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Note: Not to be confused with Fionna the Human from Adventure Time
Fiona is the tritagonist of the Shrek franchise and the main female lead. She is the wife of Shrek, the daughter of King Harold and Queen Lillian, and the mother of the Ogre triplets. Fiona was born in the kingdom of Far Far Away as the only child of king Harold and queen Lillian. At some point in her early years, she was secretly betrothed to Prince Charming by her father as repayment to the Fairy Godmother for turning him human. This marriage would never take place however. Fiona was under a curse (possibly cast by the fairy godmother) that between sunrise and sunset she was a human, and at twilight an ogre and because of that her father was very strict with her and not letting her go to a sleepover to her best friend Sleeping Beauty became it took place after sunset. Fairy Godmother suggested to lock her away in a tower. There was a semi-complex plan where Prince Charming, was supposed to rescue Fiona and marry her. It was the King's way of repaying the Fairy Godmother for a favor she had done him while courting Fiona's mother (King Harold was originally a frog and the Fairy Grandmother allowed him to pursue his dream of marrying and loving Lillian, by making him human). She spent 20 years in the tower until Shrek rescued her.
Why She Rocks
- At first, Fiona is portrayed as the archetypal princess from fairy tales who would speak formally in matters of courtship and presenting high expectations of how she is to be rescued, who is to rescue her, and so forth. But all this is changed when she learns that her true colors are down-to-earth and independent.
- She's shown to be very nurturing and proves to be a great mother to her and Shrek's triplets. Sure, Shrek the Third was a letdown to the Shrek series, but at least we could point that out.
- She's a loyal friend just like a good princess would be. No matter if she's an ogre or a human.
- What makes her different from many typical princesses from fairy tales is that she can defend herself such as taking down a group of merrymen or knock out Prince Charming with a headbutt.
- Her backstory is quite sad. When you think about it, she was locked up in a tower after a witch put a curse on her to turn into a ogre as we all know it.
- She's could be considered as a morality pet for Shrek. She turned him from a grumpy ogre who wanted to left alone to a hero of Far Far Away.
- Speaking of Shrek himself. Viewers can learn that you don't need to be beautiful to get a happy ending with a loved one. Fiona in ogre form may seem not as pretty as most people would see, but to Shrek he finds her beautiful. Fiona gladly accepts that. What makes this more interesting is that she doubts that Farquaad is her true love.
- Does have some funny moments like this.
- Seeing Fiona's alternate universe conterpart in Shrek Forever After in an interesting touch and is a great callback to the first Shrek movie. In fact, she plays a big role in the film.
Bad Qualities
- She at first hated her ogre self thinking that no one would like her which caused Shrek to overhear the "who could ever love a beast so hideous and ugly?"-, and believes Fiona is referring to him.
- Thanks to Rumpelstiltskin, her alternate self is abrasive and refuses to believe in love, completely unlike her normal self. But it goes away once the time stream is back to normal.
- Like Shrek, she has poor manners.
Trivia
- It's possible Fiona is based on the repulsive princess from Shrek! as at the end of both the book and the movie they get married to Shrek.
- The first time where you could see Fiona as an ogre is the scene in Shrek where she is in the cave, but it's hard to notice because a fire is casting an orange light onto her green skin.
- Donkey knew about the ogre curse before Shrek.
- Fiona likes to sing with woodland creatures like Snow White; her and Shrek started to fall in love while in her human form like Beauty and The Beast; Fiona was locked away in a tower guarded by a dragon like Sleeping Beauty; and Fiona had a Fairy Godmother and Prince Charming like Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty (latter had 3 fairy godmothers).
- Fiona has a lot of elements like other fairy tale princesses (Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and Beauty and The Beast)
- Fiona was one of the first human characters to have a lead role in a computer-animated film, thus the animators aspired to make her both beautiful and realistic in appearance.
- An early test screening resulted in children reacting negatively towards the character's uncanny realism, prompting the animators to re-design Fiona into a more stylized, cartoonish heroine.
- In early drafts of the script, Fiona is born an ogre to human parents, who lock her in a tower to conceal the true nature of their daughter's appearance, lying to the kingdom that she is a beautiful princess. One day, Fiona escapes and seeks assistance from a witch named Dama Fortuna, who offers her a choice between two potions: one will turn the princess beautiful, while the other guarantees Fiona's happily ever after. Fiona ignorantly drinks the "Beauty" potion for which she does not realize there is a catch, as the potion renders her human during the day only to revert her to an ogre every night. This concept was reused in the second film when she transforms after Shrek drinks the Happily Ever After potion.
- The writers originally intended for Fiona's backstory to be fully animated and used as the film's prologue, but discarded the idea after test audiences deemed it too depressing.
- A second abandoned scene entitled "Fiona Gets Them Lost" follows Fiona, Shrek and Donkey after she is and they become trapped in a cave; an action sequence inspired by the film Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) ensues.
- In the writers' original draft, Fiona's monstrous form was to have a physical altercation reminiscent of Hong Kong action films with Shrek once he discovers her, assuming that the monster has harmed Fiona. The idea was abandoned because, according to Elliot, few were familiar Hong Kong cinema's "emphasis on action and physicality" in comparison to more violent American films, explaining, "no matter how much we described it, [the studio] ... imagined this violent, knock-down, Steven Segal-type, bone-cracking fight", while some female crew members protested that the concept was misogynistic towards Fiona.
- Feeling that her curse remaining undiscovered until the end was unsuitable for a feature-length film, screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio introduced the concept of a shapeshifting princess, which was rejected by the other filmmakers for six months because they found it "too complex" for a fairy tale.
- She was originally going to be voiced by Janeane Garofalo.
- Elliott and Rossio had originally envisioned Fiona's monstrous form as furry in appearance, wanting her to resemble an entirely unique character as opposed to simply a female version of Shrek, but the filmmakers struggled to agree upon her final design.
- She is described as the film's most difficult character to animate due to people's familiarity with human mannerisms and expressions, whereas audiences are not nearly as accustomed to talking animals, such as Donkey.
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