Continuing his "legendary adventures of awesomeness", Po must face two hugely epic, but different threats: one supernatural and the other a little closer to home.
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Po and his friends fight to stop a peacock villain from conquering China with a deadly new weapon, but first the Dragon Warrior must come to terms with his past.
The Dragon Warrior has to clash against the savage Tai Lung as China's fate hangs in the balance. However, the Dragon Warrior mantle is supposedly mistaken to be bestowed upon an obese panda who is a novice in martial arts.
The Madagascar animals fly back to New York City, but crash-land on an African nature reserve, where they meet others of their own kind, and Alex especially discovers his royal heritage as prince of a lion pride.
The Madagascar animals join a struggling European circus to get back to New York, but find themselves being pursued by a psychotic animal control officer.
When Sid's attempt to adopt three dinosaur eggs gets him abducted by their real mother to an underground lost world, his friends attempt to rescue him.
When Gru, the world's most super-bad turned super-dad has been recruited by a team of officials to stop lethal muscle and a host of Gru's own, He has to fight back with new gadgetry, cars, and more minion madness.
Manny, Sid, and Diego discover that the ice age is coming to an end, and join everybody for a journey to higher ground. On the trip, they discover that Manny, in fact, is not the last of the woolly mammoths.
Manny, Diego, and Sid embark upon another adventure after their continent is set adrift. Using an iceberg as a ship, they encounter sea creatures and battle pirates as they explore a new world.
When Po's long-lost panda father suddenly reappears, the reunited duo travels to a secret panda paradise to meet scores of hilarious new panda characters. But when the supernatural villain Kai begins to sweep across China defeating all the kung fu masters, Po must do the impossible-learn to train a village full of his fun-loving, clumsy brethren to become the ultimate band of Kung Fu Pandas.Written by
20th Century Fox
So far the only Kung Fu Panda movie to not be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. Kung Fu Panda (2008) and Kung Fu Panda 2 (2011) were nominated, but lost to WALL-E (2008) and Rango (2011), respectively. See more »
Goofs
When Oogway fights with General Kai face to face in the Spirit World, he wrote the Chinese character Chi (Pinyin is Qi4) and pushed it to attack Kai. Since the audience (and General Kai) can see this Chinese character in the right way, that means Oogway wrote this Chinese character in the opposite way (like in a mirror), which is awkward. Is Oogway really considerate?
It could be that the shot was added flipped left to right. See more »
Quotes
[first lines]
Oogway:
Inner peace... inner peace.
[a flower petal falls on his nose]
Oogway:
Itchy nose...
See more »
Crazy Credits
Instead of the usual Dreamworks SKG opening with the little boy fishing from a crescent moon in the sky, Po climbs a huge staircase, jumps onto the crescent, and fishes from there. See more »
Alternate Versions
The FX print begins with the 2013 Universal Pictures logo plastered over the 2010 20th Century Fox logo. See more »
Try
Lyrics by Vincent Fang and Celeste Syn
Music by Patrick Brasca
Performed by Patrick Brasca featuring Jay Chou
Production supervised by Jay Chou
Produced by Hans Chen and Josh Lo
Co-Produced by Al Clay
Courtesy of JVR Music International Ltd. See more »
As a certain character once said, a James Bond movie is only as good as the villain. The same rule actually applies to just about any story with some kind of confrontation, with the best of such stories having villains which you even want to relate to.
Kung Fu Panda trilogy is no exception. One of the reasons behind the first film's excellence was Tai Lung, a character so intense, conflicted and deeply rooted in the history of the KFP universe, that his story managed to combine the vibes of two great confrontations: Obi-Wan vs Darth Vader and Darth Vader vs Luke. So it's no wonder that my greatest wish for every next KFP movie was to have him back somehow. Those vain hopes...
The villain's complexity became the foundation on which the rest of the story could develop. Including the main character. First film's Po was so great because he was a classic "loser with a dream" type of character: confined in his bleak reality but refusing to accept his destiny. Po's power was in finally letting himself pursue the dream he's been having on his own for so long, and in how a true dream can overcome any obstacle in its way.
The problems began when Po was raised to the supreme position. It's where the pursuit of a dream was replaced with a job. Po is not a leader, he's not even a hero, he's just a guy who does what he can because his heart tells him so. But letting him keep that spirit would mean losing pace for the franchise. So each next film was basically creating a new villain out of thin air (or, in this film's case, from the other world, literally) and imposing the duty of defeating him on Po, using it as a justification for granting him another magic ability.
The gods are what we create ourselves. And, at the end of the day, KFP3 finished creating a cult of the Dragon Warrior by transforming Po from a goofus with a heart and spirit into some kind of omnipotent golden Buddha, smiling and just-be-yourself-preaching. The complexity is gone, the humanity, with all its inherent flaws, is gone. The only thing that's left is the divine perfection and invulnerability. Maybe the kids will love such glossy happy ending, just like they love playing video games in god mode: easy win, plain and simple. But for someone more mature, that kind of easy is just boring.
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As a certain character once said, a James Bond movie is only as good as the villain. The same rule actually applies to just about any story with some kind of confrontation, with the best of such stories having villains which you even want to relate to.
Kung Fu Panda trilogy is no exception. One of the reasons behind the first film's excellence was Tai Lung, a character so intense, conflicted and deeply rooted in the history of the KFP universe, that his story managed to combine the vibes of two great confrontations: Obi-Wan vs Darth Vader and Darth Vader vs Luke. So it's no wonder that my greatest wish for every next KFP movie was to have him back somehow. Those vain hopes...
The villain's complexity became the foundation on which the rest of the story could develop. Including the main character. First film's Po was so great because he was a classic "loser with a dream" type of character: confined in his bleak reality but refusing to accept his destiny. Po's power was in finally letting himself pursue the dream he's been having on his own for so long, and in how a true dream can overcome any obstacle in its way.
The problems began when Po was raised to the supreme position. It's where the pursuit of a dream was replaced with a job. Po is not a leader, he's not even a hero, he's just a guy who does what he can because his heart tells him so. But letting him keep that spirit would mean losing pace for the franchise. So each next film was basically creating a new villain out of thin air (or, in this film's case, from the other world, literally) and imposing the duty of defeating him on Po, using it as a justification for granting him another magic ability.
The gods are what we create ourselves. And, at the end of the day, KFP3 finished creating a cult of the Dragon Warrior by transforming Po from a goofus with a heart and spirit into some kind of omnipotent golden Buddha, smiling and just-be-yourself-preaching. The complexity is gone, the humanity, with all its inherent flaws, is gone. The only thing that's left is the divine perfection and invulnerability. Maybe the kids will love such glossy happy ending, just like they love playing video games in god mode: easy win, plain and simple. But for someone more mature, that kind of easy is just boring.