Well, this makes me feel old, doesn’t it? Despicable Me is 15 this year, and it is one of those films I distinctly remember seeing as a kid. I watched it in a drive-in in Ennis, Texas, while visiting some relatives. At some level, the fact that something I saw and enjoyed as a kid has been around for all these years is kind of nuts when you think about it. A lot has been said about how Universal took the success of this movie and basically oversaturated it as much as possible to this day. Trust me, minion discourse online used to be aggressive and nuts. However, I feel that focusing on the original film and taking a more balanced approach with its impact is a better approach here since it’s honestly still a good little film.
Animator Sergio Pablos developed the film in the 2000s under the title Evil Me. He would go on to direct the beloved Christmas animated film Klaus. The original pitch is very much in line with the final version of the movie, where a supervillain adopts three girls to execute an evil scheme before genuinely connecting with his new daughters. Ideas like the minions and the general design of the characters would be further developed at Illumination for their first film, though Sergio would not stay on to see the project to completion.
As it stands, the first Despicable Me is honestly the best film Illumination has made for a simple fact: it feels the most like a movie. I try not to be wholly dismissive towards animation or media made for younger audiences, since they do need simpler things to get attached to. However, the issue with most Illumination films is that they don’t really have strong plots or characters. Most of them involve a segmented style of story structure that is focused on gags. I feel I wouldn’t be bothered by this at all if the studio tried to deviate and experiment from their typical production model or even made more stylistic and ambitious slapstick affairs, but they haven’t, and the fact that they have been the most successful animation studio as of late despite being the least interesting is disappointing. However, with the first Despicable Me, there’s a clear balance between the story and humor. Gru’s character arc is strong, and the film does a great job showing his growth in believable ways. It’s nothing mind-blowing, but it is effective, and I genuinely feel that the emotion in this movie is very strong. It helps that the humor is both solid and balanced since the minions are more off to the side and don’t dominate huge stretches of the movie like they would in the subsequent sequels.
Even so, I feel my emotions towards this franchise have been interesting as well. I was as upset with the minion oversaturation as many online were during the mid to late 2010s. But now, I feel I’ve been more at peace with it. I do have my frustrations with Illumination as a studio since I feel they’ve been stuck in autopilot with the types of movies they make, but I’ve mellowed out with my perceptions overall. It’s far less to do with their work and more about wishing that general audiences would be more willing to watch a variety of movies and expose their kids to films that could be more formative to them. I grew up during Pixar’s golden age, so I know how well-made and introspective films made for younger audiences can affect their developing tastes.
An animated franchise lasting for well over a decade is interesting to see. The Ice Age series lasted for so long mostly due to international audiences, and we’ll see if that still holds with the 6th movie next year. Toy Story is still getting more movies, and Disney in general is focused on sequels, given Moana 2’s massive success, with Zootopia 2 coming later this year, as well as two more Frozen films being in development. Despicable Me is simultaneously the most and least interesting case. It makes a lot of sense that a film with such a marketable approach got so successful and continues to appeal to kids. However, the fact that Gru has basically been unseated from his series by the minions is an interesting case of how comedic relief can basically hijack an entire media franchise and push it even further. I know Despicable Me 4 was a huge success, and we have another minion movie coming out next year, but I am curious to see what the future of this franchise will be. Not really in the case of more installments, since that’s given, but how kids who watched these movies will look back at them, or if the movies will even be remembered that much. I mentioned Ice Age before, and that could be the future of Despicable Me. The first film is remembered as a cute little movie, and the sequels kind of just form an amorphous blob that is vaguely remembered. Don’t believe me, ask yourself if you remember that they even made a 4th or 5th Ice Age movie, or that a 6th one is being made. It’s the case of studios focusing on marketable projects rather than ones that last, and while I don’t have an issue with making films that appeal to more people, it’s a problem of balancing them with works that either allow different experiences or try new things. I just don’t feel that the minions truly have the staying power of other cartoon characters like Mickey and Bugs to maintain a sense of relevancy once these movies stop getting made. This is more observational introspection since maybe I could be wrong, and the marketing machine out of Universal keeps these movies relevant until the sun blows up. Either way, it is interesting to lay out the impact and history of this franchise, knowing it came from a simple movie that blew up in ways the creators probably never expected. That tends to happen a lot with entertainment since the most dominant franchises start without that intent in the first place, and that will always be immensely compelling to me.d. That tends to happen a lot with entertainment since the most dominant franchises start without that intent in the first place, and that will always be immensely compelling to me.
