Anyone remember a cartoon called Dexter’s Laboratory? It was about a young mad scientist with a large, diabolical laboratory on the outskirts of his own room. For those who do recall that show, try to imagine what Dexter would be like if he grew up.  He would clearly become Gru!

Now Gru has been described as a grinch. I don’t believe this is completely accurate. A grinch’s motives are based purely on his bitterness. Though he clearly has some mother issues, Gru is hardly bitter. He just loves being mean. He’s an evil supervillian, who uses a freeze ray on patrons at a coffee shop, steals jumbotrons, and initially has little remorse for when a child is believed to have been killed by one of his one contraptions. The latter is one of the darkest jokes in the entire film, and one that I find a bit disturbing.

His dastardly plans involve stealing stuff, mostly mock replicas of famous landmarks, such as the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty, from Las Vegas. His latest plan is to shrink the moon so he can steal it. One problem, the shrink ray has been stolen by Vector, a younger evil mastermind formally named Victor. (Any Airplane! fans out there?) Vector has one weakness, cookies! In order to steal the shrink ray, Gru must adopt three children, so they can deliver the robotic cookies. It doesn’t take an evil genius to see where the story is headed.

Despicable Me is nowhere near the experience that Toy Story 3 embodies. Unlike that film, there are plenty of butt, fart, and booger jokes and very little suspense to be found. There is a tad bit of heart in there, but not enough to enjoy the film in a way that is not purely superficial. Having said that, the film is often charming, and is quite funny at times.  Can I see myself watching it again? Maybe! Maybe not! But I can tell that I’m not at all disappointed that I watched it.

If you see this in 3D, it’s clearly a stretch to call its presence in the film anything other than a gimmick. But still, credit must be given where credit is due! The film managed to produce a fun, little sequence involving a rollercoaster.  It is not an action sequence, and there is little to nothing as far peril is concerned, but you do get the sense of having both the vertigo and the velocity from such an experience. Being a front row rider, I found that the only missing was the wind.

The children’s films of this summer seem to be outdoing some of the grown up films. Given the opportunity to re-watch Despicable Me or Predators, I’d chose Toy Story! But if that’s sold out, I’d clearly chose Despicable Me.

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