Balthazar Bratt

"I've been a baaaaaad boy!"

- Balthazar Bratt's catchphrase.

Balthazar Bratt is the main antagonist of Illumination's 8th feature film Despicable Me 3. He is a former child star-turned-supervillain and the archenemy of Felonious Gru.

He was voiced by Trey Parker, who is best known for creating the hit animated comedy series South Park and voicing half the characters on it including Eric Cartman, Stan and Randy Marsh, Scott Tenorman and Mr. Garrison and Mr. Hat, as well as voicing Kim Jong-il in Team America: World Police.

Past
"You know what, Clive? Playing a villain on TV was fun, but being one in real life is even better!"

- Balthazar Bratt to his robotic sidekick Clive.

During his youth, Balthazar Bratt played a character called Evil Bratt in his own self titled series, Evil Bratt which revolved around him performing various evil deeds (such as robbing banks, defeating armies, destroying cities, and anything else dastardly). Although the series was beloved worldwide, during the third season, Bratt hit puberty and the series fell from popularity and was cancelled soon after. Bratt, having his reputation and career destroyed by his fall from grace, immediately turned to a life of crime, believing himself to actually be Evil Bratt.

Feud with Gru and the AVL
"Hello Gru, how's your transition coming? You know from world's worst villain to world's worst agent?!"

- Balthazar's first encounter with Gru in the movie.

After his turn to villainy, Balthazar Bratt quickly rose to the top of the Anti Villain League's most wanted criminal list and fought with them on various occasions, particularly with Felonious Gru, an ex-supervillain and the AVL's newest member as well as his partner/wife, Lucy Wilde.

Attempting to Steal the World's Largest Diamond
Bratt, along with his robotic sidekick Clive (who was also in the television series), robs a ocean liner transporting the world's largest diamond, the Dumont Diamond, using his rapidly inflating bubblegum to turn the ship airborne. Balthazar then gets into a fight with Gru, and, after disarming each other, begin "dance fighting", although Gru seemingly knocks him out. As Gru prepares to turn the diamond back to the authorities, Bratt gets back up, stating that he was only pretending to be knocked out, and blows Gru away using a sonic keytar, publicly humiliating him in the process. Before Bratt can get away, numerous AVL agents swarm the liner, forcing him to escape. As punishment for failing to capture Bratt, both Gru and Lucy are fired from the AVL by the new and overly harsh director Valerie Da Vinci.

Retaking the Diamond and Plotting his Revenge
After escaping Gru, Bratt poses as an overweight jewel inspector in order to gain access to and retrieve the Dumont Diamond from a museum in Paris. The next day, Balthazar Bratt's diamond heist makes the first page of the news, infuriating Gru. Later, Bratt trains for "the big day" and watches an episode of his television series in which Evil Bratt attacks a city with a giant robot and uses his expanding bubblegum to float the city into space, with Bratt planning on doing the same thing to Hollywood as revenge for them cancelling his show.

Against Gru and Dru
In order to get his old job back, Gru plots to steal the Dumont Diamond back from Bratt with the help of his twin brother Dru (who believes them to be stealing it as an act of villainy, not heroism). Making it to Bratt's bedroom, they narrowly avoid waking him up and alerting him before he wakes up himself and continues working on his giant robot. After Dru accidentally alerts Bratt to their presence by nearly choking on his expanding bubblegum, Gru throws the gum at Bratt, sticking him to the wall while they take the diamond and narrowly escape his fortress in a helicopter piloted by Lucy (who had followed them) and they return to Dru's mansion with the diamond.

Once at the mansion, however, Gru and Dru get into an argument over how the former wants to return to the AVL while the latter wants to continue their family's villainy tradition, ending with both disowning each other and Gru storming out.

Meanwhile, Bratt disguises himself as Lucy (tying up and gagging the real Lucy, and stuffing her in a closet), takes the diamond back and kidnaps Margo, Edith and Agnes (along with Agnes' new pet one-horned goat Lucky). Gru is about to leave out the door when he finds Lucy in the closet and she frantically tells him that Bratt took the girls. Gru rushes to Dru who is still sulking from their argument. But, learning that his nieces have been kidnapped by Bratt, Dru immediately drops his anger at his brother and he, Gru and Lucy board his hovercraft and fly to Hollywood to stop Bratt and rescue the girls. On the way there, they nearly collide with the aircraft that the Minions built (to escape from prison), and the Minions decide to follow them.

Attacking Hollywood
"HELLOOOOOOO, HOLLYWOOD! I'm back and bigger than ever!"

- Bratt as he attacks Hollywood in his giant robot.

At Hollywood, Bratt's giant robotic self-replica emerges from the ocean and begins attacking the city, shooting his expanding gum everywhere as several people fearfully panic and run. Edith demands Bratt to release her and her sisters, and Bratt complies by casually placing the girls (and the goat) on the ledge of a building in order to give them a perfect view of the destruction he is causing. After shooting enough of the gum, Bratt uses the robot's diamond-powered laser cannon to begin separating Hollywood from the ground in order to let it drift off.

Gru, Dru and Lucy arrive at Hollywood to see Bratt's robot attacking the city and Dru realizes Bratt's plan due to having watched Evil Bratt. The Minions parachute out of their aircraft and onto the expanding gum and desperately try to pop it, but it is too strong and sturdy. While Lucy rescues the girls, Gru and Dru shoot Bratt's robot with a number of missiles. Unfortunately, they prove to be ineffective and Bratt has his Bratt-Bots—modified Evil Bratt dolls—bring down Gru and Dru's plane, and the two brothers leap out of the aircraft before it crashes and explodes. Dru uses the suction on his spy suit to land on the robot's chest plate (without Bratt noticing), while Gru lands hard on the ground, knocking him unconscious. Seeing the unconscious Gru, Bratt begins firing his laser towards him, but before the beam can reach Gru, Dru destroys the robot's generator, causing it to collapse.

Final Dance Fight and Defeat
Whilst trying to search the wreckage for his brother, Gru comes face to face with an enraged Bratt, and before he can use his keytar to blow him away, Gru proposes a dance fight and Bratt complies, setting the music to Madonna's "Into the Groove". After a brief dance fight, Gru snatches Bratt's keytar and uses it to both blow him away and humiliate him in a similar fashion to how Bratt had previously done to him earlier, leaving Bratt floating away in his own gum while naked, as AVL helicopters swarm in. Bratt's ultimate fate is unclear, but however, he is most likely either arrested or the gum he was floating in could have popped, leaving him to fall to his death.

Personality
Balthazar Bratt was nothing more or less than a pure megalomaniac with 100% egotism. He is a pure egotist who thinks almost only on himself and only on his actions. In addition to him being an egotistical megalomaniac Bratt is an extremely ruthless and destructive individual who shows no mercy towards his enemies especially when he attempted to destroy Hollywood and mostly, he enjoys wreaking havoc and destruction.

Yet, Bratt sees no evil in his actions, which means that he is a pretentious and delusional individual who had lost faith in the world, and he is also extremely vindictive and cruel, as all he wanted was to destroy Hollywood as revenge for cancelling his TV show. In addition to this goal, Bratt sought what all supervillains sought; to gain world domination after he destroyed Hollywood. In addition to his dangerous, megalomaniacal, violent, and evil personality, Bratt is a man who lost his time so he always lives in the bubble of himself, which means that he always listens to music from the 80s (such as the songs "Bad" by the late Michael Jackson or "Into the Groove" by Madonna), why he always acts and look like a man in the 80s.

Bratt is also an extremely puerile, manipulative and cunning individual; for example, when he uses his skills of mastery of disguise, Bratt is able to pose himself as an obese jewel expert to steal the DuPont Diamond from Paris and impersonating Lucy Wilde, succeeded in manipulating Gru and kidnapping the girls.

Appearance
As a child Bratt was an adorable child of small stature and wore a purple suit jacket with shoulder pads and a white shirt underneath, he also wore purple parachute pants and black and white shoes. He also had a thick head of black medium length hair styled into a mullet.

In the present day, Bratt is a handsome, tall and slim, athletic built man with fair skin. He now has a thick and bushy black moustache and his hair is a bit longer but also has one bald spot. He wears an updated version of his original outfit but added several hidden features into his clothes such as his shoes turning into water skiis and his outfit turning into a paraglider. He also has one gold earing and is seen holding his Key-Tar a lot. Bratt is also mostly seen blowing a bubble out of bubble gum which he did frequently on his TV show as well.

Quotes
"Ooh la la. You have been duped! (Museum Curator: What?! We have?!) Yes...by ME!"

- Bratt disguised as a jewel inspector before revealing himself.

"It's too bad Gru won't be around to try to stop me. Wait, no it's not. I hate that dweeb! And you, Hollywood! This time, I'm cancelling you! AND ALL THE LOSERS WHO REJECTED ME!"

- Bratt seeking vengeance on Hollywood for canceling his show.

"You've been a bad boy, Gru. Can you get the rest of the suitcases? Come on, girls, let's go! Let's get physical, physical! Change of plan, girls. Instead of going home... WE'RE GOING TO HOLLYWOOD! Now that's what I call acting! Let's go, Clive. We've got a giant robot waiting!"

- Balthazar Bratt disguising himself as Lucy Wilde whilst kidnapping Margo, Edith, Agnes and Lucky in his getaway jet.

"(Edith: Hey, Mullethead! Let us out!) Oh, don't worry, girls! I've prepared a front-row seat for you! Once again, I win and Gru loses! Enjoy the show, girls!"

- Bratt "releasing" the girls by casually placing them on the edge of a skyscraper.

"Sorry, Gru. This is gonna be a total burn!"

- Bratt while attempting to incinerate the unconscious Gru with his robot's laser.

"You've ruined everything! And now, it's time to die! Any last words, Gru? (Gru: You know what? I got two words for you—dance fight!) Oh, it is on like Donkey Kong! I'm gonna enjoy this!"

- Bratt confronting Gru in a final dance fight.

"Game over! (laughs evilly as he reaches for his keytar, but feels nothing) Huh? (Gru: [holding the keytar] Is this what you're looking for?) NO!"

- Gru snatching Bratt's keytar before blasting him away in a very similar fashion Bratt did to him earlier.

"CURSE YOU, GRU! Ow! Curse you..."

- Bratt's last words as he floats away in his own gum.

Trivia

 * Balthazar's plan to float Hollywood into space is very similar to Ultron's plan in Avengers: Age of Ultron. However, while Balthazar only wanted to float Hollywood away, Ultron wanted to crash Sokovia into the Earth and wipe out humanity.
 * Balthazar Bratt is potentially the most evil, destructive and dangerous villain in the Despicable Me franchise (although, realistically, Gru and Vector would be the most destructive since in the original Despicable Me they stole the moon, an act that would result in untold amounts of natural disasters, and in a physical sense, El Macho was far more dangerous).
 * In the film, several 80s songs can be heard playing whenever Balthazar appears, such as "Bad" by Michael Jackson, "Sussudio" by Phil Collins, "Take on Me" by A-ha, and "Into the Groove" by Madonna.
 * Balthazar Bratt's name is likely a reference/shout out to Benjamin Bratt, who voiced El Macho in Despicable Me 2, although it is equally possible that his name is simply a pun on the word brat (meaning a spoiled, obnoxious child).
 * He bears a striking resemblance and has a similar voice to Randy Marsh from South Park, another character that Trey Parker voices and created. This makes many think that it is possible that Trey (being an animator himself) could have had some influence on Bratt's design, although this remains unconfirmed.
 * He also sounded somewhat similar to Eric Cartman as a child (who is another character Parker voices).
 * He is based on the late Michael Jackson, potentially the one of the most famous and iconic artists of all time who was very popular in 1980s as well.
 * Balthazar Bratt is generally considered by critics and moviegoers to be one of the best and funniest parts of the film (partly because critical and general reception has been fairly positive and mixed).
 * Balthazar Bratt is the only main antagonist in the Despicable Me franchise to not have a familial relationship. Vector is the son of Mr. Perkins, El Macho is the father of Antonio Perez and Scarlet Overkill is married to Herb Overkill.

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