Quick Thoughts: "Puss in Boots" (2011)

I'm not a particularly knowledgeable or dependable barometer on the canon of DreamWorks properties post-2001's "Shrek," but I can say that "Puss in Boots," the latest offspring of that film that so enchanted viewers a decade ago, is better than the last two sequels and I haven't even see them. 
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Which isn't so much a gleeful rave of this feline spin-off, but rather a condemnation of the floundering "Shrek" franchise that so dwarfed most of the goodwill from the original with its three sequels, each more punnily titled than the last. 
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Having said that, "Puss in Boots" is, for the most part, a pretty delightful little film, a Zorro-styled sand-and-sun swashbuckler with traces of Spaghetti western elements all under the umbrella of DreamWorks Animations' cheeky realm of fairy-tale satire.
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There are portions of the film that reek of narrative convolution (holy flashback!) and childish pandering (we have to end every animated film with a dance number?), but on the whole, the film - essentially a Cain and Abel tale set against the backdrop of a quest to find the golden eggs up Jack's beanstalk - has a classic adventure feel that the filmmakers clearly mined for inspiration. [B-]