Megamind observations

[gryphonsegg]

Yesterday I watched Megamind at the behest of Kansan Entrails/Surrealist Dreamer's brother. It was more interesting than I'd been expecting. First of all, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the mother load of Foe Yay in this movie. That was not what I found most interesting or most surprising, but it was rolling off in larger waves than expected. And I'd be remiss if I didn't fit in the caveat that there is exactly one reasonably well-developed female character and she's very much confined to a cliche love interest role and she doesn't even get to talk to one of the female background characters. Now that all that is out of the way, here's what really stood out to me: despite having some cliched elements in other respects, the story of the one female character, Roxanne, is one long refutation of Nice Guyism. She's not really attracted to the wealthy, "jock" superhero even though nearly everybody assumes she is, she's not attracted to the cold, snobbish intellectual type at the museum, she becomes friends with and eventually romantically interested in a different nerdy intellectual character who looks like the aforementioned character after she comes to perceive him as someone who is brave and "has feelings," and she dumps him when he is revealed as a criminal who has been lying to her all along and gets back together with him after he proves that he can be better than that. And then there's the plot thread that really surprised me, given how much movies these days are crawling with Nice Guyism: there is a stereotypical Nice Guy character who pines after the female character (or rather his mental image of who she should be), and she rejects him because he's really not a good person and rejects him more emphatically after he gains powers and proves that he was never truly nice, just weak and insecure and waiting for an opportunity to become the biggest bully in town. I wouldn't exactly say it's actively feminist, especially since the movie never takes seriously the possibility of Roxanne rescuing herself, but it's refreshing to see a movie that takes the POV of skinny supergenius supervillain AND also calls bullshit on the woman-hating Nice Guy tropes that run rampant in other stories that sell to and valorize nerdy guys.

Also, I absolutely ADORE Megamind's differentiation between "a villain" and "a SUPERvillain" ("PRESENTATION!") and how he accomplished his last-minute save. Oh, come on, that's not a spoiler, everyone knows that G-rated animated movie with superheroes and supervillains is required to have a last-minute save! And this movie's last-minute save struck me as pretty clever.

BTW, this post is exactly the kind of thing that keeps me checking Metafandom even though the community tends to link more posts that annoy me. And I couldn't help thinking that Megamind would be a perfect fit for the "troll romance" category, since he clearly has a kismesis and a moirail and may have acquired a potential matesprit, and maybe you could even make a case for the warden being his austispice. XD