Heroes no good without evil

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Barry C Chung
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Barry C Chung |
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Imagine Superman without his arch-nemesis Lex Luthor. Or Batman without the Joker. It's unthinkable. Megamind confronts this dilemma from the perspective of the villain: what if a villain had no superhero? Simple answer: he'd be so bored, sooner or later he'd create one.

From the opening scene, you know Dreamworks has produced a cleverly thought-out film that dares to veer from the norm.

From the moment Megamind (voiced by Will Ferrell) was born, he's been in competition with another alien. Now as grown-ups, Metro Man (Brad Pitt) is the good guy that protects the city; Megamind is the "villain".

But after an attempt to rescue reporter Roxanne (Tina Fey) goes bust, there's nothing left of Metro Man but a pile of scorched bones - and Megamind has no superhero to torment.

He creates a new enemy in the form of slacker cameraman Bernard (Ben Stiller). But the plan backfires. The roles of good and evil are reversed, and Megamind becomes the thing he dreads most - the good guy.

Superhero stories are founded on cycles of failure. If the bad guys ever won, the good guys would simply cease to exist. Megamind takes that concept but explores deeper possibilities. It also adds the element of love, and the idea that superheroes are made, not born.

In probing the idea of evil without some sort of counteracting goodness, Megamind is simple yet bold.

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