Peak Minion and the new abnormal

It doesn’t take a genius to work out that Hollywood has an originality problem. As the industry becomes increasingly risk averse the notion of taking a punt on an unproven property becomes even more remote. Producer Lynda Obst wrestles with this issue in her entertaining book Sleepless in Hollywood. Obst is a veteran – her first screen credit was Flashdance which almost makes her a dinosaur – with a distinguished career but she confesses to being a little nonplussed by what she calls ‘the new abnormal’ which now exists in Hollywood.

This new abnormal is obsessed with IP rather than ideas. It wants intellectual property, a pre-tested, pre-digested, pre-sold product from another medium that it can retool for the movies. It doesn’t do originality; the website Den of Geek is keeping track and according to their latest estimate there are 140 sequels in various stages of production and that doesn’t included remakes, re-imaginings or whatever other synonym applies to the creatively bereft.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a perfect example; we reach the end of Phase Two with Ant-Man next month, then Phase Three is rolled out with another ten films scheduled between May 2016 and November 2019. The new abnormal has taken something which was fun and glorious – a four-colour, nine panel, comic book – and turned it into a corporate balance sheet. The quality isn’t important, and I will concede the MCU has been lucky so far in producing some cracking films. But this isn’t about quality, it’s all about recognition factor and continuity of product.

Which brings me to Minions. A bunch of characters who look like ambulatory temazepam, they were introduced in Despicable Me as anarchic and unruly underlings to supervillain Gru in an animated film which was obviously going to be a franchise. Despicable Me 2 duly followed in 2013 and Despicable Me 3 is on that Den of Geek list for 2017. However the world is apparently crying out for more little yellow henchmen and four years is just too long between fixes, hence the new movie.

Let’s be clear from the outset, Minions is fun. It’s agreeably daft, and in the best traditions of modern commercial movie making it is effectively an origin story. These banana-yellow single-celled creatures evolved from the primordial soup with only one aim; to find a villain and support them without question. Unfortunately their zeal in serving their masters and the quality of their strategic advice seem to be at odds which does tend to make their supervillain bosses somewhat expendable.

A collective ennui falls over the tribe until the redoubtable Kevin, decides he will go out into the world and find a new evil master worthy of their undying servitude. Accompanied by fellow minions Bob and Stuart he sets off an epic journey which leads them to Scarlett Overkill, the world’s wickedest woman, and a plot to steal the crown of the young Queen Elizabeth II – the story is set in 1968.

It all moves along very efficiently. There are some very funny gags, some gentle satire on geekdom, and a skilful voice cast that includes Sandra Bullock, Jon Hamm, Michael Keaton, and Alison Janney. Not to mention director Pierre Coffin who apparently voices all 899 minions. Chapeau M. Coffin!

But for all the fun that it provides, and there are several laugh out loud moments, there is also something slightly dispiriting about this film. The minions seem to have lost their spark. In Despicable Me there was a wildness to the characters, they were a manifestation of chaos theory, a little like modern-day Gremlins. In the intervening five years they have been softened somewhat, made kiddie-friendly, and in the process lost their edge. The result is hundreds of millions of dollars in box office, gaming, and merchandising revenue but at the cost of their spark.

Minions will be an enormous international hit; possibly the most successful film of the year. Then there is Despicable Me 3 of course and I get the feeling that they are ideal for an animated TV series. All of this means that, considered as part of the new abnormal, we are a long way away from peak Minion.