Talk about happy forever! “Shrek Forever After” is the best since the first Shrek.

After the third episode that proves they can not bear to go ahead, they have found a clever way to reboot the story with “It’s a Wonderful Life”-style living to see what Shrek is going to be like if no events in the first movie that ever happened.

When the movie started, the big green ogre Shrek (voice of Mike Myers) is feeling a little choked her with a fairytale ending in the land of Far Far Away. He loves Fiona (voice of Cameron Diaz) and their triplets, but the busyness of daily care and supervision they are constant being a celebrity is making her feel uncomfortable pet. The most frightening was the roar turned into a party trick. He longed for “just one day feel like a real giant again,” to return to a time “when I can do what I want … when the world makes sense.”

And that is just the opening that Rumpelstiltskin (voice of writer Walt Dohrn) has been waiting for. Rump wants to be King and came very close once before when Fiona’s parents, the King (voice of John Cleese) and Queen (voice of Julie Andrews) have come to Rumpelstiltskin as a desperate last resort. He can break the curse that condemns their daughter Fiona to be human by day and an ogre at night. But he always insists on something of value in exchange. They are just about to sign over their kingdom when they get word that the spell has been broken.

Rumpy gets his revenge when Shrek impulsively agrees to an exchange — if he can have just one more day as an unencumbered ogre, he will give up a day of his life in return, any day of Rumpy’s choice. But just as in real life, people in fairy tales never read the fine print. After about an hour of fun scaring villagers (to the cheery accompaniment of The Carpenters’ “Top of the World”), Shrek begins to feel lonely, especially when he starts to understand that his best friend Donkey (voice of Eddie Murphy) and Fiona have never met him. And then he begins to feel dread when he realizes that it will be much harder than he thought to find his way back home.

The first Shrek was a wonderful surprise, a post-modern fairy tale. Shrek 2 was a lot of fun but a bit noisy and crowded. Shrek 3 was over-clever, self-referential, and snarky. This one restores the balance between humor and heart. And it gives Fiona a chance at center stage as the confident and courageous leader of a rebel band of outlaw ogres. Shrek falls in love with her all over again, and we do, too.

We meet up with some great new characters, especially ogres Cookie (voice of Craig Robinson of “The Office”) and Gretched (voice of “Glee’s” Jane Lynch). Our giant green hero enjoys being with his own kind but is nonplussed to find himself something of a runt among his fellow ogres. The bounty hunter Rumpy sends to round up Shrek and Fiona is the legendary Pied Piper. It turns out his famous pipe has a special ogre setting that has the huge green folk helplessly shaking their groove things as they boogie off to the dungeon. And there are some big changes in those we already know. Speaking of big, Puss is far, far away from the dashing swashbuckler; here he is Fiona’s ultra-pampered pet.

The film makes superb use of the 3D effects with action sequences that involve a huge pendulum swinging through Rumpelstiltskin’s palace. There’s also a 3D diaper joke, though thankfully not what you’d think. The spit take, on the other hand, is. Dorhn is a bit of a weak spot in the voice talent but the film’s expert balance of humor, heart, and excitement is real movie magic.

Parents should know that this film has some gross-out and 3D potty humor (in 3D!), fairy tale/fantasy action (no major characters hurt, witch dissolved by water and cookie character eaten), and some schoolyard language

Family discussion: How would your family’s life be different if you had not been born? What surprised Shrek most about his wish? Which is your favorite Shrek film?

If you like this, try: the first three “Shrek” films and the book by William Steig