Meh, about what you get with sequel

Rating: 5/10 (2 August 2013)

Much like Cars 2, Despicable Me 2 relies too heavily on secondary characters meant to be the comedic leavening to the main protagonists the first time out. Much like Mater gets nauseating in large doses, the minions (or allergy pills with eyes) get to be more annoying than cute when brought to the fore. This main issue rises from generally flat writing that attempts to stick too closely to tropes presented in the first installment rather than trying to break new ground. In fact, the only real laugh comes from Agnes asking Gru dressed as a fairy princess why a fairy princess would be fat and he responds: "because I live in a house made of candy and I eat instead of facing my problems." Beyond that most of the humor comes from minions doing slapstick which just isn't that funny unless you are six years old. The voice talent does an admirable job lead by Steve Carrell doing his non-specific Eastern European accent. Unfortunately, we never hear from Gru's mother whose complicated relationship with her son drove a lot of the interest for adults in the first one. In short, watch the first one again instead.