Megamind Review
Jun. 10th, 2011 08:53 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
miko2So I watched Megamind last night (which I picked up for $16.99, it was on sale!)
First of all, I enjoyed the movie. It's a clever animated superhero story. It might make a nice trilogy with The Incredibles and Despicable Me.
In fact, I read a review that stated that Megamind was a "bastard child of the Incredibles and Despicable Me". Ignoring the fact that this movie came out within a year of Despicable Me, this is a superficially accurate description, in that The Incredibles is an animated film about Superheroes, and Megamind has a superhero in it, while Despicable Me is about a villain with a good heart who fights another villain, and that's essentially the plot of Supermind.
But really, that's all just on the surface. There's even a superficial resemblance between Syndrome, the villain in the Incredibles, and Titan, the true villain of Megamind. They look similar, they are both kind of geeky losers gone supervillain. Except that Syndrome is actually a very intelligent guy with no super powers who invents all the contraptions that make him powerful, and actually sees himself as a hero (and desires to be seen as a hero), while "Tighton" is a guy of no ambition and low intelligence who is gifted with super powers and immediately uses them to do evil. He never has any ambition to be a hero. So below the surface, they're not that much alike.
Megamind is much more a film based on the old Superman/Lex Luthor model. Megamind is Lex Luthor with blue skin, an alien origin akin to Superman's, and an initial reluctance to cast himself as the villain. He has no super powers; he has only his mind and his inventions. Metro Man is Superman with the personality of a bully. Ultimately Megamind accepts his role as the villain to Metro Man's hero, and comes to relish the role, but it wasn't really like he had a choice in the matter.
There's also more than a bit of Captain Amazing (Mystery Men) in Metro Man. Although Metro Man is never as big of a jerk as Captain Amazing, it's clear that when he dies, you don't feel very bad about it. He had it coming. Of course, you see everything from Megamind's viewpoint, since he's the one telling the story, so it's natural that Metro Man seems like a big jerk.
Megamind is a traditional villain. Much like the old vampires in Terry Pratchett's Carpe Jugulum, he knows he isn't supposed to win and doesn't expect to win. In fact, he doesn't even have a goal beyond being Metro Man's evil foil. Thus, when he unexpectedly does win, he doesn't know what to do next. Victory turns out to be the worst thing that could have happened to him.
The movie is mostly told in a flashback, which I'm not convinced was really necessary. But other than that, the things that kind of annoyed me most were the disconnects between what the audience knows and what the characters in the movie know. In several cases, they're assumed to be the same thing when they aren't.
For example, Metro Man is killed by Megamind. Later, it's revealed that he's still alive -- but only Megamind and Roxanne actually know this. So at the end he reappears and basically says, "I've come out of retirement to save the day!" and nobody questions why he's even still alive -- not even Titan, who's now facing him. Then we learn that this isn't Metro Man after all -- it's only Megamind posing as Metro Man. This is the murderer of Metro Man posing as Metro Man, that doesnt' bother anyone?
And then Megamind saves the day and everyone accepts him as the new hero of the city. Never mind that he murdered the previous hero (so far as anyone knows), and created the villain Titan that truly threatened the city and which Megaman ultimately defeated. That makes him a hero? It just doesn't make a lot of sense.
He also temporarily "murdered" (dehydrated into a small cube) Bernard, the curator of the Metro Man museum and assumes his role. Unless I missed something, you don't see the real Bernard again. Roxanne doesn't ask, "Where's the real Bernard? What have you done to him?" He's a cube somewhere in Megamind's lair.
So basically there's some hand-waving and plot holes that kind of bugged me. Other than that, I liked the movie.
First of all, I enjoyed the movie. It's a clever animated superhero story. It might make a nice trilogy with The Incredibles and Despicable Me.
In fact, I read a review that stated that Megamind was a "bastard child of the Incredibles and Despicable Me". Ignoring the fact that this movie came out within a year of Despicable Me, this is a superficially accurate description, in that The Incredibles is an animated film about Superheroes, and Megamind has a superhero in it, while Despicable Me is about a villain with a good heart who fights another villain, and that's essentially the plot of Supermind.
But really, that's all just on the surface. There's even a superficial resemblance between Syndrome, the villain in the Incredibles, and Titan, the true villain of Megamind. They look similar, they are both kind of geeky losers gone supervillain. Except that Syndrome is actually a very intelligent guy with no super powers who invents all the contraptions that make him powerful, and actually sees himself as a hero (and desires to be seen as a hero), while "Tighton" is a guy of no ambition and low intelligence who is gifted with super powers and immediately uses them to do evil. He never has any ambition to be a hero. So below the surface, they're not that much alike.
Megamind is much more a film based on the old Superman/Lex Luthor model. Megamind is Lex Luthor with blue skin, an alien origin akin to Superman's, and an initial reluctance to cast himself as the villain. He has no super powers; he has only his mind and his inventions. Metro Man is Superman with the personality of a bully. Ultimately Megamind accepts his role as the villain to Metro Man's hero, and comes to relish the role, but it wasn't really like he had a choice in the matter.
There's also more than a bit of Captain Amazing (Mystery Men) in Metro Man. Although Metro Man is never as big of a jerk as Captain Amazing, it's clear that when he dies, you don't feel very bad about it. He had it coming. Of course, you see everything from Megamind's viewpoint, since he's the one telling the story, so it's natural that Metro Man seems like a big jerk.
Megamind is a traditional villain. Much like the old vampires in Terry Pratchett's Carpe Jugulum, he knows he isn't supposed to win and doesn't expect to win. In fact, he doesn't even have a goal beyond being Metro Man's evil foil. Thus, when he unexpectedly does win, he doesn't know what to do next. Victory turns out to be the worst thing that could have happened to him.
The movie is mostly told in a flashback, which I'm not convinced was really necessary. But other than that, the things that kind of annoyed me most were the disconnects between what the audience knows and what the characters in the movie know. In several cases, they're assumed to be the same thing when they aren't.
For example, Metro Man is killed by Megamind. Later, it's revealed that he's still alive -- but only Megamind and Roxanne actually know this. So at the end he reappears and basically says, "I've come out of retirement to save the day!" and nobody questions why he's even still alive -- not even Titan, who's now facing him. Then we learn that this isn't Metro Man after all -- it's only Megamind posing as Metro Man. This is the murderer of Metro Man posing as Metro Man, that doesnt' bother anyone?
And then Megamind saves the day and everyone accepts him as the new hero of the city. Never mind that he murdered the previous hero (so far as anyone knows), and created the villain Titan that truly threatened the city and which Megaman ultimately defeated. That makes him a hero? It just doesn't make a lot of sense.
He also temporarily "murdered" (dehydrated into a small cube) Bernard, the curator of the Metro Man museum and assumes his role. Unless I missed something, you don't see the real Bernard again. Roxanne doesn't ask, "Where's the real Bernard? What have you done to him?" He's a cube somewhere in Megamind's lair.
So basically there's some hand-waving and plot holes that kind of bugged me. Other than that, I liked the movie.
