Saturday, November 16, 2024

Despicable Me 4

Tonight, on Peacock, I saw “Despicable Me 4,” which came out theatrically in July but on Peacock on Halloween. How is this latest installment in this franchise?

The sixth entry in the “Despicable Me” franchise and a sequel to “Despicable Me 3,” the film starts with Gru, reprised by Steve Carell, driving to his school, Lycée Pas Bon, for a reunion. However, he is also undercover for the Anti-Villain League (AVL) to arrest Maxine Le Mal, voiced by Will Ferrell.

Maxine and Gru have been enemies since their school days, especially after Gru sang Culture Club’s Karma Chameleon dressed as Boy George at the talent show. Maxine, who was planning to sing the same song, also dressed as Boy George, could not do so as everyone would think he was copying Gru.

Maxine has made many villainous inventions including a machine to turn people into cockroaches. Gru arrests Maxine who escapes the AVL’s maximum security prison with help from his girlfriend Valentina, voiced by Sofia Vergara, and wants revenge on Gru and his family.

The former director of AVL Silas Ramsbottom (Steve Coogan) comes out of retirement to get Gru and his family, which includes his wife Lucy (Kristen Wiig), adopted daughters Margo (Miranda Cosgrove), Edith (Dana Gaier), and Agnes (Madison Polan), and son Gru Jr (Tara Strong), to a safe house in the upscale Mayflower neighborhood.

Despite the family, incognito under the name Cunningham, try to blend in, they do stand out. Gru trying to make friends with his neighbor the affluent Perry Prescott (Stephen Colbert) fails while Lucy trying hair salon has an epic fail with burning a customer, Melora’s (Laraine Newman) hair. Perry’s wife Patsy, voiced by Chloe Fineman, invites the Cunninghams to a game of tennis, which Lucy knows is not a sign of being accepted.

The Prescott daughter, Poppy, voiced by Joey King, however recognizes Gru and blackmails him to joining her on a theft to steal his school’s mascot. Besides the three minions (Pierre Coffin) who join the Gru family, the rest are at AVL headquarters and Silas puts five into a program for the creation of Mega Minions. The program quickly ends as the Mega Minions create all kinds of chaos while trying to help.

The voice work is fun with most of the cast reprising their roles. Mini Anthikad Chhibber said in her review, “Romesh Ranganathan as Gru’s quarter master Dr. Nefario and Chris Renaud as the tough-as-nails principal Übelschlecht have a blast as do Ferrell and Vergara. Some of the sequences are inventive, especially the one with the mega minion and the Swiss cheese.”

Chhibber ended her review by saying, “Stuff keeps happening through Despicable Me 4’s 94 minutes and before you know it, the credits are rolling, which might be a good thing if you want to pounded into submission with a relentless procession of gags. Despicable Me 4 is fun while it lasts, but might not stand as a synonym for enduring.”

I think this film is just as fun as the previous installments, but might not be as good as the last one. I don’t know where I might rank this as I would have to think a lot about it. However, if you have Peacock, and you missed the chance to see this in theaters, then I would highly recommend everyone to see this film because you will have a lot of fun seeing this. If you liked the previous films in the franchise, this is not one to miss.

Thank you for joining in on this review tonight. Stay tuned this Friday for the continuation of “Buddy Cop Month.”

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