Despicable Me 4 [comedy film]
Gru welcomes a new member to the family, Gru Jr., who’s intent on tormenting his dad. However, their peaceful existence soon comes crashing down when criminal mastermind Maxime Le Mal escapes from prison and vows revenge against Gru.
Release date: July 3, 2024 (USA)
Directors: Chris Renaud, Patrick Delage
Distributed by: Universal Pictures
Box office: $580 million
Music by: Heitor Pereira (score); Pharrell Williams (songs and themes)
Produced by: Chris Meledandri; Brett Hoffman
Despicable Me 4 is a 2024 American animated comedy film produced by Illumination and distributed by Universal Pictures. It is the sequel to Despicable Me 3 (2017), the fourth main installment, and the sixth overall installment in the Despicable Me franchise. The film was directed by Chris Renaud, co-directed by Patrick Delage (in his feature directorial debut), produced by Chris Meledandri and Brett Hoffman, and written by Mike White and Ken Daurio. It stars the voices of Steve Carell, Kristen Wiig, Pierre Coffin, Joey King, Miranda Cosgrove, Steve Coogan, Sofía Vergara, Stephen Colbert, Renaud, Madison Polan, Dana Gaier, Chloe Fineman, and Will Ferrell. The film sees reformed supervillain and secret agent Gru (Carell) relocate his family to a safe house when his old rival Maxime Le Mal (Ferrell) seeks revenge. Subplots deal with Gru’s family adjusting to their new lives, teenage neighbor Poppy Prescott (King) trying to follow in Gru’s villainous footsteps, and a group of Gru’s Minions (Coffin) becoming superheroes.
Development on a fourth main Despicable Me film began in September 2017. It was officially confirmed in February 2022, with Renaud, Delage, and White attached as director, co-director, and writer, respectively. Production was underway by June 2022. Most of the main voice cast was announced in January 2024, with Hoffman and Daurio revealed as co-producer and co-writer, respectively. Heitor Pereira and Pharrell Williams returned from previous installments to compose the score and write original songs and themes, respectively.
Despicable Me 4 premiered at the Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City on June 9, 2024, and was theatrically released in the United States on July 3. The film received mixed reviews, and grossed $580.7 million worldwide, making it the third highest-grossing film of 2024.
Plot
Anti-Villain League (AVL) agent Gru attends a reunion at his school Lycée Pas Bon where he reunites with his rival Maxime Le Mal, who has a feud with Gru for stealing his talent show act when they were younger. Maxime reveals he has enhanced himself with cockroach parts to make himself overpowered and so he can conquer the world, but Gru has him arrested with the help of the AVL. Maxime escapes prison with the help of his girlfriend Valentina and reveals his invention that turns people into human-roach hybrids, which he plans to use specifically on Gru’s biological infant son Gru Jr.
Silas Ramsbottom visits the Gru household to inform them of Maxime’s escape, and that the AVL will have to relocate the Gru family to a house in another town named Mayflower until Maxime is captured. Assuming new names and identities as part of a Witness protection program, Gru’s character becomes Chet, a solar panel salesman, and Lucy is given the name Blanche and the career as a hairdresser.[6] Most of the Minions are taken in by the AVL, where Silas selects five of them—Dave, Mel, Gus, Tim and Jerry—to be augmented with powers under an initiative called the Megaminions, but the initiative is called off after the group causes collateral damage in a city.
In their new well-off residential town, Gru and his family meet their neighbors the Prescotts. Their teenage daughter Poppy, an aspiring villainess, recognizes Gru from his former career as a villain and threatens to blow his cover unless he helps her pull a heist to steal Lycée Pas Bon’s mascot, a honey badger named Lenny, so she can enroll there. The pair, with the help of three Minions and Gru Jr., successfully steal Lenny from the school. The school’s elderly principal Übelschlecht identifies Gru via security cam footage and contacts Maxime to inform him about Gru’s whereabouts using a tracker in Lenny’s collar.
The next day, while Gru and Lucy are away at tennis practice with Poppy’s parents Perry and Patsy, Principal Übelschlecht visits the house to interrogate the girls about Gru’s whereabouts. Gru and Lucy rush back home after being called by Margo and they fight Übelschlecht. Lucy also contacts the AVL who in turn calls the Megaminions out of retirement to stop Maxime. In the chaos, however, Gru Jr. leaves the house and is spotted by Maxime and Valentina who proceed to kidnap him.
With the help of Poppy, Gru meets up with Maxime at a building where he reveals he has transformed Gru Jr. into a roach hybrid and fights him off with Gru Jr. Gru’s encouraging words to his son manage to break Gru Jr. free from his state and attack Maxime instead. Maxime falls to the ground where he is further squashed by the Megaminions and the aid of other animals and insects, who arrive in turn to arrest him and Valentina.
Gru and his family return to their home, where Dr. Nefario reverses Gru Jr.’s transformation. Gru later visits Maxime in prison to talk and settle their differences. The pair then performs “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” for the prisoners, including all of Gru’s past adversaries, while Poppy is shown to have enrolled in Lycée Pas Bon.
