Speaking of celebrity voice actors – might as well tackle this now because I’ll probably mention it time and time again – I’m personally not on board with the whole deal. Whenever a celebrity voice actor is involved, I always appreciate that kind of detail from the animators. He also somehow looks like Steve Carell…if you’re an Office fan, you’ll definitely recognize a few facial expressions here and there. Evil and Frankenstein had a love child, and Tim Burton picked out the wardrobe…this is what you’d get. If the movie is called Despicable Me, then what else can you expect from Gru?įirst of all, the design of the character is AWESOME. How about we start with The Good – because being positive is good for you. So, as the first of its kind, Despicable Me definitely scores points for originality…right? Well, maybe. The idea was later adapted in Dreamworks’ Megamind and (in my opinion, perfected) in Disney’s Wreck-It Ralph. Despicable Me is also one of the first full-length, animated films to feature a villain as the protagonist. It’s an original execution of a motif we’ve seen dozens of times before: when love changes the main character’s heart. The big conflict of the film lies in Gru’s struggle to balance his new role as a father and his dream of becoming the world’s baddest baddie. As the girls slowly warm up to the villain, Gru also begins to love the girls as his own daughters and realizes there is more to life than being despicable. Gru selfishly adopts the girls and uses them to infiltrate Vector’s fortress meanwhile, Margo (Miranda Cosgrove), Edith, and Agnes just want a dad. After multiple attempts, Gru fails to break into Vector’s lair and steal the shrink ray, but he observes three orphaned girls who easily gain access to the lair while selling girl-scout cookies. Gru sets his plan into motion with the help of his army of minions, but complications ensue when Vector acquires the world’s only shrink ray. With his pride wounded, Gru hatches a plan to shrink and steal the moon and commit the crime of the century. That is, until he learns that the spotlight has fallen on a new, up-and-coming villain named Vector (Jason Segel), who has stolen the Great Pyramid of Giza. In a reality where evil is a profession and super-villains manage secret lairs in the suburbs, Gru (Steve Carell) considers himself the best in the business. Without further ado, this is Despicable Me. So, if the sequel is so hilarious, then why the hell couldn’t I remember a single thing about the original? I decided to find out, and I hope you’ll join me on this exciting journey. It’s almost a month later, and my boyfriend and I are still quoting this movie. The adults in the audience were laughing harder than the kids. Seriously, Despicable Me 2 is joke, after joke, after joke – from witty one-liners, to a cross-dressing sequence, to perfectly timed slapstick a lá Family Guy. Definitely not because of the plot, maybe because of the characters…but mostly because it was just so damn funny. So, when I finally did see Despicable Me 2, you can imagine my surprise when I realized I actually really enjoyed the sequel. I had seen it in theaters with friends, and I remembered liking it…but, three years later, I could barely recall the main character’s name. Truthfully, I remembered little to nothing about the original Despicable Me. Probably to desperately remind you that an animated movie besides Monsters University was coming out this summer. Little, yellow minions laughing at you from gigantic billboards, the roofs of taxi cabs, the posters on every bus stop…like it or not, this movie was EVERYWHERE. If you lived or worked in New York City over the summer, then you know that the promotional campaign for Despicable Me 2 was constantly in your face. “When we got adopted by a bald guy, I thought this’d be more like Annie.”
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