Puss in Boots Too Dark for Kids

Abbey Prewitt, Staff writer

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish came out in theaters Dec. 21st. It was directed by Joel Crawford and co-directed by Januel Mercado and 

produced by Dreamworks animation. 

The plot follows, while hosting a party in the town of Del Mar, legendary hero and outlaw Puss in Boots accidentally awakens a sleeping giant. He subdues the creature but is crushed by a bell. Waking up in a hospital, the town doctor informs him that he has lost eight of his nine lives and suggests Puss should retire. That night in a bar, Puss meets a black-hooded wolf, who disarms and wounds him in a swordfight.

Traumatized, Puss flees to the house of cat lady Mama Luna, where he buries his clothes and meets an optimistic Chihuahua disguised as a cat whom he calls Perrito. Goldilocks and her Three Bears Crime Family soon arrive at Luna’s home. They plan to hire Puss to steal a map bearing the Wishing Star’s location from amoral pastry chef “Big” Jack Horner, but fail to recognize him and leave after finding his “grave”.

Puss decides to use the Star to restore his lost lives. Accompanied by Perrito, he breaks into Horner’s bakery to steal the map, but is interrupted by his resentful ex-fiancée Kitty Softpaws, Horner, and Goldi and the bears. Puss manages to escape with the map alongside Kitty and Perrito, though he sees the wolf threaten him while fleeing.

The map leads the trio to the Dark Forest, a pocket dimension that changes its landscape depending on the map’s holder. During another clash with Horner, his henchmen, and Goldi and the bears, Puss sees the wolf again and runs off, distracting Kitty and allowing Goldi to obtain the map. After Perrito calms Puss’s panic attack, Puss confesses to being on his last life, and his remorse for leaving Kitty on their wedding day. Kitty overhears them and reveals that she never attended the wedding either, believing Puss could not love anyone more than himself.

Puss and Kitty steal back the map while Goldi and the bears are distracted by a manifestation of their woodland cottage. As the dimension shifts, Puss accidentally traps himself in a crystalline cave, where he encounters his arrogant past lives, and the wolf, who reveals himself as Death. Feeling disrespected by Puss not valuing his extra lives, Death wants to take Puss’s final life prematurely. Horrified, Puss runs out of the cave towards the Star alone, ignoring Kitty and Perrito’s pleas for him to stop. Meanwhile, Goldi reveals to the bears that her wish is to be reunited with her biological family; although they are devastated, the bears agree to help her.

Puss arrives at the Star and begins to make his wish using the map, but is confronted by Kitty, who berates him for his selfishness and confesses that her wish was to find someone she could trust. Goldi, the bears, and Horner arrive, and a fight ensues for the map; Goldi briefly obtains the map, but abandons it to save Baby Bear, while Kitty traps Horner inside his magical bottomless bag.

Death mounts the Star and challenges Puss. Having learned the value of life from his time with his companions, Puss forgoes wishing for more lives and accepts Death’s duel. Puss disarms the wolf, and declares that while he knows he can never defeat Death, he will never stop fighting for his last life. Seeing that Puss has lost his arrogance, Death begrudgingly spares him. Before leaving, Death and Puss agree they will meet again one day.

Horner eats a magic snack inside the bag, which makes him gigantic and allows him to escape. He attempts to make his wish to control all of the world’s magic for himself, but Perrito distracts him long enough for Puss, Kitty, and Goldi to destroy the map, causing the Star to collapse and consume Horner. In the aftermath, Goldi affirms to the bears that they are her true family, and they leave to take over Horner’s bakery. Puss rekindles his romance with Kitty; the two and Perrito later steal a ship and set sail to the Kingdom of Far Far Away.

Cast includes Antonio Banderas as Puss in Boots, a swashbuckling cat fugitive from the law and a hero of San Ricardo who has lost eight of his nine lives. In Mama Luna’s Cat Rescue, Mama Luna named him “Pickles.” Salma Hayek Pinault as Kitty Softpaws, a street-savvy Tuxedo cat who is Puss’ ex-fiancée, and seeks the Wishing Star to find somebody she can trust. Harvey Guillén as Perrito, a friendly and naive therapy dog who started out as one of Mama Luna’s pet cats, because he disguised himself as a cat. Since the end of the film, he officially names the trio “Team Friendship.” Florence Pugh as Goldilocksl known as Goldi, the leader of the Three Bears Crime Family who wants to use Last Wish to regain her biological family.

Rotten Tomatoes  gave this film a 95% while the audience score was 94. They say that cute animation and a lot of laughs make Puss in Boots: The Last Wish fun for the whole family.

My view is quite different. I hated this movie and I wouldn’t watch it again honestly. It’s a kids movie about death and it’s just weird. Like death follows him around because he’s on his last life and I don’t get the meaning of doing that. Like it’s not a fun and enjoyable kids movie it’s like a dark and scaryish kind of movie. I wouldn’t recommend it to children, honestly it might frighten them or scare them into thinking about death. All in all This movie was awful, the story was awful and wasn’t really funny. This is a PG movie meant for kids. There is a character swearing constantly and it is bleeped out as a joke but its not funny and its kind of shocking to be honest. I mean its a PG movieOne of the villains is always talking about murder. He says the word murder quite a few times for this kind of movie. Definitely a perplexing route they took with this movie. I think the Puss in Boots character is really cool too, but this movie is terrible.