The Minions speak a language made of real words
The MINIONS sound as if they are talking nonsense, but their language is built from real words in lots of different languages, mixed together and said in a silly way. There are bits of Spanish, French, Italian, English and Indonesian, and a few words that everybody can recognise, like BANANA. Bello means hello, and gelato is ice cream.
Most of the Minions are voiced by Pierre Coffin, one of the directors, who speeds up his own voice to make it squeaky. Because the Minions rarely say anything that needs translating, the films can be enjoyed in almost any country without much change. The three best known, KEVIN, STUART and BOB, got their own film in 2015, which became one of the most successful animated films ever made.
Made in Paris
Despicable Me was made by the American studio Illumination, but much of the animation was done in Paris, at a French studio Illumination later bought. Several of the people behind the films are French, including Pierre Coffin, and the Minions' love of food and silly songs owes a lot to that team.
The films were made on much smaller budgets than most big animated films, and the animators kept the style simple and cartoony on purpose, with rounded shapes and bright colours. The Minions' yellow skin, blue OVERALLS and round GOGGLES are easy to draw and easy to recognise, which helped them become one of the most famous cartoon characters in the world.
A villain who became a dad
GRU starts out as a would-be supervillain planning the greatest crime ever: stealing the MOON. To get the SHRINK RAY he needs, he adopts three orphan girls, MARGO, EDITH and AGNES, planning to use them. Instead he grows to love them, and the story turns into one about a grumpy man learning to be a father. Agnes's shriek of joy at a toy UNICORN — it's so fluffy — became one of the most quoted lines in the film.
Gru's accent is deliberately hard to place, a mix of European sounds that makes him seem like a cartoon villain from an old film.
What would happen if you took the Moon
In the film, when Gru shrinks the Moon, the tides on Earth go wild. That part is based on real science. The Moon's gravity pulls on Earth's oceans and makes the tides rise and fall twice a day. If the Moon disappeared, the tides would become much smaller, driven only by the Sun, and many creatures of the shore would be affected. Our space page covers the Moon and its pull.
The real Moon is about 3,500 kilometres across and roughly 384,000 kilometres away, and it is slowly drifting further from Earth by about four centimetres every year.
Rivals and the rest of the grid
VECTOR, a younger rival with a squid-firing gun and a very high opinion of himself, beats Gru to the shrink ray at first. Dr NEFARIO, Gru's elderly inventor, builds his gadgets, including the FREEZE RAY. LUCY, a secret agent, joins the story in the second film and marries Gru.
The rest of the grid holds a supervillain's needs: a LAIR, a HENCHMAN, and the plan of a truly DESPICABLE VILLAIN.