A title like Henchmen immediately invokes those other villain-helpers, Despicable Me’s Minions, the merry yellow beings whose antics have earned them legions of fans despite a subpar spinoff film. Yet the plot of Henchmen more closely resembles supervillain-wannabe Gru’s story from the same franchise, because even though the animated movie centers on a lowly (human) henchman and his hapless apprentice, that apprentice aspires to supervillain grandeur. Unfortunately, that doesn’t add up to things like a compelling plot, consistent characterizations or coherent world-building. In fact, outside of stellar voice-work by an impressive cast, there’s little to recommend Henchmen, which feels like its script was a few drafts short of being ready to commit to film.

The movie, the debut feature of writer and director Adam Wood, starts by introducing young comic-book fan Lester, who doesn’t understand why the bad guys always lose. Ten years later, Lester (Thomas Middleditch) takes the first step towards his dream of becoming a supervillain who actually wins by joining the Union of Evil as a henchman. The bumbling teen doesn’t exactly impress, however, and he’s relegated to the role of henchman, third class, the plumbers, clean-up crew and repairmen of the villain support team. Meanwhile, after another screw-up, disillusioned longtime henchman Hank (James Marsden) gets saddled with Lester as his apprentice.

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During their first job together as janitors at the Supervillain History Museum, Lester manages to bungle his way into a supervillain suit he can’t control -- and can’t get out of. Soon, Hank realizes if he can harness the powers of Lester’s suit, he can steal a substance that will allow him to change his life. When the supervillain Baron Blackout (Alfred Molina) kidnaps his friends, however, Hank springs into action to help them with the aid of Lester and Hank's scientist friend, Jolene (Rosario Dawson).

From the get-go, Henchmen fails to come together, as it seems to take cues from other better movies (like the aforementioned Despicable Me and the Star Wars franchise) while never managing to stitch its inspirations together into a coherent whole. Part of the problem is there’s little internal logic at work. For example, in the movie’s prologue, Baron Blackout targets the school bus young Lester is traveling in. Why does he want to take out a bus full of children that is coincidentally carrying one of the film’s major characters? The movie’s answer mostly seems to be because Blackout’s evil and the filmmakers needed a concise way to introduce both him and Lester.

Other inconsistencies and sharp plot turns abound. Hank’s desire to harness the power of the suit Lester’s trapped in to acquire that life-changing substance is barely foreshadowed before it happens. Meanwhile, the question of why Hank can’t just quit being a henchman if he’s so miserable lingers over the whole film.

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The characters are equally incoherent. For instance, in one of the very few scenes in which superhero Captain Superior appears, he dismisses the journalist trying to speak to him about his recent wins and in the next he flirts with her as if that's always his reaction to her. There are a shocking number of examples like this, including Lester spending most of the movie being completely incompetent only to use all the guile and smarts he didn't seem to possess to ultimately help Hank. If that weren’t enough, Hank’s motivations are so obtuse that at one point Lester feels the need to explain them to Jolene.

The world created by the movie is also head-scratching. There's a great deal of advanced technology in use in the characters' daily lives, including flying cars and robot policemen. Yet, blue-collar henchmen are still required to do the most menial jobs. On top of that, while Lester knows if he wants to become a supervillain he should join the Union of Evil, at another point he's unaware that the comics he’s been reading are real. Meanwhile, that all-important Union of Evil functions more like henchmen HR than a union, controlling far more of the characters' lives than seems to make sense.

Henchmen’s depiction of its female characters is often disappointing as well. While the movie takes tentative, although not entirely successful, stabs at female empowerment, the only women superheroes are a pair of tittering cheerleaders. Meanwhile, before Hank’s henchman rival Biff (Rob Riggle), is taken down by Hank’s colleague Jane (Jane Krakowski), Biff comments that Hank needs a girl to fight his battles and taunts Jane by saying the only thing she can do to him is ask him out.

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Henchmen is supposed to be funny and heartwarming, but all of these issues just make it perplexing and off-putting. While the movie boasts an ace voice cast, which in addition to the actors previously mentioned includes Nathan Fillion, Craig Robinson and Will Sasso, even they can’t rescue this mess of a film.

Henchmen stars Thomas Middleditch, James Marsden, Rosario Dawson, Alfred Molina, Will Sasso, Nathan Fillion, Rob Riggle, Jane Krakowski, Craig Robinson and Bobcat Goldthwait. It premieres in select theaters, drive-ins, digital and on demand on Friday, Oct. 9.

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