By Jack Clark
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish was just recently released as the third installment of the Puss in Boots franchise, a spin-off of the Shrek movies. This movie follows Puss in Boots, down to his last life, as he journeys to find the legendary Last Wish and regain his other eight lives. A mysterious wolf follows him throughout the movie, haunting Puss in Boots’ every move and playing the role of the biggest antagonist in the movie. He is joined by an old friend and a new one, and chased by various characters from two classic tales as secondary antagonists, intending to get the Last Wish for themselves.
This is a children’s movie, and so the plot is simple and somewhat predictable—But it would be stupid to hold a children’s movie to the standards I would hold a movie intended for an older audience to. The story merely reflects what capacity the intended audience can understand. The most endearing part of this movie is the animation. It’s stylized, instead of playing out in the lifeless, realistic style of animation that’s been plaguing the industry as of late (for reference, see the “live action” Lion King movie released a few years back). And, looking back at the previous two Puss in Boots movies, they’re visually dull and boring in comparison to this final installment. There’s clear improvement in every factor of the movie, from the animation and cinematography to the character design and the story itself. Even the humor is funny for both kids and adults, and makes the movie all the better.
It’s truly refreshing to see great, stylized animation. It’s also really great to see a kid’s movie with actual work put into it. It seems that there’s been an increase in movies (and entertainment in general) for children that are lazily done with no real message or character development in recent years. But Puss in Boots: The Last Wish shows genuine quality and care for the characters. There’s important development for all of its characters that show that the writers actually like who they’re writing. Puss in Boots is shown as a rich, three dimensional character that the audience wants to root for, not just because he’s cool and smooth-talking, but because he’s undergoing big changes for the better. This movie is the comeback for Puss in Boots after many negative reviews on the earlier components of the trilogy. Really, the only thing I wish to change about this movie is that the other two movies were done just as well as this one. I hope Dreamworks will continue to make movies similar to Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, both in terms of animation and in its writing.