Whether you have kids or not, you've likely been unable to escape the 16-year phenomenon that is the Minions. Confusingly dressed in blue overalls and goggles – and therefore looking better suited to take up a construction job than to serve a "big boss" – the Minions are a swarm of villain lackeys with slapstick potty humor. Their unique manner of speaking, canonically called 'Minionese,' combines various languages, including English, Spanish, and Italian, in addition to nonsensical babble. And, more often than not, they're using this bizarre language to make equally bizarre declarations, frequently just the word "banana."
If that sounds mind-numbing, that's by design. Before they were starring in their own movies, the Minions were introduced as supervillain Gru's simple-minded underlings, who were willing but often unable to do his bidding, in the 2010 movie Despicable Me. It perhaps caught even the creative minds behind that movie by surprise that audiences immediately latched onto the Minions, and children on the whole became outright obsessed with them. No doubt as a result of that popularity, just five years later, they had secured their first standalone movie, Minions.
Yet, that very same popularity may have made the movie's creators a little too comfortable phoning it in, as Minions was generally seen as disappointing by critics and audiences alike. A full seven years later, the franchise tried again with Minions: The Rise of Gru, which performed much better (although, notably, that sequel relied on the popularity of Gru as well). Now, the Minions are back once again with the franchise's latest installment, Minions & Monsters, and – certainly defying my expectations – they've managed to make something well worth watching.
From its opening scenes, Minions & Monsters made clear this was not going to be like the previous Minions installments. In fact, I found myself double-checking that this movie has a G rating, because many of the early gags felt like thinly veiled adult humor (but, frankly, that's why it worked). As was shown in the Minions & Monsters trailer, at one point, the Minions are serving a Cyclops, only for one of them, James, to ruin it by creating bricks reminiscent of LEGO.
The Cyclops steps on one of the bricks (a pain parents know all too well) and it gets stuck. While that bit is undoubtedly for the kids, what happens next certainly isn't. After having the brick extracted from his foot, the Cyclops is so relieved that he immediately goes to sit down, only to land on another, much taller stack of bricks.
The implications for where that stack goes are abundantly clear, but that isn't the most shocking aspect of this moment. In a blink-and-you-miss-it image, a large drawing of a tree can be seen on the stack, but to an adult, it... doesn't look very tree-like.
These scenes also introduce a brand-new Minion named Dick, which quickly elicited giggles, including from kids, across the theater. Sure, some may find it crass, but honestly, this was a welcome break from the canned chuckles and exclamations of "Papoy!" The movie also doesn't linger on any one joke. In fact, just a few scenes later, Minions & Monsters reveals one of its most delightful shockers: a cameo by George Lucas. In addition to the animated depiction of Lucas being a dead ringer, it's really the creator of the galaxy far, far away voicing the character.
...the pacing feels built for a generation that has grown up on screens, swiping away the second a short-form video loses their attention.
This cameo comes by nature of Minions & Monsters' focus on the film industry, with much of it set in 1920s Hollywood. That unexpected choice ends up being a stroke of genius, because it sets this movie fully apart from its predecessors. Rather than trying to steal the moon, the Minions are trying to get their big break in Hollywood, and that premise allows this movie to be the funniest the Minions have ever been. In fact, because of the era, Minions & Monsters also has multiple scenes involving the suffrage movement.
Where the film falls short is in its absolute breakneck speed. While it's likely to work for its target audience, the pacing feels built for a generation that has grown up on screens, swiping away the second a short-form video loses their attention. In a way, that's nice, because it means that viewers aren't trapped in any one part of the plot for too long.
However, the rushed pace also means that what should have been the core of the movie – the introduction and subsequent attack of the titular monsters – ends as soon as it begins. Of the movie's tidy, one-and-a-half-hour run time, for example, the heavily marketed, vibrant orange, globby monster covered in eyeballs, Irene, spends maybe 20 minutes on screen.
Admittedly, it's also still pretty hard to get past the way the Minions speak, even if it's what the kids love. Yet, Minions & Monsters shines in so many other ways that it's easy to forgive how lightning-fast the plot feels. Among the brightest spots is Dort, a robot cosplayer voiced by Jesse Eisenberg. (Or, at least, he seems to be cosplaying, until he later has a baby with Debbie (Zoey Deutch), and the baby is a walkie-talkie. That also got huge laughs.) The movie also ends with a twist that not only was a nice touch, but also exemplified that, somehow, Minions & Monsters manages to elevate the cute, if a little grating characters in a movie that I would actually watch again.
Minions & Monsters releases in theaters nationwide on Wednesday, July 1.
