Jerry, Kevin, Stuart, Dave, and Carl having an ice cream party from Despicable Me 2
They are impulsive creatures with little self-control, but with a wide-eyed wonder and odd innocence that endears them to viewers and makes them relatable. They can be pesky when they are doing weird interactions with other people, animals, or objects. Minions have standard English names (see below).
Unlike most other criminal masterminds and their usual doctrine of abusing their henchmen, Gru gets along famously with his minions. He genuinely seems to like them and even shows appreciation for their hard work and support. He even seems to know each of them by name.
A rambunctious bunch of simple-minded homunculi, Minions are a similar size and shape, but have unique features to tell them apart, such as height, number of eyes, roundness or secondary features such as hair, eye/pupil size or clothing.
Minions wear metal goggles accommodating their number of eyes, blue overalls with Gru's emblem on the front, and small black gloves.
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, as one is seen in outer space without oxygen in Despicable Me.
Though there are several hundred minions, there are only about forty-eight 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. Tall Minions are all with Sprout-Cut Hair.
Minions
Minions are small, yellow earplug-like creatures who have existed since the beginning of time, evolving from single-celled organisms into beings who have only one purpose: to serve history's most villainous masters. They successfully find great masters, including a T. Rex, a caveman, an Egyptian pharaoh, Dracula and Napoleon but after accidentally killing them all soon after, they decide to isolate themselves from the world and start a new life in Antarctica. By 1968, the lack of a master drives them into depression, so one fearless Minion named Kevin comes up with a plan to find a new one for his tribe.
He is joined by rebellious teenage Minion Stuart (who unwittingly was selected) and lovable young Minion Bob (due to his begging and lack of volunteers).
After a long journey, the Minions arrive at New York, where at a shopping center on TV, they learn about Villain-Con, a villain convention where all the supervillains gathered from around the world, which is to be held in Orlando, Florida. They manage to hitch a ride to Orlando, where coincidentally, the family who drives them are criminals heading to Villain-Con as well. After seeing various supervillains, including a young Dr. Nefario, they finally become the henchmen for Scarlet Overkill, the world's first female supervillain.
Scarlet takes the Minions to her residence in London, where she instructs the Minions to steal St Edward's Crown from Queen Elizabeth II for her, threatening to execute them if they fail. With the help of the weapons of Herb, Scarlet's husband, the Minions successfully break into the Tower of London, however, the crown, at the same time, is being delivered to the Queen. The Minions steal the crown from the Queen's carriage, destroying the carriage, while pursued by the police. In the process, Bob crash lands on the mythical Sword in the Stone, where he pulls the sword Excalibur out easily to defend himself. Elizabeth is then removed from the throne, and Bob is crowned as the new King of the United Kingdom.
Convinced they are traitors Scarlet confronts the Minions attempting to destroy them but then she craves her revenge. King Bob eventually abdicates in Scarlet's favor. However Scarlet ultimately betrays the Minions, locking them in the palace dungeon where they are to be tortured by Herb. However, this backfires due to their unusual shapes and abilities. When Herb goes to attend his wife's coronation, the Minions escape the dungeon through a sewer, intending on apologizing to Scarlet.
At Westminster Abbey, the Minions accidentally interrupt Scarlet's coronation by unscrewing a chandelier which falls and crushes Scarlet before she could be crowned. Scarlet survives and angrily orders the attendees of the coronation, some of which are super-villains from Villain-Con, to execute the Minions. Stuart and Bob are captured while Kevin hides in a bar where he finds Elizabeth drinking with friends. After learning that Scarlet is going to execute Stuart and Bob, Kevin breaks into Herb's laboratory where he accidentally triggers a machine which turns him into a giant and destroys the Overkill residence in the process.
Simultaneously, the rest of the Minions in Antarctica encounter a few Yetis. The Minions begin to work for the leader of the Yetis but once again accidentally kill their leader when a piece of ice falls on his head with a tuba causing the remaining Yetis to pursue the Minions in anger. The remaining Minions travel around the world eventually landing in Britain to find their new master to serve.
Kevin rescues his companions from death as the army of Minions arrive in London. Scarlet is distracted by the army of Minions and Kevin knocks her away, however, Scarlet attempts to escape with Herb using her dress rocket after sending a missile which Kevin swallows, sacrificing himself to save Stuart, Bob and the Minions. Before escaping, Kevin is able to hold onto her rocket, seemingly killing her and Herb and shrinking himself back to his original size as the missile he swallowed exploded.
Elizabeth is once again crowned Queen of the United Kingdom and, in front of a crowd, presents Bob, Stuart, and Kevin with their rewards: a tiny crown for Bob, an electric guitar (later replaced by a snowglobe after he smashed it) for Stuart and a knighthood respectively for Kevin. Scarlet is suddenly revealed to be alive and snatches the Queen's crown with Herb, but they are stopped and frozen by young Gru. Scarlet is disappointed until Bob gives her his tiny crown. At the end, the Minions see Gru as their new potential boss and chase after him to his home, setting up the plot for Despicable Me.