With this prequel to 2015’s Minions, The Rise of Gru follows 11-year-old supervillain Felonious Gru (voiced by Space Force actor Steve Carell) as he aspires to join the villainous group known as the Vicious 6. This is the fifth Despicable Me film and the follow-up to Minions. Gru relies on his yellow minions, a new tutor, and a few new pals to evade the diabolical Belle Bottom (Taraji P. Henson) and the rest of the Vicious 6 after an unexpected turn of events. Franchise star Steve Carell returns to voice Gru in The Rise of Gru, as does director Kyla Balda, who last directed Minions and 2017’s Despicable Me 3 as part of a duo.
The Rise of Gru also introduces a slew of high-profile voice actors as new characters, including Jean-Claude Van Damme, Lucy Lawless, Dolph Lundgren, Danny Trejo, and Alan Arkin as the other five, colourful members of the Vicious 6. RZA and Michelle Yeoh round out the cast as supporting players. Because The Rise of Gru takes place in the mid-’70s, as opposed to the late 1960s of the last Minions feature, it gives lots of opportunities for the story to seem fresh. Music, clothes, and fashions from that era complement Illumination’s brilliant palette throughout the franchise. There’s a lot to see around every corner of the screen, and the picture has outstanding attention to era-appropriate detail, much like every other film in the Gru series.
As Gru, Carell has always provided a superb performance, and he manages to bring just as much cynicism and overconfidence to the 11-year-old character as he did to the middle-aged Gru in past movies. As a result of the film’s high-profile casting, adult fans may expect to see more of the franchise’s high-profile supporting characters, such as action hero Van Damme voicing “Jean Clawed,” a lobster-armed monster. Minions: The Rise of Gru has plenty of laughs to go around, but it doesn’t quite keep up the pace of its predecessors for the duration of its 88-minute running time. Watching the film at a theatre where the number of parents sans kids was roughly equal to the number of accompanying kids in the crowd, the huge laughs in The Rise of Gru weren’t quite as common as they’d been in past Despicable Me films.
With Minions and Despicable Me 3 both attracting a raucous public audience, the prolonged period of silence during The Rise of Gru’s showing by children and adults alike shows (though anecdotally) that the series may be slipping. However, Minions: The Rise of Gru is still a pleasant and engaging trip for both new and longstanding fans, even if it fails to provide as many chuckles. Despicable Me took a major risk by making a villain the key character of the franchise, but it paid off and continues to do so, even when the adult version of Gru adopts a more law-abiding existence. The Rise of Gru illustrates that even one of the poorer entries in the Minions franchise is still a lot of fun for audiences of all ages by chronicling Gru’s early years.
Minions: The Rise of Gru, from Universal Pictures, is now playing in cinemas.