#PUSS IN BOOTS: THE LAST WISH

[pintsofguinnesmakeyoustrong]

absolutely fucking reeling from puss in boots the last wish. my grown ass friends made me see it and it absolutely fucked. it was mad max fury road for kids. it was a horror movie about the fear of death. it was a western about an ageing outlaw trying to regain his youth with the help of his ex fiance and homeless harvey guillen. it was about found family. it was about needing people and asking for help. it had the best depiction of a panic attack i've ever seen in a mainstream film. the villain looked exactly like boris johnson. there was a wicker man reference. it had a kill count higher than most slasher films. it set up shrek 5. they even said fuck.

[lucdoodle]

This scene is so iconic, I had to make a fanart of it

[simpingseafood]

I know I'm late for Halloween, but…

I mixed Wolf from the "Puss in boots: the last wish" with Jack Howl

|ʘ‿ʘ)╯

[harveyguillensource]

Harvey’s the cover star of EW’s 2023 Pride issue! Check out his interview at the source link!

[taifun1]

Puss in Boots and Kitty Softpaws are so cute in these pictures...💘

[gaymaramada]

it’s them

[ccerealbowl]

Hey hi hello I drew the guy

[lrndvs]

ɪ ᴊᴜꜱᴛ ʟᴏᴠᴇ ᴛʜᴇ ꜱᴍᴇʟʟ ᴏꜰ 𝐹𝐸𝒜𝑅

[iamblue15]

It's Their Night.

[theoneandonlyespa]

Family member: “Why are you smiling at the screen?”

Me:

[a-little-ray-of-fantasy]

"Characters get haunted by visions of past selves that met a demise in a previous danger they faced" wasn't on my decade's bingo card, but I'm not complaining!

[gearbroth]

pussinboots doodles from last month

[lucdoodle]

Tried to use a more loose artstyle

[bugsongs]

THE BOOK OF LIFE (2014)

COCO (2017)

PUSS IN BOOTS: THE LAST WISH (2022)

[harveyguillensource]

Harvey Guillén stealing the show in Christian Siriano on the 2023 Academy Awards red carpet.

[cheeseanonioncrisps]

Been thinking about Puss in Boots: The Last Wish and what makes Death the Wolf such an effective villain, and like… character design and voice acting is certainly doing a lot there, don't get me wrong, but I think there's something else at play.

Death is the most terrifying character in Puss in Boots, because he's the only one playing the genre straight.

The premise of the Shrek films has always been that they're normal, modern people living in wacky fairytale land.

The evil king uses his magic mirror as a dating app. The fairy godmother uses business cards to contact her clients. Her workers consider unionising over their lack of dental plan.

Puss in Boots 1 kinda broke the mould in that— while there are plenty of modern elements to how the characters act and how their world works— it's more specifically intended to be characters from the world Zorro living in wacky fairytale land. But the point still stands.

The aim of the Shrek films and spin-offs is to subvert common fairytale tropes for comedic effect. What if the princess fell for the ogre? What if Prince Charming was an entitled dick? What if Goldilocks teamed up with the three bears and started a crime family?

But Death? Death, for the most part, isn't playing that game.

No character questions why he doesn't just kill Puss outright. There are no gags about him being inconvenienced by Jack Horner losing so many men. Nobody makes any self-aware fourth wall breaking jokes about why he bothers with the whole whistling thing.

We all know why he does the whistling thing. It's the same reason why Little Red Riding Hood has to go through the whole "what big eyes/ears/teeth you have, Grandma" rigamarole. The same reason why the wolf takes care to knock before blowing the little pigs' houses down.

The Wolf is scary because he's the only actual fairytale creature in this entire setting. He's not bound by rules of logic or common sense, or his own will, he's bound by the narrative.

And that's also why he backs down at the end.

The first time he and Puss fight, in the bar, Puss is arrogant. The second time, in the Cave, Puss is scared out of his wits. It's the third time, on the wishing star, that Puss learns his lesson. Of course the Wolf backs down after that! The rules say he has to.

But, on another level, there is also the issue of Puss realising that he wants more from his life than just to be a legend.

They say "legends never die", but the most famous part of any given legend tends to be the story of how the hero finally bites the dust.

And "he was such a great fighter that Death himself had to kill him off, personally!" is just the sort of ending that would fit the legend Puss has constructed around himself. In a sense, the Wolf is giving Puss exactly what he proclaims to want— the chance to go down in history.

Puss realising he doesn't want that anymore is the catalyst for sending the Wolf away. Through his own egotistical and reckless attitude, he turned himself into a story and thus summoned a narrative device. Only by choosing to value his life over the legend is he able to escape that trap.

The Wolf's defeat is both the natural ending of the story that he and Puss have been playing out since the film began, and a rejection of the natural ending to the story Puss has been telling about himself since he first became the hero of San Ricardo.