Shrek gets in the spirit

“Shrek the Halls.” Say it with me, people. “Shrek the Halls.”

Can’t you just see the meeting in which this extension of a dangerously frayed franchise was first conceived? The sudden held breath, the faces in the room lighting up like, well, yes, like so many Christmas trees?

Apparently there wasn’t enough time or money or something to take it to the big screen, and so we have, tonight at 8 on ABC, in our very own living rooms should we wish, the Grinch’s new rival for greenest, meanest cartoon of the season -- the Christmas ogre. Not to mention a princess ogre, three adorable baby ogres and all their crazy friends. Just imagine the tree ornaments, the plush toys -- why, the snow globe possibilities alone make it pure holiday magic.

OK, OK, I’m done. I know, I know, sour grapes -- no doubt my secret Christmas wish is that I had thought up the original “Shrek” idea. The first movie and even the second have provided hours of entertainment for so many. But the third feature film seemed to prove that all good things must come to an end.

Which isn’t to say “Shrek the Halls” is terrible. It isn’t. It is a half-hour of high-quality CG work draped over a slim but workable premise: As a surprise for Princess Fiona and their triplets, Shrek attempts to create a perfect Christmas, despite his own anti-holiday temperament and the meddlings of Donkey, Puss in Boots and the gang. There are fart jokes and burp and vomit jokes; things catch on fire, and everyone shouts pretty much all the time.

But then as Donkey says, in what must be acknowledged as perhaps the wisest piece of modern Christmas lore imparted in any medium, “Christmas isn’t Christmas until somebody cries.”

All the famous voices -- Mike Myers, Cameron Diaz, Eddie Murphy and Antonio Banderas -- are present and accounted for, and if the script feels very slapdash (like maybe that meeting occurred much too late in the production cycle), there are some very funny moments, as when the Gingerbread Man tells his personal Christmas story (you will never think of Santa quite the same).

This being a Christmas special, there is, of course, a message. And not to give it away, but it’s about the importance of family and friends. (Just once I would like to see a holiday movie without a message or maybe with a nihilist message. Couldn’t Scorsese do a Christmas movie?)

Fortunately, “Shrek the Halls” puts its own pop-culture spin on things. Perfection, we are warned, is not only impossible, it is positively tyrannical. Christmas is, by definition, a crazy time of thwarted plans so the best you can do is embrace the madness.

The true meaning of Christmas, it seems, is flexibility.

This may not be as touching as “Every time a bell rings, an angel gets his wings,” or “God bless us every one,” and it may resonate much more with the parents than the kids, but for a Christmas special about an ogre who may have overstayed his 15 minutes, it’s actually not too bad.

mary.mcnamara@latimes.com

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‘Shrek the Halls’

Where: ABC

When: 8 to 8:30 tonight

Rating: TV-PG (may be unsuitable for young children)