About

Despicable Me is an animated children's comedy film from Illumination Entertainment about a supervillain who adopts three girls as part of his evil master plan. It is the first film of a trilogy.

History

Despicable Me was released on July 9th, 2010.^[1] The film stars the voices of Steve Carell as supervillain Gru, Jason Segel as Gru's rival Victor Perkins, Julie Andrews as Gru's mom, and Russell Brand as Dr. Nefario, Gru's scientist friend.

Premise

Gru (Steve Carell) decides to become a great supervillain by stealing the moon. To accomplish that feat, he will need to steal a shrink ray. When the shrink ray is stolen by rival supervillain Vector (Jason Segel), Gru gets the idea to adopt three orphan girl's after he sees how they easily gain access to the supervillain's lair while they're selling cookies. Gru manages to get the shrink ray, and also begins to care for the children. When his affection for the children beings to distract him from his evil plan, his friend Dr. Nefario (Russell Brand) kidnaps the girls so Gru can regain his focus. Gru steals the moon, then discovers the girl's have been taken by Vector, and will be returned if he hands the moon over to him. Gru gives him the moon, but Vector keeps the children. As they fly off in a spaceship with a moon that is rapidly un-shrinking, Gru and Dr. Nefario manage to save the girls, and Gru decides to raise them as his own.

Reception

Upon its release, Despicable Me was a critical and commercial success. The film earned a rating of 81% on Rotten Tomatoes^[2] and a score of 72 on Metacritic.^[3] During its theatrical run the film grossed more than 540 million dollars worldwide.^[4] The success promoted three follow up films: Despicable Me 2 (2013), Minions (2015), and Despicable Me 3 (2017).

Accolades

The film was nominated for a 2011 Golden Globe for Best Animated Film. It was nominated for seven 2011 Annie Awards and one 2011 BAFTA Award for Best Animated Film.

Online Presence

As of March 2014, Despicable Me's Facebook page^[5] has over 13.9 million likes and its Twitter account^[6] has over 99,000 followers. The film is available to watch in its entirety on YouTube for $2.99 through Universal Movies’ official YouTube channel.^[7]

Fandom

In addition to the branded social media presence, there are numerous fan sites for the film including the film's page on Fanpop^[13] and the Despicable Me forum on Proboards.^[14] There are several Tumblr blogs dedicated to the film such as fuckyeahdespicableme^[8], despicableminionlove^[9], and despicablemeconfessions.^[10] Tags fans use on Tumblr include #DespicableMe^[17] and #Minions^[18]. As of March 2014, the the Fanfiction.net^[11] page for the film has more than 300 submissions and the film's DeviantArt page^[12] has over 16,000 submissions.

Minions

The films Minions, yellow oval shaped creatures that help Gru in the films and are often featured heavily in the films’ trailers, have gained their own following, especially on Tumblr and DeviantArt^[21], where there are over 67,000 submissions under the Minion tag. Fan Artists often put the Minions into different fandoms, like The Simpsons (below, right). Minions are often inserted into already popular image macro memes including Ancient Aliens (shown below, left) and Grumpy Cat (below center).

The Banana Potato Song

On March 1st, 2012, MOVIECLIPS Trailers'^[22] YouTube channel uploaded a teaser trailer for Despicable Me 2 which featured the Minions singing nonsense words to the tune of the Beach Boy's song "Barbra Ann." The only distinguishable words featured in the video are "banana" and "potato" which lead the internet to dub it the "Banana Potato Song." As of March 2014, the video has gained over 31.1 million views.

The video sparked many covers on YouTube including one performed by three school children uploaded to YouTuber ashley espiel's^[19] channel (below, left) and a parody uploaded to moviemonsterz's^[20] YouTube channel featuring the Minions asvegetables (below, right). As of March 2014, the two videos have gained over 640,000 views and 806,000 views, respectively.

Happy

On June 18th, 2013, a video for Pharrell Williams' song "Happy", featured on the Despicable Me 2 soundtrack, was uploaded to PharrellVEVO's^[15] official YouTube channel (below, left). The video features the film's Minions dancing to the song. As of March 2014, the video has gained over 20.5 million views. On November 21st, 2013, the song's official music video was uploaded to iamOTHER's^[16] YouTube channel (below, right). The video features Steve Carell, who voices the film's protagonist Gru, and individuals dressed in Minion costumes. As of March 2014, the video has gained over 139 million views.

The song sparked many covers and parodies on YouTube, including a cover by acapella group Pentatonix (below, left) and a parody by band TeraBrite titled "Flappy" referencing the moible game Flappy Bird. Terabrite's parody was uploaded on February 18th, 2014. As of March 2014, it has gained over 240,000 views. Pentatonix's cover was uploaded on March 17th, 2014, and as of March 24th, 2014, has gained over 3.7 million views.

Notable Examples

Search Interest

External References