Defending Despicable Me
The Despicable Me franchise is stealing the world (or should I say, moon?).
As Despicable Me 4 rolls out, the franchise crossed the momentous $5 billion milestone a few days ago. It’s the first animated franchise to do so, surpassing other giants like Toy Story, Shrek, and Ice Age.
To many, this is unsurprising. The Despicable Me franchise has become a cultural megatrend in its own right. Kids and adults alike plaster Minions on bottles, bags, lanyards, mugs, hoodies, phone cases, and more. Since the franchise rolled out with 2010’s Despicable Me, it’s propelled Illumination Studios, then a fledgling new studio, to one of the leading competitors against the two animation titans, Pixar and Dreamworks.
Arguably the most distinctive aspect of the Despicable Me franchise is the minions and the slapstick humour they provide — yellow balls of silly, elementary-school-level fun. This has been the main draw for many fans (most prominently kids, of course — but also their parents and other groups).
But it’s also been the main source of hate for the series. Critics criticise the show for masking shoddy writing and character-building with slapstick fun, depriving kids of actually good, lesson-learning storytelling. Save for the original 1–2 movies, all other installations have been lazy and unoriginal, merely coasting on the widespread cultural phenomenon created by cutesy gibberish-speaking characters. And this dissatisfaction shows in the mediocre-poor critic ratings:
Of course, this hate is perfectly understandable. Despicable Me is the archetypal lazy, unoriginal franchise: a series where each instalment adheres to a generally set and predictable recipe. Add in two scoops of adorable minions, one dose of the lovable antihero Gru and his family, a simple plot, and a healthy gallon of safe, simple slapstick comedy.
Aside from that, just ramp up advertising and merchandise massively, tap on the large existing fanbase, and get ready to gross an average of ~$300 million in box office sales.
It seems so predictable, so easy, so lazy. And of course, that’s easy to hate. How could you support such a lazy studio focused on profits above original storytelling? Especially when there are so many other creative and savvy filmmakers out there that’ll kill for a fraction of the Despicable Me franchise’s reach?
This hatred is most prominent on internet forums and platforms. Many of these communities are actually similar to Medium, in that they tend to be more creative, vocal, and independent. After all, there’s no “wrong” more invigorating than the oppression of the small indie artist by the big soulless giant corporation.
But this misses a crucial point. True, the Despicable Me movies follow a predictable formula without much originality and experimentation. True, Illumination has made a killing while at it. But what’s also true is this: audiences have lots of goodhearted fun watching these movies.
As “trashy” as the content may be, the benefit that the movies provide to society — in terms of pure, predictable fun — is immense. And sometimes predictable is good, too — just as a movie can serve as a piece of literature and complex emotional and intellectual discussion, so can another serve as nothing more than a reliably fun family night out.
This has been Illumination’s plan from the start. In the words of one of its first employees, Janet Healy:
We kept redefining our mission and narrowing down what the goals were,” says Healy. “Ultimately, we hit upon the idea of making humor-based comedic films that could appeal to all ages and on a global basis.
There’s nothing inherently greedy or evil about this goal. We shouldn’t hate Illumination or the franchise that they’ve succeeded in their goal, and made bank while at it. Though quality storytelling is important, it’s fine to indulge in ‘trashy’ entertainment too, as long as it serves us by allowing us to have a good time — the main goal of entertainment.
