Mower Minions is a 2016 short featuring the Minions. The short made its theatrical debut on July 8th, 2016 with Illumination Entertainment's film The Secret Life of Pets. It is also counted as one of the three mini-movies of the film as of December 6th, 2016.
Plot
The Minions see a blender which costs $19.95 from infomercial on television, and they want to buy one to blend bananas. They find a piggy bank and decide to break it by explosives at first, but they break it by simply knocking it instead. Yet, only few pennies are left. Then, they see that there's a Larry's Gardening Service truck doing mowing business in the neighborhood, so the Minions decide to start a lawn mowing business by themselves.[1] The minions steal from the truck sneakily and go to a retirement home called Fuzzy Memories and ask the elder if they need to have their lawn mowed. The old people can hardly understand what the Minions say, but an old lady tells the Minions can go ahead.
However, the Minions' work turns out to be chaotic; four of them were in terrible states after the chaos, such as blackened and naked after an explosion from a grill with a gas tank, having the head stuck in fallen beehive, grossed out after having nausea from accidentally using a bag with dog poop for easing the hyperventilation, and being inflated and floating around after the hazmat is inflated by a flying leaf blower. Nevertheless, their clumsy acts amuse the elderly and at last the Minions are given a bottle of 2,000 pennies and one of the old lady says that they can visit them anytime.
The Minions are later seen when they can hardly move after they ate too many banana smoothies made by the blender they bought. At the same time, an advertisement promotes that a new blender is available and it costs $142.95, and the Minions want to get it so they go for it again. In a post-credits scene, one of the Minions puts back all the pieces of a broken gnome (which was destroyed during the chaos previously) and hugs it, but it breaks instantly.
Trivia
- During the theatrical release, the mini-movie was shown before the film The Secret Life of Pets.
- The helmet from one of the Minions has written "Let it Grow", which is the name of a song in the film The Lorax.
- One of the old ladies, named Gertrude, can be seen when Gru goes back to his house by Grumobile at the beginning of Despicable Me, while another lady resembles the ticket seller from Tower of London in the film Minions. There is also an old man that visited the Great Pyramid of Giza with Justin's family in Despicable Me.
- The cat that one of the elderly owns is the same one that Kevin grabs before he is about to be kidnapped in the yard in Despicable Me 2.[2]
- This is the first Illumination Entertainment's theatrical short film with a name.
- There is a continuation error about the number of minions in the short. At first, there are five minions joining the mowing job, but in the process, there are two additional minions (a combed two-eyed minion and an one-eyed minion with buzz-cut hair) that are also doing the job and they both don't show up when the old lady gives the minions the money.
- The theatrical print of the short was preceded by both cut-short Universal Pictures and Illumination logos. However, home media releases of the short are only preceded by the cut-short Illumination logo (like the most recent direct-to-DVD mini-movies), following the MPAA PG rating bumper in the US releases, so don't expect to see the same version twice.
- The lawn mowing scenario of the minions may be inspired from the comic The Duplex in June and July 2013; both works were made by Glenn McCoy.
- A phone number can be seen in the infomercial: 800-555-0100 - which is one of the common fictional phone numbers.[3]
- Due to being a theatrical short, this is the first Illumination short film to have been designated an MPAA rating (which is PG, like the feature-length Despicable Me films).
Gallery
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References
| Despicable Me | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Released film(s) | ||||
| Despicable Me (2010) • Despicable Me 2 (2013) • Minions (2015) • Despicable Me 3 (2017) • Minions: The Rise of Gru (2022) | ||||
| Upcoming film(s) | ||||
| Despicable Me 4 (2024) | ||||
| Short films | ||||
| Minion Madness (Home Makeover • Orientation Day • Banana) (2010) • (Puppy • Panic in the Mailroom • Training Wheels) (2013) • (Binky Nelson Unpacified • Competition • Cro Minion) (2015) • Mower Minions (2016) • (The Secret Life of Kyle • Yellow is the New Black) (2017 and 2018) • Santa's Little Helpers (2019) • Minion Scouts (2019) • (Minions and Monsters • Post Modern Minions) (2021 and 2022) • Mooned (2023)
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