his lot in life and made the best of it. It's what makes Shrek so sympathetic, he was treated badly, and interpreted it in the worst possible way...

* In the first film, Shrek is able to kill fish with his flatulence. Later, when Donkey accuses him of farting, Shrek claims that if the fart were his, Donkey would be dead. However, in the second movie, Shrek farts in front of Donkey and Puss in Boots after drinking the Happily Ever After potion, and while smelly, neither of them seem to phased by this. Was the deadliness of his flatulence retconned?
** You answer your own question - in the second movie, it was ''after'' he drank the potion. Since the potion turns him human, it likely started working it's magic. Perhaps the first thing the potion impacts is bodily functions. If I'm not mistaken, we never see Shrek break wind in ''The Third'' (I haven't seen the fourth movie), but if I had to guess, he's probably back to normal after the potion wears off in this regard.
** Alternatively, since Donkey and Puss weren't facing Shrek's backside (and weren't ''that'' physically close to him) when he farted, they therefore probably didn't feel any lethal effects, unlike the fish in the first film that were in Shrek's immediate vicinity.

** Not true at all. The movie pokes fun at his height all the time, even if it's not characters making a joke themselves, and there's the whole bit where Shrek and Donkey say things like how men like him are in "'''short''' supply" while giggling.
*** If you go back and watch the movie, all of their comments on his size double as jabs at his character and moral standing: Shrek specifically says that men of Farquaad’s ''stature'' (which can refer to his reputation as well as his physical height) are in “short” supply, to which Donkey replies that some people think ''little'' of him, because he’s an unlikable bigot. Then Fiona says neither of them could “measure up” to a “great ruler” like Farquaad, and Shrek quips that he’ll let her do the ''measuring'' of him (and his supposed greatness) when they meet the next day. And Shrek and Donkey start cracking these jokes after Fiona asks what Farquaad is like — they’re clearly trying to forewarn her that he’s a jackass in addition to being short.

* By about halfway through the first movie (or maybe even a little earlier), Donkey had won Shrek over and had become a trusted friend. But it wasn't until near the very end of the film, after nearly everything had gone wrong (Fiona goes off to marry Farquaad due to her and Shrek's mutual misunderstanding, Shrek and Donkey's big blow-up) that Shrek really stops being dismissive toward Donkey and treats him more as an equal partner. Why? Donkey, after initially being run off of Shrek's land, later returns to reassert his rights to half the booty by virtue of his aid and contributions. He refuses to let Shrek (who, mind you, is ENRAGED and miserable at this point) scare him off or intimidate him into backing down or giving up his rightful claim, even getting into a shoving match with the monster. Donkey them proceeds to give Shrek a classic "TheReasonYouSuck" speech that makes him come around. As it was at that point Donkey truly earned Shrek's respect, Shrek starts to treat Donkey decidedly differently than just an annoying tagalong or even pet, but as a true ally (aside from some good-natured ribbing, of course).
** Shrek being dismissive of Donkey had less to do with not respecting him yet and more to do with the ThirdActMisunderstanding that this movie made famous. The two of them got along fine during the scene at the windmill, but then Shrek overhears Donkey talking privately with Fiona and assumes their "hideous beast" line was referring to him. That's why he yelled at Donkey for supposedly stabbing him in the back (since Donkey had earlier said he didn't mind how Shrek looked) and why the two make up and become friends again once Donkey reveals Fiona ''wasn't'' talking about Shrek's appearance.

* In the first film, Fiona says that when she's a baby a witch cast a spell upon her that turns her into an ogress each night, who was the witch? was it [[WesternAnimation/SleepingBeauty Maleficent]] herself?

** Some speculate that it was the Fairy Godmother as added incentive to get Harold to marry Fiona to Charming, but that's more WMG.

* In ''Shrek 4-D'', why would Farquaad's Ghost want to merry Fiona, living or Ghost? She's permanently an Ogre, and he was repulsed by her Ogre-ness in life. Him being a ghost shouldn't change his opinion on that.
** [[AFateWorseThanDeath Becoming the undead]][[DrivenToMadness does a number on your pysche.]]

* Why does Rumpelstiltskin looks so different between the third and fourth film?

* How do the producers manage to get the rights for Captain Hook? He's not in public domain.

* Why did Fiona think Shrek wouldn't love her as an ogre? ''He's'' an ogre. Does she think male ogres don't find females of their own species attractive?
** A). Fiona didn't know all that much about ogres and what attracts them. B). She felt ashamed to be an ogre, as she was born a human, and thought this wasn't how she was supposed to look, since she's a princess. C). When Shrek confronted her about what he heard between her and Donkey about "loving a hideous beast", she assumed he knew about her curse, and believed he, like everyone else, couldn't love her because of it.

* At the end of Shrek 2 and in some of the spin-offs starring Puss in Boots, there are moments where he's near tears. But when this happens, why does he wipe his nose and not his eyes? Is that a cat behavior?

*** If that’s the case, would Shrek’s Great-Aunt Ruthie (revealed in Swamp Talk) have become a human to marry a human (like King Harold didt?

** A kingdom is ruled by a king. Otherwise, its a manor (Lord), county (Count), Duchy (Duke), or Principality (Prince) or some other fancy title. The Mirror said it was technically not a perfect kingdom simply because it wasn't ruled by a king.