' When Puss is running on the rooftops, the motion isn't always super-smooth. It isn't just because of the Puss in Boots' new animation style, but it didn't deter audiences.Ĭrawford later described the process and how he helped create the Puss in Boots 2 animation into what audiences eventually fell in love with. The movie was one of the highest-grossing movies of 2022, it picked up an Oscar nomination and has a higher Rotten Tomatoes rating than any other movie in the Shrek franchise. Now, the success of Puss in Boots: The Last Wish is further proof that audiences love the idea of this new hyper-realized form of non-realistic animation. The idea is that Into the Spider-Verse really tested the waters with 2.5D, and then The Bad Guys showed how DreamWorks could implement it in their animation. Such brighter colors and visuals are right at home with the visually and tonally pleasing stylizations of similar films like DreamWorks' The Bad Guys and Pixar's Turning Red and Luca. Gone are the somewhat duller colors and visuals of Shrek the Third and Shrek Forever After, replaced instead with ones that feel right at home with the original Puss in Boots and the first two Shrek movies. In addition, the 2.5D style, having been applied correctly, makes several scenes feel brighter with more dynamic lighting. One visual gag from Shrek 2 given an appropriate 2.5D counterpart, for instance, is Puss in Boots' puppy eyes. In addition, the characteristics of many characters have not been lost - rather, they have been enhanced in visually pleasing and often hilarious ways. Its visuals look like a modern storybook, recalling the hyper-stylized looks of Little Golden Books being blended into the visuals of past Shrek films. With the 2.5D style, it is clear that DreamWorks have learned the right lessons from Spider-Verse's success.

The move to 2.5D ultimately explains why the Puss in Boots 2 animation looks so distinct, and also heralded a return to form for the franchise. By following the 2.5D wave, Puss in Boots: The Last Wish took the Shrek series to the next level, employing a successful brand of highly stylized, yet appropriate action and restoring some of the movies' anarchic and energetic tendencies.

Similarly, as they have progressed, the Shrek series and its Puss in Boots counterpart have boasted an offbeat and fractured take on the fairy tale genre. Leaping off the pages of a comic book and putting the various Spider-People in the film worked for it, and the guidebook for using that style or a variation on it was set for several franchises. With Spider-Verse's comic book style and multiversal chaos, it only made sense for it to evoke the style, eschewing the more polished MCU Spider-Man films for something more comic-accurate.

When Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was released in 2018, the trend it set for animated films with the 2.5D style was unmistakable.

Puss in Boots by Charles Perrault