Mindful tip

The jokes and high energy in the entertaining animated feature Megamind come out of a cute conceit: what if every type of boilerplate character you've ever seen in every superhero story all of a sudden questions his or her motivations and role in life? So here we have a super villain who starts wondering why he's a villain, a villain's henchman wondering why he's content to be a henchman, characters who are supposed to be heroic who decide they just want to slack off for a while or (in a third act tour-de-force) even be villainous.

And, oh yes, there's also a cute Lois Lane-type reporter character who questions why she always has to be the one being rescued and pined over by the guys in capes.

Peppered throughout all this are lots of affectionate pokes at every remaining convention of the superhero genre that the characters I just mentioned weren't already addressing. Imaginative character designs, good action, and a decent little story round things out.

In the end, Megamind is sort of like Pixar's The Incredibles (which I also liked a lot), only tighter and funnier.  It's well worth seeking out on disc, streaming or download services, or your cable system's On Demand function, which is the way I saw it.