It appears I am very much out of tune with the rest of America. Their actions this month continue to baffle and amaze me. How can they turn out in droves to support something I can’t even imagine being a part of? They’re zealous passion makes me a little uneasy, and quite frankly, scares me. No matter, I’m going to keep speaking out against this movement no matter what the cost to me personally. I truly believe I am right and they are wrong.

That’s right…I thought Shrek 2 was a bad movie.

Having been somewhat unimpressed by the titular ogre’s original outing, I was not one of the ticket-buyers who catapulted the sequel to a gross in excess of 440 million at the box office. This monstrous take prompted the marketers of the equally successful Shrek 2 DVD to proclaim the movie as the “#1 Comedy of all-time.” This claim is somewhat true. Even if you adjust for inflation, the only movie I might consider a comedy that ranks above Shrek 2 on the all-time box office gross list is The Graduate, and I didn’t laugh very much at that either.

The numbers pointing towards Shrek’s staggering success were not the most alienating factors to me. The fact that the reigning “#1 Comedy of All Time” prior to Shrek 2 prominently featured Joe Pesci repeatedly getting hit in the groin with paint cans and all other types of household miscellanea speaks volumes to what we as American consumers demand in mass quantities. No, the most troubling part to me was the eerie positive word-of-mouth I kept hearing from the Shrek-o-philes I ran into.

“Have you seen Shrek 2?” they would breathlessly exclaim before going on to tell me how I would “love it because it tweaks popular culture.” Yes, I’ve been desperately waiting for someone to stick it to COPS. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone do that before. As if COPS wasn’t moldy enough, the movie inexplicably ends in a rousing rendition of the Ricky Martin classic, Livin’ La Vida Loca. Here’s a little list to give you a frame of reference on what has changed since Ricky was last living the crazy life:

  • Paris Hilton was largely known as a place to lodge (no pun intended) and not an amateur porn star.
  • Enron: pretty damn good place to work.
  • With the notable exception of Rene Elizondo and James DeBarge, most Americans had not seen the naughty bits of Janet Jackson’s breasts.
  • Karl Rove was only beginning to hatch his plans of world domination.
  • Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy’s Old Fashion Hamburgers: Not dead.
  • Vast amounts of Americans still considered Ricky Martin to be a heterosexual.

My biggest beef with the alleged top cinematic farce of all time is that for something to be classified as a comedy, doesn’t it have to elicit laughter? I didn’t laugh once at this movie. Not once. Okay, okay, I must confess I did laugh when the donkey kicked Shrek in the groin. I think it’s because I imagined Eddie Murphy was a method actor who actually had to kick Mike Myers in the unmentionables to get the take right.

What kind of American would I be if I didn’t enjoy a little celebrity-on-celebrity groin-injury humor, right?