Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

Film Critic Dragged After Penning Scathing Review Of 'Shrek' For The Film's 20th Anniversary

Film Critic Dragged After Penning Scathing Review Of 'Shrek' For The Film's 20th Anniversary
Dreamworks

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

But that isn't to say people won't argue against those opinions like they've taken another full-time job.


So when film critic Scott Tobias of The Guardian shared his criticism of Shrek, and on its 20th Anniversary no less, ogre fans were ready for him.

The article dropped on Tuesday this week and was full of punches against the quirky film.

Tobias wrote:

"The fairytale comedy was a hit with critics and audiences but its toilet humor, glibness, and shoddy animation mark it out as a misfire."

He felt the film contributed nothing positive to the world of animation.

"Twenty years later, that flushing sound (at the beginning of the film) seems to signify the moment when blockbuster animation circled the drain."
"Shrek is a terrible movie. It's not funny. It looks awful."
"It would influence many unfunny, awful-looking computer-animated comedies that copied its formula of glib self-reference and sickly sweet sentimentality."
"Three of those terrible movies were sequels to Shrek and one was a spin-off with a sequel in the works. The curse has eased but not lifted."

To his mind, it didn't do anyone any favors, period.

"In the end, Shrek didn't save DreamWorks from setting itself off a few years later."
"It didn't extend [Mike] Myers's career past a hard expiration date. And Katzenberg went on to found Quibi."
"The entire enterprise is better left in the past."

Tobias was so proud of his critique, he even boasted about it on Twitter.

But fans of Shrek and those excited for the 20th Anniversary weren't about to take this sitting down.

Some couldn't believe anyone would even write such a critique.




Others were really miffed with specific aspects of the review.

They had their rebuttals ready.



Some were simply offended or felt they had been betrayed.




But... there were those small few who understood where Tobias was coming from.




The old saying goes, "You can't make everyone happy," and that strands true, whether it's for a much-loved animated film like Shrek or for a critique of the film by Scott Tobias.

There are going to be avid fans and lackluster never-watched-its, as well as those who wildly disagree or quietly nod their heads.

More from Trending

Elmo; New York Knicks
Paul Zimmerman/WireImage; Gregory Shamus/Getty Images

Elmo Hit With Hilarious Backlash From New Yorkers After Tweeting Well-Wishes To Both The Knicks And The Spurs

Sesame Street may be set on a fictional street in a Manhattan neighborhood, but only a select few characters have that New York attitude.

Lovable, cuddly little Elmo is definitely not one of them, and it recently got him in a bit of trouble with fans of the New York Knicks.

Keep ReadingShow less
Donald Trump
Samuel Corum/Getty Images

Trump Plans To Attend The NBA Finals In New York—And Knicks Fans Are Having None Of It

The New York Knicks lead the NBA finals best of seven series against the San Antonio Spurs 2-0 going into game three at Madison Square Garden (MSG) in New York City on Monday night.

It will be the first finals game played at the historic venue in 27 years. Should the Knicks prevail in the series, it will be the team's first championship since 1973.

Keep ReadingShow less
Screenshot of Hillary Clinton in 2016; Donald Trump
C-SPAN; Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images

Hillary Clinton's 2016 Speech Predicting How Trump Would Behave As President Just Resurfaced—And Wow

People can't help but nod their heads after one of former Secretary of State and then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's speeches from 2016 warning about how Donald Trump would act if elected president resurfaced and proved more relevant than ever.

The footage resurfaced as public sentiment has soured on the economy; recent surveys show that roughly two-thirds of Americans disapprove of Trump's economic stewardship, while a majority say their personal financial situation is deteriorating.

Keep ReadingShow less
Screenshot of James Talarico; Donald Trump; Ken Paxton
@jamestalarico/X; Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images; Ron Jenkins/Getty Images

James Talarico Epically Blasts Trump And Senate Opponent Over What It Means To Be A 'Real Man'

Texas Senate candidate James Talarico criticized his opponent in November's election, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, as well as President Donald Trump in a speech about what it means to be a "real man" after facing regular attacks on his masculinity.

Trump has described Talarico as “a weird—a weird—candidate,” a line that was quickly incorporated into an advertisement from Paxton, who argued that that Talarico is unfit to represent Texans partly because of his supposed veganism. Members of the right-wing have followed suit and described Talarico as an “effeminate, estrogenetic, catty, and totally embarrassing” candidate.

Keep ReadingShow less
Jennifer Aniston (right) and Lisa Kudrow (left) discuss a potential Friends spinoff.
Variety/YouTub

Jennifer Aniston And Lisa Kudrow's Idea For A 'Friends' Spinoff Is Going Viral For All The Wrong Reasons

For decades, critics have argued that Friends benefited from a television landscape that often overlooked Black-led sitcoms telling similar stories. So when Jennifer Aniston and Lisa Kudrow recently floated the idea of a Friends spinoff called Girlfriends, many viewers saw it as yet another example of Black television history being left out of the conversation.

During Variety's Actors on Actors, Aniston and Kudrow discussed what a potential Friends revival could look like more than 20 years after the sitcom ended its original run.

Keep ReadingShow less