Revenge of the Shrek. How Shrek was a Diss Track Against Disney

How Shrek was One Man’s Revenge against the House of Mouse

Revenge, a dish that is best served cold and with great satisfaction. Fellow netizens, many of us can acknowledge that vengeance can often do more harm than good. At the same time, though, we also acknowledge that there is something about getting even that we find inherently fascinating. That’s why there are stories like The Count of Monte Cristo and Revenge of the Sith. However, I think one of my favorite stories about revenge has to do with that of Shrek, AKA the great green ogre that put Dreamworks on the map and embarrassed Disney. With the original film celebrating its 25th anniversary this month, I’ve had the ogre on my mind a lot lately. More importantly, though, I’ve been thinking about how the movie that made Dreamworks into one of Disney’s greatest rivals was also a diss track of Disney. I’m RJ Writing Ink, and this is the story of how Shrek was created as a tale of revenge.

Eisner and Katzenberg, From Allies to Enemies

To understand the origins of the Shrek movie and DreamWorks, we have to understand the history of two men, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Michael Eisner. The two of them had first met working together at Paramount, and they discovered that they made a pretty good team. So much so that when Eisner left Paramount to become the new CEO of Disney in 1984, he asked Katzenberg to come along with him. They would end up being exactly what the House of Mouse had needed.

At this point in its history, Disney was in the middle of its dark age. Ever since Walt and Roy’s deaths, the company they had built had become a shadow of its former self. Its films weren’t as popular as they once were! Their once mighty animation department was on its last legs. And that is when Eisner and Katzenberg came in to turn the ship around. While Eisner would become the new CEO of Disney, Katzenberg would become head of its film and animation studios. And under Katzenberg’s leadership, Disney would go from being dead last to the king of the hill.

With Katzenberg overseeing things, the legendary Disney Renaissance that would dominate cinemas from 1989 to the end of the century would unfold. From The Little Mermaid onwards, they doled out hit after hit. As a result, Katzenberg began to gain a lot of pull at Disney. So much so that he even approached Eisner with talks of promoting him to be the new President, making him the number two of the whole company. And Eisner started to sweat. However, whatever arrangements they could have made would be thrown out the window when fate intervened.

The Founding of DreamWorks

In 1994, the president of Disney tragically died in a helicopter crash. Now that the job was open, Katzenberg began to lobby even harder for the job of President that he thought he was owed. Rather than give him what he wanted, though, in August of that year, Eisner forced Katzenberg to resign from the company. Little did Eisner know at the time, but he was about to make the biggest mistake of his career. Not only did this lead to what the public sees as Katzenberg getting revenge, but it led to the creation of one of Disney’s biggest rivals.

When you let someone as knowledgable and talented at leadership like Jeffrey Katzenberg, they are not going to just fade away. They are either going to get hired by another, equally powerful entity or they’re going to become a rival. In Katzenberg’s case, he chose the latter. And by the mid-1990s, he, Steven Spielberg, and music executive David Geffen all came together to found a new company: DreamWorks. And in 1997, their debut movie, Antz, premiered in theaters…only to be overshadowed by Pixar’s A Bug’s Life.

But this is where the revenge story really begins, as DreamWorks was busy working on its secret weapon: Shrek.

Around the same time DreamWorks was founded, a producer working with him brought in this kid’s book that came out in 1990 by the name of Shrek. It was basically the anti-fairy tale, complete with the titular character being someone who would normally be the monster the hero had to beat to save the princess. And that gave DreamWorks an idea. An awful idea. Katzenberg and DreamWorks got a truly awful idea. And from 1995 onwards, they worked tirelessly on what was essentially one giant diss towards Disney. And by May 2001, this ultimate diss, Shrek, released in theaters.

And this is where I come into the story.

Shrek was the Anti-Disney Movie, and even I could see that as a kid!

When I was a little boy, one of my favorite things to do was watch TV, be it whatever was playing on my favorite channels or our family’s extensive VHS collection. Thanks to that collection, I grew up on a steady diet of Disney movies that spanned from its golden age up to the then-recent Disney Renaissance films. In other words, I was very familiar with how Disney told fairy tales. And even though I was only six when my family went to see Shrek in theaters, I think I was smart enough to recognize what the movie was doing with fairy tales. And I loved it!

From start to finish, Shrek was taking what had been Disney’s winning formula for movies and put it through the ringer. The first scene alone has Shrek using a page from a Disney fairy tale as toilet paper! He was wiping his butt with their work!

And the fairy tale creatures that show up in Shrek’s swamp! To see all these characters that I had grown up on being reduced to homeless refugees was so funny! I didn’t fully understand it at the time, but it was still funny. Of course, that was just the warm-up. The real diss towards Disney came in the form of its villain, Lord Farquaad.

It’s never been confirmed by anyone, but it’s widely believed by the public that Lord Farquaad was based on Michael Eisner. Or at least how Katzenberg had come to see his former boss after their huge falling out. He was this short, insecure man who demanded perfection and control out of everything and everyone around him. And then we have the fact that his realm, Duloc, felt less like an actual land and more like a theme park no one wanted to visit. Also, the guy’s name sounds like a pun on “f***wad.” If that isn’t an insult, I don’t know what is! The fact that the film ends with Farquaad himself getting eaten by Dragon only seems to cement how Katzenberg felt about his former boss.

And with that, Katzenberg’s revenge was complete.

One Instance where Payback Worked out Well for Everyone

Shrek proved to be a massive success. Kids and adults loved it. Shrek became one of the biggest pop culture icons of the 2000s, complete with three more movies and plenty of other spin-off material. More importantly, though, Shrek is what put DreamWorks on the map as they began to crank out even more successful films. By the time the 2000s ended, DreamWorks had established itself as a genuine rival to Disney. And it did while also tearing the formula that Disney had used for its award-winning films to pieces and humiliated it in the process.

Not bad for a revenge story, huh?

Was Shrek really meant to serve as Katzenberg’s ultimate revenge on his ex-boss? That may not have been its full intentions, but it’s pretty obvious looking back on the movie that it was taking a lot of digs at Disney. And frankly, I’m glad that it did. I love Disney, in spite of how critical of it I can be at times. And while, yes, Shrek did start to go downhill in the later movies, that first movie is still amazing to watch. The fact that it was movie born partially out of a desire for revenge on a former boss doesn’t change the fact that it left a positive impact on the world. These days, DreamWorks is almost as big as Disney! And personally, showing up your ex-boss who doubted you feels like the most satisfying revenge you can get. And if the Internet has anything to say about it, then Shrek is not going anywhere for a long time.