Minions and Monsters is the seventh feature film in the Despicable Me franchise and, somewhat surprisingly for a series nearing the two decade mark, is the top rated outing according to the critical consensus at Rotten Tomatoes. What does the film do differently to deserve that distinction? Does it fix the scattershot plots that plagued previous films? Does it plus up the humor that has been somewhat lacking? Does it go back to its roots and bring music back as a focus?

The answer to each of those questions is no. So why, sixteen years into making these films, were critics enamored with this one the most?

My theory? A major plot point in the third Minions movies revolves around an especially artistic minion who wants to make a movie. And movie critics love movies about making movies. It’s cliche. Earlier this year The Hollywood Reporter noted that “films about filmmaking often seem destined for film lovers only, to the detriment of everyone else”. That seems true here. While Tomatometer critics rank it the best of the seven films in the series, the Rotten Tomatoes audience score puts it as the third worst.

As we seem to say in every Despicable Me and Minion movie review, things aren’t that bad. The movie is competently made and, in what is almost a mantra in these reviews, “there is some fun to be had”. But issues in the previous films are still issues in this one.

The biggest problem, as usual, is a plot that tries to juggle too many balls. Things start off normally enough with the minions, as is their wont, looking for the biggest bad guy to follow. Things then veer off into an odd tangent when some of the minions break off from the pack and decide to make a movie. These two main plots split further as the movie-making-minions begin a search for monsters, while the bad-guy-hunting-minions help someone they meet at a sci-fi convention dressed as an alien robot as he begins dating a suffragette. Yes, you read they correctly!

Quick aside: Focusing on a movie-making minion was such a strange writing choice to me. It would be like making a Cookie Monster movie but then having him decide to give up his cookie habit to pursue his dream of becoming a professional bowler! And where does giving minions individual character traits that make them completely stand out from the others end? Will the next films star other minions who eschew looking for a new master to follow their passions? It feels like you take away what makes the minions fun and unique if you can basically make a minion movie about anything by just saying, “oh, this minion is different than the rest because he’s a…” and then plug in any random occupation.

All of this might not matter so much if the humor were more distracting. But, as has been the case too often in these films, the laughter is more the quiet-smile-to-yourself variety rather than the laugh-out-loud kind. The minions are so funny in small doses. But at feature length, their humor apparently gets stretched too thin or maybe just goes on too long.

The first Despicable Me and Minions movies used music as an integral part of the storytelling. It’s weird that no followup films continued that trend. In fact, music was basically a non-factor at all here.

Voice acting in the series has been hit or miss for me, and again nothing changes in this regard either. Trey Parker does a variation on South Park’s Cartman that, while a bit of fun, is distracting once you notice it. Christoph Waltz and Jeff Bridges are wasted in roles they seem to have been chosen for just to add their names to the movie poster. Jesse Eisenberg was the only new standout as a seemingly inept cosplay alien. And, of course, Pierre Coffin brings the minions to wonderfully ridiculous life.

I got some digs in at movie critics earlier, but I want to admit that the Illumination filmmakers actually had a lot of nice homages to animation history and old school Hollywood in this movie. I can see why someone whose job is to talk about films would appreciate the references more than most.

But unfortunately, a Tomatometer score of 90% leads to high expectations. And Minions and Monsters just meets the low expectations set by its predecessors. As usual, it’s perfectly fine as mindless entertainment. But like the minions themselves, it’s incoherent to rank it anywhere near top banana.

		Minions and Monsters Universal, Illumination July 1, 2026 90 minutes Rated PG directed by Pierre Coffin