Movie Review: Despicable Me 2

Despicable Me 2 
2013
Universal
Rated: PG
98 minutes

While Gru, the ex-supervillain is adjusting to family life and an attempted honest living in the jam business, a secret Arctic laboratory is stolen. The Anti-Villain League decides it needs an insider's help and recruits Gru in the investigation. Together with the eccentric AVL agent, Lucy Wilde, Gru concludes that his prime suspect is the presumed dead supervillain, El Macho, whose his teenage son is also making the moves on his eldest daughter, Margo. Seemingly blinded by his overprotectiveness of his children and his growing mutual attraction to Lucy, Gru seems on the wrong track even as his minions are being quietly kidnapped en masse for some malevolent purpose. (description from imdb.com) 

So... have I mentioned how much I love the minions? I want some of my own!! For reals.  I saw the first movie, Despicable Me, a few years ago on DVD and immediately went out and bought my own copy. Then I started wishing for a sequel.  Just when I thought they would never create a follow-up, they announced not only DM2, but another movie, Minions, that will be coming out in 2014!

There is just something wonderful about the combination of yellow, mostly mute, evil henchmen and a family unit that is truly surprising in its sweetness.  Now that Gru has settled in to having a family, has backed off from his evilness, and has trained his minions to make jam...things are well, maybe too sweet for the movie world... 

Some hilarious examples:

Gru-a-rina has come to make your party special! 

Here we see Gru, stepping in for the fairy who was supposed to entertain at Agnes' birthday party. Unable to break her heart with a no-show fairy, Gru actually puts on the dress, wings, and a falsetto to keep her happy.  *grins*  Let's just say Gru makes an interesting fairy... 

So, Gru, what *are* your hobbies?

Here, Gru finds the girls putting together his online dating profile.  *snarf* I laughed so hard I almost cried here.  They mean well, but Gru's, well Gru, and imagine an ex-super-villain dating online! 

Then, because nothing can stay that easy or happy in the movie world, Gru meets a woman who infuriates and fascinates him. She also tases him at their first meeting! 

LIPSTICK TASER!

Lucy is hilarious and awesome and just the right amount of kick-@ss newbie secret agent to pluck at the heartstrings.  Her unabashed admiration of Gru, his family, his minions, and his past make her a heartwarming addition to the crew.  The way that she helps each of them out without stepping over any boundaries or making them feel awkward was just another example of movie-writing magic.  

I saw this movie with friends and their small children.  I'm happy to report that there was only one moment that was a little too scary for the young ones and within a few funny moments it was smiles all around again.  I left the theater smiling and full of anticipation for Minions.  I'm already plotting my DVD purchase the day this one comes out, and I'll just leave you with a last little glimpse of my personally favorite minion: 

I LOVE CARL.  Bee-do, bee-do, bee-do... 

I consider this movie to be a MUST SEE of the summer!!! 

Despicable Me 2 Party at the Library!

Last Thursday, I threw a Despicable Me 2 party for little minions aged 6 - 10. We had a wild time planning world domination and the kids even got to make their own minion to take home.


Here's what I did:
I started out by decorating the room.  I hung "minion" balloons from the ceiling.  These were super easy to make...just a plain yellow balloon with a minion face draw on in Sharpie! I made sure each one had a slightly different face and the kids just loved checking them all out! 

Then to start our party off right, we had some rocket launching practice. I bought two cheap foam rocket sets (1 launcher and 4 mini-rockets per set) and hung up three cardboard bulls-eyes for them to try hitting.  I purposely drew the three centers different sizes so that kids will have a higher success rate. One bulls-eye is hug (see below) and then one is slightly small and then the last one is very small. 

Once each child had had their turn to shoot the rockets, they lined up to take their turn at "Pin the Tail on FLUFFY!"  I created a very basic outline of Agnes' stuffed unicorn, Fluffy, on a piece of poster board, colored it with markers, and then I found a donkey tail outline online that I photocopied onto fuchsia construction paper.  I had each child write their name on the tail with marker, then I tied on their blindfold, spun them around three times, and let them pin their tails!  

For the second half of the program, each child made their own minion to take home!  Using a photo that I found online for inspiration, I created a minion craft out of a cereal box.  The downside to this particular craft was that cereal boxes come in different sizes, so I had to measure and cut the construction paper to fit each box.  I cut two large yellow pieces to fit the front and back of the box, two small yellow strips to fit the sides and one small yellow strip to fit the top of the box.  (I actually cut one end of the box open to help it stand and to be one less surface to cover.)  

Then, I cut small blue strips to fit the front back and sides of the bottom of the box to make the minion's overalls. I cut a blue square and some mini strips to become the bib and straps on the overalls.  I cut little black half moons for feet, and then cut large round circles from silver contact paper for the goggles.  I cut smaller white circles for the eyeballs and black strips for the goggle straps.  I made the decision to not worry about the overall straps or goggle straps going around the back of the minion to make prep easier. 

When I gave each child their cereal box, it contained the yellow and blue strips cut to fit that specific box.  They glued those pieces on first with white Elmer's glue, then I handed out the smaller pieces. I let each child choose whether they wanted one or two eyes for their minion and I also put out markers so that they could draw their minions eye expressions, mouths and any other decorations they wanted.  

This craft took a little longer than I expected, but they all loved it. I plan to do it again this fall, though I may try to make a mini version with poptart boxes or some other type of smaller box.  

At the very end, I also sent each child home with a "Despicable Me" coloring sheet and a little candy minion. These were fairly easy to make, though it's been so hot and humid here in New England lately that my minions were a little more melty than I had anticipated, making the icing way harder to work with!  For these I got yellow (vanilla-flavored) candy melts at Michael's, as well as candy eyeballs and black icing. I melted the candy, then dipped the spoons into the candy. I only coated the backs of the spoons rather than dipping the entire bowl of the spoon in to cut down on the amount of pure sugar that they kids got to eat.  Then I stuck one or two candy eyeballs into the candy.  I put them in the fridge for a while to solidify, then took them back out to use the icing to make the goggles around the eyeballs.  They came out really cute and both the kids and their parents loved them! 

If any of my librarian friends have any questions, please let me know and I'll answer whatever I can/share templates/etc!