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BY MAGGIE SCOTT

Can a curmudgeon convince family, friends and fairy tale kingdom of Far Far Away that he isn’t just being difficult; he really, truly isn’t qualified to be the realm’s next king?
Opening the next chapter, “Shrek 3”, of the green ogre’s story, Shrek (voice of Mike Meyers) is enjoying the perks of castle life as King Harold’s son-in-law.

Unhappily, the frog sovereign (kissed out of his human form in Shrek 2) calls the queen (voice of Julie Andrews), daughter Fiona (voice of Cameron Diaz) and Shrek to his lily pond bedside before he croaks.

Because Shrek believes he’s not so much a fish out of water as an ogre out of swamp, he lamely protests Harold’s dying suggestion that Shrek take the crown.
Trouble is, Shrek’s already tried and failed at such royal duties as christening a ship (he knocks a hole in it with the champagne bottle) and knighting (he slips with the sword). And, he looks pretty ridiculous in buckled shoes and powdered wig.

He’s faced it: He’s not just an ogre, he’s an oaf. Harold (voice of John Cleese) reveals there is someone else with blood line credentials for the job: a guy named Arthur. After a solemn period of mourning (with a funeral with frog chorus crooning “Live and Let Die”), Shrek decides he’ll pass the crown to Arthur.

Before the ship bearing Shrek to summon Arthur can disappear over the horizon, Fiona shouts out the happy news: she’s pregnant. She had been trying to broach the topic of little ogre feet running through their swamp cottage; but it only brought unpleasant visions of crying and pooping to her thick-headed mate. Besides, “right now,” he said, “you’re my family.”

The voyage induces not seasickness but an elaborate sorcerer’s apprentice-style dream of torment by rapidly replicating ogrettes. Desperate to fulfill his mission before he’s engulfed by fatherhood, Shrek strong-arms Artie (voice of Justin Timberlake) into leaving his misfit life at Worcestershire Academy (where Just Say Nay banners festoon the assembly hall).

All seems well as the ship sails back to Far Far Away, until Donkey (voice of Eddie Murphy) and Puss in Boots (voice of Antonio Banderas) reveal there’s more to life as a king than subjects bowing and scraping. There’s also the poisoned food and plagues.

It’s going to take some magic to convince the young man that he’s got what it takes to become the leader of the free world. Enter Merlin (voice of Eric Idle), the slightly mad, former Academy magic teacher.

After some dotty philosophizing Merlin casts a rusty and slightly skewed spell, sending everyone back to the kingdom; where Shrek discovers Prince Charming (voice of Rupert Everett) has been making things pretty much unhappily ever after. Not conditioned for rescue like her princess friends, Fiona orders Snow White, Rapunzel, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty to get their heads out of the once-upon-a-time sand and help her prevent Charming’s palace coup plans.

Taking the stage in a production that didn’t play too well on the road, Shrek and the fairy tale heroes face off with Charming and his fairy tale villains to decide once and for all time who really is the fairest in the land. With no new riffs on fairy tale lore or new characters to take the story in unique directions, a lot of Shrek 3 feels recycled.

But, directors Chris Miller and Raman Hui deliver better-than-ever animation that provides can’t-take-your-eyes-off-the-screen delights; and Miller, Jeffrey Price, Peter S. Seaman and Aaron Warner wave their magic storytelling wands to sprinkle great gags and clever cultural spoofs over all like fairy dust.
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