Review of Minions and Monsters, directed by Pierre Coffin

If you’re new here, and stumbled upon this blog through the mythical powers of the Internet, welcome! I know a lot of visitors to my website are people who randomly come upon this website through search engines like Google, but I also do have a lot of visitors who come back. Regardless: my name is Ashley, and I started this blog in order to keep track of everything I’m coming across in the world.

I recently started an 8-5 job and have been trying to reclaim my sanity and hobbies by finding fun things to do on the weekends and after work, and one of my saving graces truly has been my AMC A List subscription. I’ve always had one on and off throughout graduate school, and I recently reclaimed my subscription after a brief stint of thinking I was going to move to India (long story).

Sometimes the movies I really want to see aren’t included on AMC A List, which is sad, but I accept the reality of the situation. I get a ton of use out of this subscription despite that. On a slightly different note though, I used to work professionally as a film critic, which is very much a dying career, and when I would go to the film festivals I watched everything that really excited me.

A List is also an opportunity for me to go outside of my comfort zone. Recently, at the time of typing this, I’ve seen a handful of movies I don’t think I would have ever seen if I had to actually pay for them. I see so many movies throughout different states on A List that I basically make money off of AMC, rather than spending money. I have an entire spreadsheet for it.

That’s how my sister and I ended up watching Minions & Monsters on the Fourth of July. We had both never seen a Minions movie before this point, but the alternative was Supergirl and I really wasn’t feeling that movie for some reason. This is a quick hour and a half though, and it really does fly by.

Let’s get into the review!

Two Minions, ostracized from their tribe for their sense of storytelling, shape the future of Hollywood during its silent era.

This movie begins in a museum, where there’s an exhibition about Hollywood throughout the years going on. As the guide gives an introduction to all of the pieces in the exhibit, some of her group ask about the statue of two Minions: James and Henry. The guide is flabbergasted that they don’t know who these two are, then tell them to sit for story time.

While we know about the Minions who serve Gru from the previous movies, the ones this film focuses on are different. They wander the planet in search of an evil master to serve, but every time they find a good one, they end up killing the poor person. One Minion from this group is an outlier off the bat: James. He just wants to sit in the back, draw, and paint instead of doing something deemed useful from the other Minions.

He befriends Henry and Ed, two other Minions from the tribe, after they show admiration for what he’s doing. When they accidentally kill their latest master, a warlock, by taking his book and reciting a spell, Ed grabs the book on the way out and brings it with him. They wander the desert in search of a new master, where they stumble across a Hollywood set.

They don’t know that though and chase after the actor playing the robber, leading them into the depths of Los Angeles. The director of the movie despises the Minions for ruining his scene, but his film executives love the Minions after reviewing the footage, leaving Max, the director, to hire them for his movies. The Minions end up going viral (in the 1920s sense) and are global superstars because of their silent films.

However, with the arrival of talkies, or sound films, they’re unable to do the dialogue and get fired for that fact. James, having a eureka moment one night, realizes that he can make his own movie titled Minions and Monsters to reclaim their glory, but the tribe’s leader (Dick) refuses to acknowledge him and leads the Minions to find their next leadr.

Ed and Henry stay behind, then they meet with Max to discuss ideas. Max gives James a film camera, then Ed realizes he still has the book and can summon monsters. They end up summoning a little creature named Goomi the Deceiver, who tells him that he can help them find more monsters to cast in the movie. While this is happening though, Dick and the crew find a new master: Dort.

Dort claims he’s from another planet and is about to invade Earth, yet lives in a tiny studio apartment with a roommate named Floyd. Dick is deeply unimpressed by what he’s seeing, he still has faith in Dort, but Dort falls in love with Debbie, a women’s rights activist, after almost kicking a child in front of her. The Minions help them go on dates across Los Angeles.

Goomi ends up bringing James, Ed, and Henry to the lair of sea monsters Phillips and Howard. He tells them that he wants to cast these guys in their movies, but it turns out Goomi has nefarious plans. He actually wants to bring his crew back together and summon Irene, a large monster, to destroy the world and get rid of all of the humans.

It’s at the film set that Henry overhears this, but the trio of monsters take him down. Goomi then tells James about Irene being in the movie and that Henry has volunteered himself to be the sacrifice in the scene. Irene is summoned as the cameras start rolling, then we see Henry break free and tell James as everything starts going awry.

Irene begins consuming everything in her path, and Dort, Debbie, and the Minions see Henry fleeing and being eaten by Irene. Dort runs away while the Minions split up. Some take over military gear to shoot at Irene, while the rest go with Dort. James goes into Irene’s body to find Henry, and they escape when the cannonballs rip her stomach in two.

However, Irene recovers. All hope is lost until Dort shows up in his ship, and Dick and the other Minions have similar gear to shoot at Irene. They take her down while Henry and James seal the other monsters back into the book, and Ed reveals he was filming this entire time.

The Minions edit the movie and release it to great acclaim. As the tour guide finishes the story in the museum, we learn that this is actually a film set. James and Henry are filming this movie instead.

Overall Thoughts

As mentioned before, I had never seen a Minions movie before this moment, but I knew the general plot and the aspects that define them before going into this one. There are some fun moments in this movie, and some of the adults were very much laughing, but I overall thought that this was geared more towards kids in a way where adults might not care for it at all.

I was pretty bored with this plot, even though movies about old Hollywood are straight up my alley. Like Babylon by Damien Chazelle is one of my favorite movies—and I will die on the hill that it will be a masterpiece in the near future. But this movie just kind of felt off to me in terms of pacing and plot. It especially felt like many different things smashed together, which makes sense considering the ending, but might not make the best movie at the end of the day.

I say go watch this one if it interests you, but maybe don’t run to see it in theaters if you’re not deeply invested. I have a subscription and see so much that this is basically free, so it’s fine for me.

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