“Literally, we were just pitching each other ideas,” says Simons, “when that question popped into our heads. So the question was, what would Lex Luthor do with himself, because killing Superman was his life mission? And then we got the idea that villains really are the ultimate underdog. I mean, in every movie you see, they never win. And there was something there, some sort of story about a villain who kind of redeems himself and it turns out the guy who knows the most about being a hero is a villain. And in trying to fill a void in his life, funny things could happen.”
“Exactly,” adds Schoolcraft. “What happens when your dream comes true and it’s not what you think it’s going to be?”
The concept certainly caught the attention of director Tom McGrath, who had previously helmed the Madagascar films. “It was a unique idea,” he enthuses, “and during that time when it was being pitched, there were a lot of live action superhero movies going on. When [Dreamworks’] Jeffrey Katzenberg pitched it to me, it was too hard to pass up.”
In describing the plot (and note there are SPOILERS), Wikipedia writes, “Megamind (Will Ferrell) and his life-long arch enemy Metro Man (Brad Pitt) are aliens that were sent away from their respective home planets in times of crisis. Megamind, taking the role of supervillain, tries to conquer Metro City in every imaginable way, each attempt a colossal failure thanks to Metro Man, who becomes the hero of Metro City. It seems that the pattern will never cease until Megamind kills Metro Man during one of his many botched hostage plots involving news reporter Roxanne Ritchi (Tina Fey). Now freed from his rival’s shadow, Megamind proceeds to take control of Metro City. Over time, Megamind come to the realization that he no longer has any purpose in life without an enemy.”
To end his boredom, Megamind turns Roxanne’s camerman, Hal (Jonah Hill), into a superhero to battle, but this “hero” (Titan) decides to strike back against the people he feels have rejected him his whole life, forcing Megamind to rise to the occasion to stop him. Can redemption be far away?
Comic book fans will undoubtedly notice some similarities between elements of Megamind and the mythology of Superman. Not surprising considering the writers and director were all influenced by the character, particularly the 1978 feature film, Superman: The Movie, directed by Richard Donner.
“That movie blew me away,” says McGrath. “Another great type of superhero movie for me was Batman with Adam West, which took the genre and poked fun at it. I would say that Megamind is a combination of both in that you have the comedy, but you still have the action and the drama. That’s the balance we’ve been playing with. Particularly in 3D, it’s interesting to play out the action and drama that way. Like Brent and Alan said, it’s based on the idea of Lex Luthor killing Superman, but we take those characters and flip them on their ear and you end up learning much more about them than you would in a standard superhero movie.”
Simons adds, “It was kind of fun in writing it that we were making fun of all of those standbys that you see in comic books and comic book movies and kind of turned them on their heads a little bit.”
“And let’s face it,” points out Schoolcraft, “the villains are usually the more interesting between the villain and the hero. The bad guy always has a cool back story that you can sink your teeth into.”
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Megamind has certainly drawn in A-list talent, among the actors voicing characters being Will Ferrell, Tiny Fay, Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill, and when you bring in talent like that, it’s a pretty safe bet that they’re going to shake things up.
McGrath relates, “You couldn’t ask for a better cast. And what’s really nice about it is that even though it’s a big movie, it’s an intimate story. Will had done Curious George, and I think he was kind of out of his element. We got together before he came on and talked about ways to make it more interesting. We’d sit in a room and spitball a lot of stuff and do a lot of improvisation, but still kept the core dynamics of the scene and it seemed to work really well. It’s a big leap for these actors, because there’s nothing apart from another actor across from them to kind of respond to. There are no sets; you kind of have to use your imagination and what blew me away was the way that these actors were able to kind of play off of the imaginary world.”
Of Ferrell, Simons says, “We found out with Will that the great thing about him is that you wouldn’t have to hold back. You could have the villain say the worst thing possible, and you still love him and you still find it funny. Which is great, because if the story is about the bad guy, you have to somehow love the bad guy.”
Schoolcraft emphasizes, “And Will has this childlike glee to everything he does, so you love him no matter what. And it’s perfect for the character, because the character loves what he does, which is being evil.”
“Brad Pitt,” McGrath reflect, “was great. In establishing the rivalries between Metro Man and Megamind, we kind of came up with Elvis Presley versus Alice Cooper in their stylization, because both these characters have enormous stage presence. Will’s character is more Alice Cooper and Brad’s is more Elvis and he brought the charm and the swagger. In fact, usually you stand behind a music stand with the mic fixed on you when you record, but we gave Brad a hand-held mic just so he could walk around and have the stage presence for some of these scenes in the movie, and it went very well. He’s a very physical actor, he gestures a lot, so it’s great to have him not tied behind the stand. It’s surprising how funny he is, too.”
Schoolcraft concedes, “You do sort of associate him with those serious types of roles he plays, but he’s a very cool, kind of laid back guy and he gets the comedy. He certainly got the comedy of this. And of course his voice in that pre-conceived notion of the serious guy fits Metro Man to a tee.”
A member of the cast who had a really significant impact on the character, according to Simons, was Tina Fey: “With Roxanne, in our original script we’d always wanted to do the Lois Lane character and make her stronger. Not that Lois Lane isn’t a strong character but to make her character more than just a hostage. But when Tina Fey signed on to do it, not only is she strong, but she’s smart. And everything out of her mouth needs to be smart. Then the challenge was how to make the character live up to her.”
And if Megamind lives up to expectations, audiences can be sure that there will be a follow-up adventure.
“I think Megamind creates a world that has a lot of possibilities story wise,” says McGrath. “There are a lot of stories you can tell from the point of view of the villain other than just the relationship between good and evil.”