Megamind

Jesse Thompson

Megamind Review

-----WARNING SPOILERS AHEAD--------

            The film Megamind is an enjoyable lighthearted superhero comedy with fluid animation and well choreographed action sequences. The film is directed by Tom McGrath and produced by DreamWorks Animation. Will Ferrell voices the character of Megamind while Brad Pitt, Tina Fey, David Cross, and Jonah Hill lend their voices to the parts of Megaminds archnemesis Metroman, the pretty news reporter Roxanne, Megamind's closest friend Minion the fish, and news cameraman turned super powered bully Tighten respectively.

            The film borrows heavily from the Superman origins with both Megamind and Metroman being sent as babies from dying planets out into space to arrive on earth. From the onset of his young life, Megamind feels like an outsider and is constantly thwarted and humiliated in his attempts to be noticed for his genius intellect and inventions by the perfect Metroman from grade school into adulthood. Megamind makes his mind up at a young age that if he can't be  successful and recognized for his talents while acting good, then he’ll just be as bad as he can be, and starts on the path to becoming a supervillain. Metroman meanwhile becomes the adored hero of Metro City, like Superman to his beloved Metropolis, and the citizens adore him for it. Metroman has always been there to save the day and defeat Megamind's nefarious plans until one day Megamind kidnaps Roxanne and leads to Metroman to fall right into his trap. Megamind believes he has finally defeated his rival and the citizens of Metro City are left lost in misery and confused, wondering if they had taken Metroman for granted all this time.  

            For a short while, Megamind along with his pal Minion enjoy their success and newfound free reign to do as they please being the bad guys and the bosses of the city. Soon however, Megamind realizes he misses the surety of the epic battles he and Metroman would wage over the years, and wonders what he may look forward to now as a supervillain without a hero to fight. It's then that he concocts the idea to create a new hero with his inventiveness and Metroman's DNA so that he can then train him so that the battle between good hero's and bad villains may once again continue.

            By accident, Roxanne's young and foolish news reporting partner ends up receiving the injection that gives him superhero powers similar to Metroman. To train Tighten so that he will be ready for their eventual battle, Megamind takes the persona of his white haired and wise space dad in a play off Marlon Brando's character from the 1980 Superman Film. There's a great homage to the classic Nintendo Donkey Kong games in one of the training sequences that I enjoyed.

            Along the way, Megamind ends up impersonating a mild mannered caretaker of the Metroman museum named Bernard and begins spending time with the hopeful reporter Roxanne. Megamind begins to fall for her, and begins softening his evil ways, and begins to help rebuild Metrocity from the destruction and chaos he had created. His double life with Roxanne however leads his trusted pal Minion to become appalled and walk out on him after Megamind lets slip that maybe he doesn't feel like being the bad guy anymore. As soon as things are begging to go really well for Bernard with Roxanne, his cover is blown when his real identity is revealed while in the midst of them sharing a first kiss over a dinner date. Exposed, lonely and unsure of himself, Megamind reverts back to the plan of being the bad guy and causing destruction. This however fails to pan out for him when he discovers that Tighten too, after having his romantic advances rebuked by Roxanne has turned to a life of crime. When Megamind reveals to Tighten the reasons for his creation, Tighten turns on him, and vows to destroy him and rule Metro City by terrorizing the inhabitants. People start fleeing the city in waves and Megamind and Roxanne turn to eachother to try and figure out a way to stop Tighten before it's too late.   

            What they end up discovering to their surprise is that Metroman is still alive and faked his death so that he could live a normal life. Metroman explains that he just felt stuck, and says that "despite all my powers, every citizen of Metro City had a choice, something I didn't have. Ever since I can remember I've always had to be what the people of the city want me to be. What about what I wanted to do?" He explains that it was then it suddenly hit him, that he does in fact have a choice to be whatever he wants to be.  So he decided to fake his death, hang up his cape and be free to get in touch with his true power, creating lyrical magic and pursuing music. He ignores the pleas of Roxanne and Megamind to save "his" city from Tighten's destruction. He says he can't do it and tells Megamind that for every yin there's a yang. If there is bad in the world, people will rise up against it.  

            This cues Megamind to give up on himself until he is roused to do the right thing by the captive Roxanne that both she and the city need him to step up and fight Tighten. Through all its comedy and epic battles showing off awesome destruction of the elegant metro city environment, the film has a great message that destiny means we choose our own path to act with good intentions or evil. After always being on the losing end of the battles as the villain to Metroman's hero, Megamind is inspired by his connection with Roxanne to have a reason to finally win and save her and the city. When Titan as he is about to punch Megamind in the final battle he tells Megamind, "This is the last time you'll make a fool outta me." To which Megamind replies, "I made you a hero, you did the fool thing all by yourself." Megamind realizes that being a good guys has its perks, and his genius and smart thinking, with help from the quick wits of Roxanne ends of defeating Tighten and saving the day.  

            Megamind was enjoyable as a comedy, and its CGI animation really showed off some great cinematography capturing the super hero action moving around the environments, soaring high and leaving excellent sequences of destruction in every battle. While it borrows most of its source material from established superhero's from classic comics, Megamind is fun and is a good tale of redemption for a misunderstood super villain has the chance to mend his wrongs and become the hero when he finds out even superheroes and villains just want to find happiness with a normal life too and that everyone has that choice.