History Heartwarming / ShrekTheMusical

* Young Fiona reading fairytale books to her dolls and envisioning her prince. Quickly segues into {{TearJerker}} as she gets older, no prince comes, and Fiona starts to GoMadFromTheIsolation.

* During "Big Bright Beautiful World", we see a young Fiona waving to a young Shrek

* The Act One finale where the eponymous DeadpanSnarker reveals in the span of two minutes that he's adventurous, poetic, sentimental, desperately lonely, and aching to be one of the heroes he's read about. Describing his fantasy rescue of the maiden of his dreams, only to end in a moment of silence when he gets to showing his face, is like a gutpunch.
** There's also a subtle bit with Donkey and his lines: ''"You're all alone. You need a pal; my calendar's open. You need me... "'' When he first sings this in "Don't Let Me Go," it's pretty obvious he's just trying to appeal to Shrek so the latter will let him tag along. But then he sings a reprise of this after learning how alone Shrek actually is, so you ''know'' he really means it now.
* That song is one hell of an Act 1 Finale. And then when Fiona joins in, and she's in her ogre form singing about how she still believes the stories she's read despite everything wrong that's happened so far...oh lord. Heartbreaking.

* Young Fiona reading fairytale books to her dolls and envisioning her price. Quickly segues into {{TearJerker}} as she gets older, no prince comes, and Fiona starts to GoMadFromTheIsolation.

* During "Big Bright Beautiful World" we see a young Fiona waving to a young Shrek

* The Act One finale where the eponymous DeadpanSnarker reveals in the span of two minutes that he's adventurous, poetic, sentimental, desperately lonely, and aching to be one of the heroes he's read about. Describing his fantasy rescue of the maiden of his dreams, only to end in a moment of silence when he gets to showing his face, is like a gutpunch. This troper didn't even like the movie all that much...

* The "Big Bright Beautiful World" reprise. Here's a guy who's spent most of his life being cynical and grumpy pouring his heart out to the woman he loves. Always gives this troper warm fuzzies.

* The message behind "Freak Flag" (and to an extent, the entire show itself). The showstopping ElevenOClockNumber is really about the importance of [[BeYourself being yourself]] and embracing what makes you unique. The message is even stronger when you consider the song to be a sort of pride anthem (''[[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything I'm wood. I'm good. Get used to it!"]]).

* The "Big Bright Beautiful World" reprise. Here's a guy who's spent most of his life being cynical and grumpy pouring his heart out to the woman he loves. Always gives this troper warm fuzzies.

* Not to mention the song "When Words Fail" from the second act, where Shrek is trying to get up the courage to tell Fiona how he feels about her and worried that he won't be able to phrase just right and she won't know how he feels . It's a rare moment of nervousness, anxiety, and personal insecurity from a character who has kept up this appearance that he doesn't care what the world thinks of him. And by the end of the song, he decides that it doesn't matter if words fail him, because Fiona will understand all the same.