Despicable Me 2 (2013)

Just a few short weeks after Pixar lobbed the sub-par prequel "Monsters University" into theatres comes "Despicable Me 2," the follow-up to the suprisingly delightful and charmingly wicked 2010 animated hit. And just like "Monsters University," "Despicable Me 2" is 360 degrees of mediocrity, a sequel that abandons the things that made its first film so good. And yet this film makes you laugh a lot harder and enjoy yourself a lot more, because it has one thing that Disney does not...

Minions!

Can they do no wrong? Can these charming, mumbling, canary-colored Weebles generate comedic misfires? Methinks not.

And so, a film with none of the sinsiter bite of its original, in which its main character, Gru (Steve Carrell), literally plots to steal the moon itself, is rescued single-handedly by the pure joy of watching an army of individually characterized yellow pills bounce around a movie screen, plot be damned.

The narrative of "Despicable Me 2" was perhaps doomed to begin with, as it finds the once famously evil Gru now reformed and settled into domestic life (albeit in an Addams Family-sort of way), parenting the three girls he picked up during the first film. His exciting life of crime has been exchanged for more honest pursuits, and while Gru has settled nicely into being a dad, he's found no footing in terms of finding satisfying work for himself.

Opportunity knocks when a woman named Lucy Wilde arrives. She's with an organziation called the Anti-Villain League and has been sent by her boss, Silas Ramsbottom (a guy with a name the minions can't pass up having a joke over whose head looks like the entirety of Jabba the Hut squished on top of a body that looks like an additional Jabba the Hut) to enlist Gru's help in catching a criminal they feel is operating under the cover of a local shopping mall business. At first, Gru wants no part of it, but when his trusted sidekick Dr. Nefario (Russell Brand) leaves him so that he can actually do evil again, Gru reconsiders. And his kids are excited for the adventure because they see mom material in Lucy (played thanklessly by Kristen Wiig at her most aw-shucks and clumsy, with no real breakout moments of humor).

Confict arises when Gru argues with Ramsbottom over which store owner might be producting and hiding a serum that could turn whoever is injected with it into pure evil, which is later evidenced by its effects on the minions, who turn purple and essentially develop attitudes like that of the Muppets' Animal but with rabies.

I'd tell you more about the plot if there was more to tell. Suffice it to say that "Despicable Me 2" attempts to go for a love story and a family message and because of it, the characater of Gru oddly takes a back seat in all of it, nearly becoming a support player in his own story. Yes, there are some moments of genuine heart. Far more, actually, than in the aforementioned "Monsters University." But everything lacks the devilish bite of the original film. The evil isn't evil enough, or fun enough. This film's true villain, El Macho, is comically obese and not even remotely scary. And while Gru uses his experiences to lead himself to El Macho, he doesn't do much to excercise that sinister side of his brain, which made the original film so funny.

Still, I'd be lying if I told you that none of this matters much when you have the Minions. They hold some sort of charm power over me that I can't seem to explain. Whether one is using another as a golf tee, or one is vaccuuming the living room as a French maid, or - most comically - two are serenading Gru with their indecipherable rendition of the early-90s slow jam, "I Swear," I'm kept entertained in spite of myself, laughing harder still when allowing myself to also take in what audience members around me are reacting to and saying about the little guys when they are on screen (which is, mercifully, a lot).

All things considered, "Despicable Me 2" won't be that much of a letdown for anyone who enjoyed the first film, largely because this Minions thing just works. So well, in fact, that Universal Pictures has already greenlit "Minions" for a Christmas 2014 release. And may I be among the first to say I can't wait.

"Despicable Me 2" is truly an average film. You don't have to think very hard, and narrative analysis is futile. And yet sometimes you just want to watch a movie that makes you laugh, the kind you know you're not going to flip past when it ends up on HBO. And thanks to my darling little golden pills of mischief, this fits the bill.

 ★ ★ 1/2