I have just returned from my local B&B theatre after watching the new film in the Despicable Me franchise, Minions & Monsters. Frankly, I am in a weird position. I am used to being very critical of Illumination and all of their stale, theme-park movies, and there is a rationality to it. The Despicable Me series had a legendary start. I remember when I was young, watching that heartfelt movie about Gru and his found family was so touching and inspiring. The minions’ gags and side plots enhanced the movie and still make me laugh to this day. Millions of people around the world had that same reaction, instantly launching Illumination into the ranks of major Hollywood animation studios.
I wish I could say that Illumination used this funding to make more brilliant animated features with emotional themes, as in the first Despicable Me. But we all know the story from here. Constant mediocre films were thrown at us with the sole intention of milking the money out of parents with kids, who can’t understand good cinema yet. The second Despicable Me felt lazy. They fell into the classic “add in a romance for the sequel” trope, as well as creating a new type of purple minion that could sell millions worth of merchandise. And with this, they said, “Screw it, let’s just make a whole movie about the little guys that make kids and Facebook moms giggle.”
The Minions trilogy started painfully stale. It was almost two hours of mindless Minion jokes with an incredibly thin plot and an alright antagonist. The second one was much worse. It had side plots with no connection, minions randomly transforming to create new merchandise, and villains that were so stupid and bland that I can’t name a single one of them. At least the other movies in this franchise have memorable villains like Vector, El Macho, and Scarlet Overkill. Despicable Me 4 somehow was even worse, taking the side plot troubles to a whole other level. They shoved in a scene where the minions turn into superheroes who have literally no impact on the major plot. They’re not even hiding their greed.
That brings us to Minions 3, Minions & Monsters. Its title seems ironic because there are exactly four monsters in the whole film. It seems this movie confused most audiences because of the marketing. The trailers made it seem like it was a funny Minions movie where they find or team up with monsters. Those same trailers made me expect the worst because of that cute little green guy that seemed like the mascot of the “monsters” of this movie, as well as a marketable plush toy. His voice seemed annoying, and all the jokes showcased in the trailers fell flat and worried me. However, I had a tiny spark of hope for this film only because the main minion’s name is James. But I doubt you would even be able to distinguish him from the other minions; they are all the same character in the other movies. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
This movie, while it had its flaws, was very enjoyable. Unexpectedly, this movie is entirely about filmmaking, storytelling, and Hollywood culture. The minion, James, has a goal to create a movie and prove all his closed-minded minion family wrong. He has an artsy charisma to him that is so relatable to people like me. It showcases the magnificence of the inner workings and creation of movies and serves as a love letter to cinema as a whole. There are a ton of references to old films and the era of the 1920s-1930s that it takes place in. It is definitely a movie for cinephiles. It’s easily better than the other Minions movies because it actually feels like a film. The plot, while weirdly structured, has genuine payoffs and great moments. There are incredibly animated action scenes that have a ton of elements to them and encompass all of the group to create more chaos. And to make it even better, they actually embrace the Looney Tunes-esque insanity and humor of the minions in certain scenes to achieve laugh-out-loud moments.
The characters are great as well. There is James, whom I mentioned, Henry, and Ed, who serve as goofy sidekicks. A robot, alien, sci-fi nerd named Dort (played by Jesse Eisenberg) provides a very entertaining side plot with a bizarrely realistic romance. The little green guy, whose name is Goomy, is alright, but a tad forgettable, along with the other monsters introduced for the main conflict. The movie director, Max, whom I thought would end up being a twist villain, ended up being a personable, reasonable character. They even parody the Warner Brothers with these fat old people called the Bright Brothers, which I thought was hilarious.
Of course, this film does have negatives. The humor is childish at times, but what do you really expect from a Minions movie? The plot has a very strange structure. It has a very long first act, which re-explains the minions’ origin story from the first film, and shows them transitioning to different masters, and eventually ends up in 1920s Hollywood. This segment was around an hour, taking up the majority of the film, and left me questioning when the “monsters” were going to show up. They lean into the filmmaking delight for so long that the real plot of the movie feels really rushed when you get to it. This made the antagonists feel very underwhelming because of their little screen time, and by the end of the giant monster battle scene, you’re left wanting a little more. This was my family’s main complaint about the movie, and I understand the hesitation for most critics to call this movie great.
However, this movie had a smile on my face for the whole runtime. It serves as a very enjoyable animated film for all generations and especially cinephiles. I even had plenty of good laughs throughout. The film is packed with great cinematic references that would make a movie-lover like me grin. The animation was an amazing spectacle; it seems Illumination doesn’t have an issue with that department. The characters are mostly great, and even the minions felt fleshed out and not just background characters for their own movie, like they were in the previous films. I would say this is by far the best Minions movie, and it takes second place in the Despicable Me franchise behind the first film. It seems someone new must have worked on this one to make it stand out so much and outshine the fact that this movie was probably conceived to debunk the rumors that the minions may have served a fascist dictator in World War II.
Final Count: 7.5/10
Written by James Michael Counts