According to that pinnacle source for all things movie news Variety, a new voice has been added to the Shrek repertoire. N'Sync member turned Michael Jackson wannabe turned actor Justin Timberlake has been cast to play the character of Artie, the rebellious nephew of John Cleese's King Harold in the third of the Shrek movies.

This isn't the kind of news that's going to get me excited. I was genuinely intrigued when I heard Antonio Banderas was joining the last Shrek film, but Justin's addition this time around almost sounds like a bad idea. However, I am sure the casting choice will ensure millions of Timberlake fans will be bolstering the box office numbers. His other two major film projects, Edison and Alpha Dog are both due out later this year.

At present Dreamworks is doing everything possible to milk the franchise for all it's worth. It's a gold mine and they know it. Shrek 3 and Shrek 4 are in pre-production and development respectively. On the other hand, maybe Dreamworks is just determined to keep making Shreks until they win another Oscar in the best animated feature film category. It can't have been easy to lose the honor to Pixar this year when 8 out of 10 Italians clearly perferred Shrek 2 to The Incredibles.