Minions: The Rise of Gru

Gru doesn't waste any time. He steals the Zodiac Stone (an ancient relic with mystical powers that the Vicious 6 stole themselves to take out the Anti-Villain ...

We also get an homage to the silhouetted figures at the beginning of every James Bond film in the 1970s (although here, they’re not sensual at all.) In fact, the main things for parents to be mindful of are likely a bunch of allusions only they will get, some of which flirt with being ever so slightly naughty. Wild Knuckles formed the Vicious 6 because he wanted to do bad stuff with his buddies.

The newest movie in the 'Despicable Me' series has Steve Carell as supervillain Gru, lots of laughs, better animation and the same lovable Minions.

I expected the movie to be much more silly than clever and targeted at a very young audience, but parents and grandparents will probably laugh more than their kids. A few things might not make sense if you haven't seen the earlier films, but this isn't the Marvel Cinematic Universe and you don't need to watch all of them in chronological order to get the story and the humor. Of course, the Vicious Six wants the stone back, but so does Wild Knuckles, the member who was kicked out. Yes, it is an animated film that will appeal to kids for sure, but it's written with adults in mind, too. But maybe just not that young. He's named Jean-Clawed and voiced by Jean-Claude Van Damme.

It's hard to believe it's been 12 years since we were first introduced to Minions back in the first Despicable Me. Now the mascots of a multi-billion dollar ...

There's bright and colourful action and a decent helping of heart alongside it. Young kids will have a blast and there's plenty of throwback references to 70s action and other jokes for parents, grandparents and childless singles. Despicable Me has always shone with its wordplay and background gags and Rise of Gru is no different.

They have swarmed the planet like that human mob in “World War Z," spreading a happy cartoon plague that long ago became endemic. The Minions are one of the ...

The Minions are one of the great second-banana success stories. The Minions are in it. (AP) -- For a not small segment of the audience for “Minions: Rise of Gru,” only one thing really needs to be said.

In what has been a fairly dull 2022 for animation films, Minions: The Rise of Gru is just another subpar serving.

The action, too, looks like an attempt to cash in on the Marvel-DC craze, but with significantly less effort that animated films like Into the SpiderVerse had magnificently capitalised on in recent years. Twelve years, two sequels, two prequel spin-offs and billions of merchandising revenue later, a lot has changed in the industry, barring the continued obsession with tacky theatrical 3D releases. And in what has been a fairly dull 2022 for animation films, Minions: The Rise of Gru is just another subpar serving.

This latest edition featuring the animated creatures is an origin story of sorts for their master, Gru.

The peculiar nonchalance of the Minions is funniest when they hijack an aircraft and successfully fly it to San Francisco without having a clue as to what they’re doing. The movie opens with a nostalgia-inducing, feel-good Earth, Wind and Fire song, no surprise given contemporary movie convention, as the gang called the Vicious Six engages in Indiana-Jones-style high jinks for a heist of a supernatural stone. Their latest outing, directed by Kyle Balda, Brad Abelson and Jonathan Del Val, is “Minions: The Rise of Gru,” in which the arguably epicene creatures again try to help out their master Gru — only, as the title implies, Gru here is a kid and it’s the cartoon 1970s.

The latest Despicable Me prequel reunites Steve Carell (as preteen Gru) with the usual bevy of singing, babbling Minions, plus villains voiced by Alan Arkin ...

Minions: The Rise of Gru is a dutiful brand deposit, a spinoff that does indeed give us more of an idea of how a little kid with a Boris Badenov-style accent turned into a supervillain. In that respect, The Rise of Gru does the job. Given that Minions: The Rise of Gru respectfully wraps up within 90 minutes, the amount of stuff that happens is a whirlwind at best, hopping from one hyper action set-piece to another, and frantic at worst. The Rise of Gru is odd for two reasons. Amid all this, references and cameos aplenty litter the background, tying into the other entries in the Despicable Me franchise. Minions: The Rise of Gru benefits from low expectations.

Five years after the last "Despicable Me" movie and a dozen years since the first, "Minions: The Rise of Gru" extends the animated franchise without exactly ...

Mostly, "The Rise of Gru" relies on how visually pleasing and malleable its title characters are, turning them into a kind of slap-happy Three Stooges for our times. Gru and the Minions thus take off on parallel tracks, which merely adds to the splintered nature of the story, which is unhelpfully crammed into a less-than-90-minute package. "I just need to fly solo on this," he tells them, bringing tears to their eyes (or eye).

Minions: The Rise of Gru doesn't live up to Despicable Me, let alone other popular animated films.

Sometime later, we’re reintroduced to little Gru (a pitch-shifted Steve Carell), whose dreams of supervillainy get him laughed at by his classmates (if you think this embarrassment might inform his story, think again). And of course, what would Gru be without the Minions in his basement, hundreds of whom appear on screen, but four of whom are the actual focus. Whatever semblance of story The Rise of Gru features, it wobbles like the empty skin-suit of a real kids’ movie (like the three Despicables Me!). It sends Kevin, Stuart, and Bob in one direction, and Otto in another, on divergent missions to help Gru, but both storylines seem to suffer from severe cases of anti-drama and anti-comedy. Ultimately, enjoying it comes down to whether or not you can tolerate 90 minutes of “le ooga booga banana por favor,” and if you’re under the age of 3, the answer is probably yes — but in that case, any parent may as well just plop their kid in front of a YouTube playlist of D-Billions instead. Absolutely, but it’s difficult not to in a year that gave us the Pixar instant-classic Turning Red. Minions: The Rise of Gru is ultimately inoffensive, but children deserve a little better than a flurry of random images that feel barely connected. Wrapped up in all this is the question of who this movie is for, if the Minions rose to prominence over a decade ago? He’s the closest thing the movie has to an actual character, since his five former teammates mostly melt into the background as an indecipherable blob (a handful of funny gags aside).

The adorable, inscrutable roly-poly yellow henchmen return for a '70s-styled adventure.

Such is the case with “Minions: The Rise of Gru”: inevitably, it sort of succeeds, even if that means relying on silly gags, lots of butts, and the kind of set pieces that would only fly (literally) in the animated space. But The Vicious 6 have no use for a kid, even if he is Gru, and the mini boss enacts his revenge by making off with the group’s newly-snatched weapon, a gem-laced necklace that draws upon the power of the zodiac (again, the ’70s!) to do, well, bad stuff. Inevitably, they succeed, even if one of them is stripped naked in the process (the Minions love many things, but they really love butts). Gru is just crazy about The Vicious 6, a supervillain supergroup once led by Wild Knuckles (voiced, of course, by Alan Arkin) and recently taken over by Belle Bottom (Taraji P. Henson), and when he gets a chance to maybe join them, he jumps at the chance. Of course the Minions would get their own spinoff, and a canny one at that: 2015’s “Minions” smartly went the prequel route, tracking the wacky history of the little guys, setting them up on a snazzy ’70s-fueled adventure, and eventually leading them to their beloved “mini boss,” kid Gru. Seven years later, the little guys are back for another story, though this one is besieged by classic retconning problems, mainly that Gru was maybe always kind of a sweetheart? And while the grumbly Gru (voiced by Steve Carell throughout the franchise) turning away from his long-running bad guy schemes in favor of family and fun has made for some delightful, silly features in the past, as the series attempts to mine his younger years, things are getting oddly complicated.

June 30, 2022 8:55 PDT - By Sam Mendelsohn - Box Office News. After a franchise-packed June which was the highest grossing month since December 2019 (though ...

In the past year we’ve seen two films top $1 billion globally and a handful of others get in the high nine-figures, but animation has been absent from this success. The genre has yet to return to pre-pandemic highs, and while most of the big titles this summer have over-performed expectations, the one to under-perform wasLightyear. Whether the issue was specific to the Pixar film or a sign of a depressed market for animated films is hard to say. In the past year we’ve seen two films top $1 billion globally and a handful of others get in the high nine-figures, but animation has been absent from this success. Filling that void isMr. Malcolm's Listfrom Bleecker Street. The Jane Austen-inspired British period piece tells the story of Selina (Freida Pinto) who is recruited for purposes of revenge by her best friend Julia (Zawe Ashton) to pose as an eligible bachelorette for the titular Mr. Malcolm (Sope Dirisu) who has a list of hard to meet demands for his prospective match, demands that Julia could not meet. In addition to Gru and the anarchic energy ball Minions, the film introduces the supervillain collective the Vicious 6. Rise of Gru is the fifth film in the Despicable Me/Minions franchise, following three Despicable Me’s and the first prequelMinions. The new installment tells us how Gru went from a young boy with evil ambitions to the supervillain fans know and love.

Will the Minions movie be streaming on Disney+, HBO Max or Netflix? Find out where to watch Minions The Rise of Gru and when to expect Minions 2 on ...

In the case of Minions: The Rise of Gru, that means July 2026. Minions: The Rise of Gru will not be on Netflix any time soon. No. Minions: The Rise of Gru is a Universal movie, not a Warner Bros. Also, HBO Max will no longer be streaming theatrical movies in 2022. You should also expect to see Minions: The Rise of Gru on Peacock Premium around the same time. Minions: The Rise of Gru will open in theaters in the U.S on Friday, July 1. After the movie’s theatrical run, you will be able to purchase Minions: The Rise of Gru on digital platforms like Amazon Prime, iTunes, YouTube, Google Play, and more.

NEW YORK — A '70s vibe adds verve to the animated origin story "Minions: The Rise of Gru" (Universal).

The Catholic News Service classification is A-II — adults and adolescents. The result is a generally wholesome and breezy bit of entertainment. Yet she does make the sign of the cross at one point and consistently holds her hands together in a prayerlike pose.

June 30, 2022 8:55 PDT - By Sam Mendelsohn - Box Office News. After a franchise-packed June which was the highest grossing month since December 2019 (though ...

In the past year we’ve seen two films top $1 billion globally and a handful of others get in the high nine-figures, but animation has been absent from this success. The genre has yet to return to pre-pandemic highs, and while most of the big titles this summer have over-performed expectations, the one to under-perform wasLightyear. Whether the issue was specific to the Pixar film or a sign of a depressed market for animated films is hard to say. In the past year we’ve seen two films top $1 billion globally and a handful of others get in the high nine-figures, but animation has been absent from this success. Filling that void isMr. Malcolm's Listfrom Bleecker Street. The Jane Austen-inspired British period piece tells the story of Selina (Freida Pinto) who is recruited for purposes of revenge by her best friend Julia (Zawe Ashton) to pose as an eligible bachelorette for the titular Mr. Malcolm (Sope Dirisu) who has a list of hard to meet demands for his prospective match, demands that Julia could not meet. In addition to Gru and the anarchic energy ball Minions, the film introduces the supervillain collective the Vicious 6. Rise of Gru is the fifth film in the Despicable Me/Minions franchise, following three Despicable Me’s and the first prequelMinions. The new installment tells us how Gru went from a young boy with evil ambitions to the supervillain fans know and love.

Sergio Pablos must own a swimming pool filled with Dom Pérignon, because he's the genius who created the Minions. Those yellow talking Tic Tacs are the best ...

This time, little Gru — growing up in the groovy 1970s — is obsessed with a Suicide Squad-esque group of villains called the Vicious Six and dreams of joining their ranks. The Vicious Six have personality, but are mostly a missed opportunity. Director Kyle Balda’s film looks sharp — most CGI at this level does these days — but audiences don’t expect visual splendor from “Minions” movies. Still, there is Gru-m for improvement. And yet it is damn near impossible not to love those little scamps. With ho-hum names such as Bob and Kevin, they speak in helium-pitched, gibberish Span-French-talian, hit each other with blunt objects and giggle about their pain.

Editor's Note: The following contains Minions: The Rise of Gru spoilers.Gru and the Minions are back at it, unleashing their villainy across theaters everywhere ...

Devasted by loss, Gru and his newly rehired Minions host a funeral for White Knuckles. Just as Gru is about to convey his deep appreciation for his newfound mentor, Gru spots White Knuckles in the distance! They tie Gru to the hands of the clock on the clock tower. In a lovely little easter egg, the good guys encourage Gru to shoot for the moon. Unfortunately, White Knuckles sacrifices himself to Belle Bottoms' scorching fire breath so that Gru and the Minions can repossess the Zodiac Stone. With the stone in hand, Gru immediately turns the Vicious 6 into rats, who the good guys (who have since shown up and been truly of no help to anyone) cart away to jail. Gru pleads with White Knuckles that the two of them need to form their own crew to rival the Vicious 6, but it's no use. When Gru and White Knuckles return valiant from their simple heist to find that the Vicious 6 have completely destroyed White Knuckles' house, White Knuckles finally gives up.