Shrek didn’t chicken out on its Donkey-Dragon sex

The Shrek franchise dared to do what many animated films would not, from a female lead that was unconventionally pretty to the boatload of cynical and adult pop culture references. But right now I want to talk about one of Shrek’s most groundbreaking offerings to the world of all-ages animation: the fact that Donkey and Dragon absolutely fucked.

If you’ve somehow not paid attention to the cultural behemoth that is Shrek for the past 20 years, I am pleased to tell you that talking sidekick Donkey gets together with a hot dragon at the end of the first movie. (Don’t shame me: she’s hot). Dragon is largely absent from the events of Shrek 2, which Donkey attributes to her being weirdly moody. But at the end, she makes an appearance — and surprise! The reason she was moody was because she was actually pregnant. The film ends with Donkey becoming the father to six hybrid Donkey-Dragon children, known as Dronkeys. Because you are wondering, their names are Debbie, Coco, Bananas, Peanut, Parfait and Eclair.

There is a common, dumb trope that when two different animal species characters have children, the girls look like the mom animal and the boys look like the dad animal. Sometimes, this happens even when they are the same species, but different breeds, like in the Lady and the Tramp sequel. There are some exceptions, such as in Pokémon, where the babies take after mommy no matter what, or in The Amazing World of Gumball, where the daughter looks like the dad and the son like the mom. But usually there is a very one-or-the-other approach to interspecies genetics, which is absolutely not how it works in real life. Without the actual implications of genetics at play here, the interspecies parents could’ve just adopted. In fact, one might wonder if in these words, the parents reproduce asexually, simply budding off little clones of themselves. Sex is not necessarily in the equation here, which particularly anxious parents might find to be a relief.

The producers of Shrek 2, however, dared to not chicken out with interspecies romance. Dragon and Donkey’s children are hybrid monstrosities, sharing both dragon and donkey-like traits. There is absolutely no doubt that they would only come into being if Dragon and Donkey’s genetic material mixed in a Biblical sense, meaning that Dragon and Donkey canonically fucked at least once within the Shrek franchise.

“It just seemed logical,” Shrek 2 director (and voice of Gingerbread Man) Conrad Vernon tells Polygon of the decision to have Dragon and Donkey procreate. “For every story point, what would naturally be the next step. Dragon and Donkey have babies. Well, what would they look like?”

The Shrek movies get pretty damn raunchy. Farquaad literally gets an on-screen boner. Shrek and Fiona are all over each other during their honeymoon. But honestly, in the grand scheme of cinema, a straight white dude getting horny and a newlywed couple looking for places to bang aren’t revolutionary. You know what is, though? Dragon and Donkey canonically going to Pound Town. Thank you, Shrek franchise, for doing what few other animated films dared do.