The Minions from “Despicable Me” sure are a boisterous crew of cylindrical-shaped, dim-witted mini creatures of similar shape and size.
They are small and yellow and each have unique traits in order to tell them apart including the number of eyes, height, hair, clothing, roundness, and size of their pupils.
They are also impulsive creatures with little self-control, but an odd and childlike innocence about them with their corny goggles and blue overalls that makes them so relatable and appealing to viewers. Truth be told, they can be both rather annoying and entertaining all at the same time when performing strange interactions with other objects, animals, and people.
And in conjunction with upcoming release of “Minions”, here are some other little known facts about the cute and silly little yellow beings:
1. Why do the Minions exist?
The directors of “Despicable Me” previously stated that Minions were written into the script to make Gru more likeable. The easiest way to do this was to surround him with incompetence aka the Minions. They were initially supposed to be large and orc-like, but through development they kept getting smaller and smaller. The Minions were partly inspired by the Jawas in the original “Star Wars” franchise, and the Oompa Loompas in Willy Wonka.
2. Where did they come from? No, really. Where?
Eric Guillon, the art director of the “Despicable Me” movie series, is the (real life) creator of the minions. However, for storytelling’s sake, Minions are possibly made from humans by the Minionizer, a ray gun that turns humans into Minions, as seen in “Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem” at Universal Studios. But one of the short films suggested that they were made from a single strand of mutated DNA. And, uhm, if Minions have a sex or how they reproduce is still unknown.
3. The Minions & their hair or lack thereof
There were really only 7 well-known main and notable minions that names are mentioned by Gru and has a big part which are: Dave, Stuart, Kevin, Jerry, Tim, Mark, and Phil. For these Minions, there were only 5 natural hairstyles – tall buzz-cut, short buzz-cut, sprout, combed, spread out, bald. Each minion has one of 5 hairstyles. Tall minions, especially, all have the same haircut – the sprout-cut.
4. Total amount of Minions & how to distinguish them
In the theatrical poster of “Despicable Me 2”, it shows that there are at least 10,400 minions. But there are only about 48 possible combinations of height and build (short and chubby, medium, tall and thin), hair (tall buzz-cut, short buzz-cut, sprout, combed, spread out, bald), and eyes (one, two). One-eyed minions are always almost all small, although a tall one-eyed minion appears in a promotional artwork.
5. Glowing in the dark & surviving without air
Minions possess few additional physiological characteristics; with a crack and a shake, they can double as glow sticks for activities in the dark, such as going through ventilation ducts. They additionally can survive without air and resist freezing, as one is seen in outer space without oxygen in “Despicable Me”.
6. The “Banana language”, otherwise known as “Minionese”
Their vocabulary and verbal skills are really quite basic. Their mumbling and talking is actually called “Minionese”. The language is a mix of French, English (such as “bapples” which is basically “apples” but with a “b”), Italian, and Spanish (words like “para tú” which roughly means “for you” and “la boda” which means “marriage”) with a bit of Korean (such as “hana, deul, set” which means “one, two, three”) and Russian thrown in. A lot of the words that they speak are actually names for different foods.
7. There are Minions, & then there are evil Minions
The evil Minions are purple because purple and yellow are on opposite sides of the color spectrum. The idea for the evil Minions came from a cartoon in which Tweety Bird drinks a potion and turns into a monster. The Evil Minions are for all intents and purposes, made to be indestructible: they are immune to weapons like flamethrowers, guns, axes, and undercover police cars; and are able to withstand the explosion from swallowing a bomb. They will devour and destroy anything that gets in their way, including the above-mentioned weapons. Evil Minions can also repair themselves, and are very dangerous.
8. Their trademark (aside from their strange yellow looks)
Let’s not forget that they’ve got a strange sense of humour which has now become pretty much their trademark! Their sense of humor is somewhat childish, if not silly, laughing from the sound of bubbles in a water filter, scanning their own butt in a copy machine and when mentioned words such as “bottom” or “butt”. In fact, they find anything having to do with buttocks extremely funny.
9. The Minions love bananas (obviously), apples, and spitting
There are a lot of things that the Minions love, such as bananas and apples (or “bapples”, as they call them). The mere sight of one of these fruits can result in complete chaos! They love trying new things and presumably they also love potatoes (they mention potatoes on occasion). They also enjoy fine arts and for some reason, love spitting, frog legs, bunnies, and building things.
10. Their worldwide popularity & continuing to take the world by storm
As you might know, the Minions became so big that they went on to become the official mascot of Illumination Entertainment. Their quotes are now one of the most popular internet memes, and they have also e been licensed by McDonalds, Hasbro, and General Mills.
And finally, the Minions will be getting their own movie. Check out the trailer below:
Directed by Pierre Coffin and Kyle Balda, “Minions” is a spin-off/prequel to “Despicable Me” and “Despicable Me 2” written by Brian Lynch. The Universal Pictures film is also executive produced by Chris Renaud and produced by Illumination Entertainment’s Chris Meledandri and Janet Healy.
“Minions” is slated for release on 18th June 2015.
Don’t forget! We’re giving out exclusive premiere screening passes for “Minions”. Join our contest here to score yourself some 😉
Sources: Quora, Minions Wikia, Yahoo!, Despicable Me Wikipedia, Buzzfeed, omgfacts, Evil Minions Wikia.
