-Megamind: Why do we love the self-proclaimed villain? -

Megamind, a movie released in 2010 and directed by Tom McGrath is a movie about rediscovery, particularly, of our protagonist, Megamind, a blue skinned alien who proclaims himself as a villain.

In the beginning, Megamind is an innocent child whose expectations of the world are limited, due to the fact that his entire planet was abducted by a black hole. HIs parents send him to another planet, the Earth, for him to start a new life. Little did he know that another alien, Metro Man, was also getting sent to the same planet. They end up in very different conditions.

Megamind was set up to find his destiny, but Metro Man had the same idea. Their rivalry was born from the moment of their landing in the Earth, Metro Man lands on a luxurious house, full of privilege; Megamind lands into a jail, getting raise only by criminals.

"Even fait picks its favorites".

The conditions in which Megamind is born are the cause of his future, even if he didn't want to. Megamind is raised by prisoners who teach him that the so called "bad" is actually good and viceversa. Metro Man has life handed to him on a silver platter; on the other hand, Megamind was on one of the worst places possible.

The protagonist's childhood

Even though we see that Megamind has an amazing intellect, he can't develop it to its full potential and for great things. He doesn't even have the chance to attend school until much later on in his life. He doesn't get the concept of school, he can't do good assignments, he doesn't have a good lexicon and not because he doesn't want to succeed in life, but because of the conditions he has been put into. He wants to get along with his classmates, but they don't allow him to do so, as they keep rejecting him. He keeps trying to fit in, failing miserably; until he decides that his energy is being wasted into this. Instead, if people think he's the evil one, he will be the evilest villain of all. If society rejects him, he will reject society too.

Megamind starts a rivalry with Metro Man, being very resilient and dedicated, he keeps losing but gets up and tries again every single time. The constant fighting gives him a sense of work and identity, something to reach out for. Society didn't notice him when he was trying to fit in, but now they do. To him, fame is fame, even if it implicates people hating on him.

People are constantly reassuring him his identity as a villain, nothing more; they tell him he's not capable of doing something meaningful with his life, making him believe it really is that way, that his destiny is to be a villain but, is it really?

He won Metro Man?

One day, Megamind makes one his usual plans, kidnapping the reporter, Roxanne Ritchi, and planning to trap Metro Man, as he always does. Roxanne is tired of the same routine over and over again; Metro Man is always saving her and Megamind is put in jail. But, for the first time, one of Megamind's plans work; Metro Man's weakness is copper, the material in which, the observatory he's trapped in, is made; Megamind shoots him with a laser and Metro Man is dead now. He finally won and Megamind can't believe it, no one can. Not even Megamind expected to win the fight over Metro Man, it was something unimaginable that has become real. The hope for Metro City is lost.

Now, Megamind has Metro City's property completely but, what will he do now with all of that power?

Looking for motivation

After just a few days, Megamind is bored and feels lonely, trapped in life. He has everything he had always wanted, but he is lacking a crucial thing: purpose. His whole purpose in life was fighting with Metro man, making planes to defeat him but, now that he is gone, he feels empty.

"We have it all. Yet we have nothing. It's just too easy now."

He always wanted to be recognized for his efforts as a villain, now there is nothing to fight for and people hate him more than ever, he's the most isolated he's ever been. He needs to find a motivation to keep on going.

Everyone realizes that they took Metro Man for granted and no one really appreciated his work until they lost him. He gave Megamind something to keep his mind occupied; now he's lost in life.

A side part of the story is about Roxanne's colleague, Hal, who has a huge crush with her, but is constantly making her uncomfortable and, for that reason, she never wants to go out with him. Hal, as Roxanne says, isn't a bad guy in the beginning, but he's very awkward and dorky, making him unsuitable for her.

Roxanne and Bernard

Both Roxanne and Megamind go to Metro Man's museum as they feel lost in their feelings.

"What's the point of being bad when there's no good to try and stop you?"

When Roxanne hears Megamind's voice, he makes a hologram of a museum worker so that she doesn't recognize him; he doesn't want her to see him being vulnerable; he takes an alter ego as Bernard, the museum worker.

"Heroes aren't born, they're made."

While talking to Roxanne, Megamind gets an idea: he's going to create a hero to fight him and find a purpose again. He's using Metro Man's DNA to inject him it into a guy to convert him into a hero, and he's going to train him. Now, he just needs to find a suitable subject for his experiment.

The birth of a new hero

He, accidently, gets Hal shot with the power of Metro Man. Megamind has to train Hal into becoming the best superhero he can.

On the other hand, Megamind starts catching feeling for Roxanne, now that he's spending more time with her as his alter ego; now that he can act as a normal human being, Roxanne treats him with decency and kindness, she's the only one who has ever done that, making him head over heels for her.

Megamind realizes that Hal is not a very smart person, so he needs to train him using another alter ego; he makes Hal believe that he's his father from space, who has given him the blessing of his superpowers. Of course, Hal is excited with the idea; he thinks that, being a superhero, is the thing that he requires for Roxanne to like him. Megamind and Minion, his caregiver and best friend, start to train him to be like Metro man.

Does Roxanne love Megamind?

As Megamind falls more and more in love with Roxanne, he starts to get a different view of the world and starts feeling empathy for others, making him get the city as it was before. In this moment, Megamind starts knowing a different facet of himself; evil isn't in his nature, is something he acquired with time after all of the rejection he was given from society. he can, in fact, enjoy common life activities, besides being evil.

When speaking at the park, Roxanne tells Megamind that she and metro man were never a couple, that he wasn't really her type.

Men in the movie think that Roxanne was in love with metro man cause he's the obvious choice: handsome, rich, charismatic. But a girl like Roxanne wants something more from a partner , something that she finds in Megamind, a guy who listens to her, a caring guy, someone who shares her interests and more. Megamind is able to open his soul to Roxanne, he can trust her his most deep secrets and trauma that make him who he is today, something that Roxanne really appreciates.

"All you have to do is save her, and she'll be yours."

After Titan, the hero that Hal has become, is ready to get out and show his powers to the world, he thinks that Roxanne will finally love him. He has this belief because he doesn't know her, he thinks that being strong and powerful like Metro man is what it takes for her to like him. This is because he hasn't even had a proper conversation with her.

The fall of a villain

Minion notices something different in Megamind; he has fallen in love with Roxanne. Minion starts asking about what will happen after Roxanne finds out about Megamind's real identity, but Megamind hadn't thought about that. Minion says that villains never get the girl in the end, making Megamind that perhaps he doesn't want to be the villain anymore. This causes trouble for the both of them; Megamind is questioning his true identity for the first time in his life.

Titan goes to Roxanne's place and starts flirting with her. Instead of making her interested, she is just sacred by Titan's attitude. Titan takes off his mask to reveal his face and Roxanne is shocked, Titan is Hal. Roxanne tries to explain to Hal that, even though he has powers and is a good guy, she doesn't like him that way, but Hal doesn't understand. he is totally frustrated with Roxanne and leaves.

The content of a book

When Roxanne and Megamind are having dinner at a restaurant, titan sees them and is destroyed.

"You don't judge a book by its cover or a person from the outside. You judge them based on their actions."

They keep talking, but Megamind starts to think that maybe Roxanne won't accept him after all. They kiss but Megamind's face is revealed. Roxanne is in shock again; she can't be with Megamind even if she wanted to, she knows about the horrible stuff he has done in the past; adding to that, he tricked her into liking him, not being honest about his true self.

Titan's weakness

Megamind decides to fight Titan to get Roxanne out of his mind, but he can't find him on the streets. He goes out to look for Hal and find him at his home, laying and playing videogames. Hal has lost all his interest in becoming a superhero and wants to become a supervillain instead. To encourage him into fighting, Megamind reveals to Hal that the thing with his space dad was all fake; he also reveals that he's the guy Roxanne has been dating, filling Hal with rage.

Megamind and Titan start fighting but Titan tris to kill him, forcing Megamind to escape and put Titan in a copper shield to annulate his powers. The shield doesn't do anything to Titan's powers, and he manages to escape, but he doesn't want to be a superhero anymore, he wants to rule Metro City.

Megamind goes to Roxanne's apartment ti warn her about Titan. She doesn't listen, until he says that she's the smartest person he knows. They need to make a plan to defeat Titan, yet they don't understand why copper didn't work on him, it was Metro man's weakness, wasn't it?

Metro Man is alive?!

They go to Metro Man's hideout to try and find an answer to titan's weakness, but they Metro Man, alive! Metro man was never dead.

To Metro Man, being a hero, wasn't a blessing, more like a burden. he didn't have the choice of who he wanted to be because he needed to be the city's savior (another case of society's imposition of expectations on others), so he decided to fake his death. He left the city; Metro man is done with the job of the superhero; he can't help them.

Megamind quits the plan of saving the city; he's confused about what he needs to do; Megamind puts himself into jail. When watching T.V., he sees Roxanne, kidnapped by Titan, and comes into his senses to try and rescue her. Minion comes to free him from jail and they make a plan to save the city.

Finding an identity

Megamind manages to save Roxanne and the city by taking Titan's powers out of him. Now, there's only one thing missing. People slowly start to accept Megamind as the city's savior, not caring about his physical appearance. Megamind can finally enjoy life the way he was supposed to.

"Funny, I guess destiny is not the path given to us, but the path we choose for ourselves."

In the end, Megamind can accept his nature without having to change or accommodate to what others wanted of him. He can be who he really wants to be and pursue his purpose, whatever that is for him. Evil wasn't his destiny. Now, he is free from prejudice.

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