Rating: U Cast: Steve Carell, Pierre Coffin, Alan Arkin, Russell Bran and Julie Andrews. Directed by Kyle Balda, Brad Ableson and Jonathan del Val. Written by Matthew Fogel and Brian Lynch. Length: 87mins.

Minions: The Rise of Gru is the second of the Minions movies (its prequel opening in 2015) and is a spin off series of films from the hit movie trilogy – Despicable Me. It’s not difficult to see why film makers have jumped on this opportunity. When the small yellow minions took a supporting role in the original trilogy their silliness, gobbeldy-goop language and obsession with bananas stole the hearts of many children (and adults) across the world. But how many stories can be told about this group of minions? In this new release, film makers take us back to Gru’s childhood, with a glimpse of how the minions joined Gru and on an adventure to assist Gru to his dream; becoming the world’s greatest super villain. 

The story is relatively simple, no surprises there…Gru wants to join the vicious six (a league of the most evil super villains) when they kick out one of their own. They laugh Gru off for being a child so Gru steals from them and ends up being kidnapped by the wronged villain who is no longer in the ‘gang’ and the minions take it upon themselves to rescue Gru. With the minions splitting up – one on a mission to regain what was stolen and three determined to find and rescue Gru we get to follow our little yellow heroes along their adventure. The plot changes direction a couple of times but lets be honest – audiences aren’t really there for a gripping adventure plot. 

While full of slapstick style gags, the humour is average; unlike the Despicable Me films which didn’t fail to make audiences of all ages laugh. The good news is that Minions: The Rise of Gru is quite a short film and so didn’t feel like too much of a waste of time. It seems to be a film that will pack in audiences purely for it’s previous charm and history – I don’t think anyone really cares about the quality of the content.  

I wouldn’t tell anyone to rush out and see Minions: The Rise of Gru. If it’s raining and you’re looking for a way to waste an hour or two then it’s a perfectly reasonable way to entertain the children, but other than that, you wont miss anything from not watching it. I imagine they’ll make more minion movies but it’s just a money making thing at this point. They know children love minions and will just throw any old storyline together to produce something for them to watch while the dollars flow in through the box office.