Movie Thoughts: Minions: The Rise of Gru (2022)

• Released: June 13, 2022
  
• Directed by: Kyle Balda, Brad Ableson, Jonathan del Val
• Running time: 1h 27min
• Rating 3/5

Synopsis

A young Gru does whatever he can to become the best villain he can be.

My Thoughts

If you know me, you know I don't like the 2015 Minions movie at all. I don't think I've ever reviewed it on here, but to be fair that would entail having to re-watch it and I'd much, much rather not put myself through that again.

So I held off on watching this sequel for a few years but now that I got a chance to watch it for cheap it was...honestly decent. Nothing great, nothing groundbreaking, but it was fine.

This movie makes the very clever move to relegate the Minions to a sidekick role once again and not having them completely take over the plot. Which is just something I'm very thankful for. They work much better as comedic sidekicks than as main characters or the main driving force of a plot. 

No, this movie made the very clever move of once again making Gru the main character. And honestly I quite like Gru in this. While he's not bad in the current Despicable Me movies, it was genuinely fun to see his more villainous side on display here once again. We've seen plenty of Gru in dad-mode by now, so going back to see him be more evil was quite neat. Also, while the Minions are of course still in this movie, they really don't overstay their welcome for once and are used quite effectively. 

I also gotta say I really like the relationship between Gru and his idol/mentor, Wild Knuckles. Similar to the one between Gru and Poppy in Despicable Me 4, it just really works and both relationships are nicely written. I think the one written here is the superior one, though.

The villains were also quite fun, though I'd be lying if I said they were all very memorable. But I think these are better villains than Maxime le Mal from the latest movie in this universe. That said, I did think the climax where the villain team all turn into giant animals was a bit hard to take seriously. You know me and how I'm not into "fighting a giant monster/creature" climaxes.

Overall a completely fine movie, nothing great but it is a nice breath of fresh air after some of the previous movies were overly Minion-focused.