Yesterday was rough. Kitty went to the V. E. T. for teeth cleaning. Listless after the anesthesia, they said. Disinterested, they said. Not hungry, they said. PAH. So yeah, spent half the day & all night making sure Skamperpuss didn’t do herself some harm.

Ergo, a quickie 31 in 31 based on one of my favorite monsters. The format with be tweaked slightly, since after Scary Godmother, I think kiddie-centric stuff could use a different scale.

Story: Shrek is King of Halloween! But Donkey, Puss In Boots, Pinnochio & the rest of the gang challenge his right to the title. So why not head to the old, abandoned castle of Lord Farquad, spin a few scaaaaary stories, and see who’s really brave enough to last all night….

Scares: for the very young there may be a few ‘dark & stormy night’ chills. Outside of that, Scared Shrekless plays for laughs.

Nightmare Factory?: if you (or the little ones you know) think dripping icing & a new, more sinister Land of Dulac puppet song are scary enough to plant themselves into your brain? Consider yourself warned. Otherwise, there’s comfort in the familiar characters, and their usual way of interacting with each other. Everyone should sleep well after this special.

Based on…?: The Shrek series of films, which are based on the children’s book.

Trick or Treat?: Come on y’all, it Shrek! And Donkey! With Fiona & the kids, plus all the fairy tale characters you know and love from the Shrek series. (Well, except for Dragon. A curious oversight that made me a little sad at first, but hey, somebody has to take her donkey-dragons out trick or treating.)

This half-hour Halloween special is a mini anthology, with each character telling a ‘spooky’ tale in the hopes of snatching the title of King of Halloween from Shrek. As with the movies in this series, there’s plenty for the adults, including spoofs of horror staples like Psycho and The Exorcist.

Scared Shrekless is fun, appropriate for kids with plenty for adults to enjoy, and it brings back characters we all know and love. This’ll be in my annual Halloween specials rotation. As is just and right. All hail the King of Halloween!

(NOTE: as you can see from the image above, the DVD has several other goodies included. Enjoy!)

Score: out of 5 pumpkins.