Young fans dressed up in suits and brandishing bananas may not be admitted to Minions: The Rise of Gru following ‘issues’ and ‘incidents’.
Decades ago it was mods and rockers, then a generation later it was rave culture and then violent video games. Each generation has their moment when the adults of this world anxiously worry about ‘the youth of today’ and a moral panic erupts. As such, we’ve been watching keenly to discover just what Generation Z’s moment of outrageous juvenile delinquency would be, and now we have our answer with the widely-reported news that some cinemas in the UK are banning young people from attending showings of Minions: The Rise of Gru if they are wearing suits or wielding bananas.
Naming themselves #Gentleminions, these suit-clad teenagers find themselves in the eye of the storm because of what cinema chain ‘Odeon’ have called ‘incidents’ in a ‘small number of our cinemas’, leading the company to ‘restrict access in some circumstances.’
Those circumstances mean if you’re a young person wearing a suit and heading to the cinema with some chums, don’t expect to find yourself admitted, at least not without a patdown to check you for contraband bananas.
The #Gentleminions craze originated on social media platform, Tik Tok, with young people filming themselves dressing like series’ stalwart Gru and eating bananas because they happen to be the favoured snack of the titular minions. However, some of the viral videos demonstrate disruptive behaviour in screenings, leading to Odeon releasing the above statement and The Regal in Wadebridge, Cornwall putting out a complete ban on ‘unaccompanied children wearing suits for Minions: Rise of Gru.’
Perhaps most concerning is the message this sends out to Elvis lovers, who as we know are the kind of fans that love to go above and beyond to show their commitment to ‘the King’. How they’ll feel about the movie of their idol being upstaged by Minions superfans is anybody’s guess, but if you’re heading to the cinemas this weekend, perhaps brace yourself for inter-generational face-offs between adult Elvis impersonators and hordes of suit-clad teenagers dressed as their generation’s idol: Gru.
Or perhaps we’ve just had too much coffee this morning and are letting our imagination run amok. We’ll bring you more on the #Gentleminions craze as we hear it.
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