Minions take center stage in “Despicable Me” prequel

Last weekend, “Minions”, the spin-off-like prequel to films “Despicable Me” (2010) and “Despicable Me 2” (2013) was released in theaters everywhere.

“Minions” follows the life of the iconic yellow henchmen and illustrates their comedic role in history.

The minions meet a master

Dating back to prehistoric times, the minions have existed to serve the most despicable, villainous leaders alive. Napoleon, Pharaoh, and Dracula are a few heinous leaders that have employed the minions to assist them.

Tragically, however, the clumsy minion sidekicks have a way of steering their masters to impending doom and must recurrently seek out new ones.

After a series of unfortunate “turnovers”, the minions are left leaderless and purposeless. Without a villainous leader to serve, the minions roam around lifelessly and will eventually perish.

“Minions” main setting takes place 42 years B.G. (before Gru), and follows the brave adventure of Kevin, Stuart and Bob as they travel to Florida’s secret convention, Villain-Con, in search of a new master.

The film follows the minions’ humorous quest as they are recruited by most evil villainess alive, Scarlett Overkill, voiced by Saundra Bullock.

“Minions” captures second largest audience of all time in animated films

The highly-anticipated “Minions” had a near-record-breaking opening weekend.

Amazon.com Inc., McDonald’s Corp., Chaquita banana, Comcast Corp., General Mills Inc. and Snapchat Inc. all partnered with Universal Studios to promote the release of “Minions”.

Universal’s high-profile marketing campaign was not in vain.

Boxofficemojo.com states that opening weekend, “Minions” brought in $46.04 million on Friday, $38.86 million on Saturday, and $30.82 million on Sunday. Revenue for the movie in in the United States totaled $115.72 million.

Chron.com further reports that “Minions” has grossed $400 million worldwide and opened at No. 1 in 54 of its 56 international markets.

“Minions” ranked second in opening weekends among animated films, behind only “Shrek the Third” which was released in 2007 and made $121.63 million. Prior to the release of “Minions”, “Toy Story 3” was ranked second with a $110.31 million debut.

Audience and critic reviews

Unfortunately, many movie-critics and fans were less than impressed by Universal’s “Despicable Me” spin-off, “Minions”.

IMDB.com reported a score of 6.8/10 based on 26,756 movie reviews.

On Rottentomatoes.com, “Minions” scored a dismal 55% in approval ratings among critics for an average score of 5.8/10. The minions scored even lower amongst the site’s “Top Critics”, receiving a devastating 30% approval rating.

Movie-goers, however, rated “Minions” an A on Cinemascore.com, indicating that the audience may have enjoyed this film much more than the critics did.

Despite mixed reviews, minion fans are in luck; Universal Studios has announced that a fourth movie, “Despicable Me 3”, will be released summer of 2017.
For local “Minions” screening times check out www.ellensburgmovies.com