Physics in the World of "Megamind"

Imagine yourself taking a walk at a park on an ordinary day, and you see a girl swinging on the swing set. Everything seems normal at first, but what if the girl didn’t slow down at the apex of each swing? That would undoubtedly catch your eye, because you know that after each swing, there should be a brief moment when the girl should hang in the air. When it comes to physics, people can usually sense when something is off. However, when it comes to animation, sometimes, these things are harder to catch. Often times, animators will break the laws of physics in order to make the film more interesting for the audience. This is true in the animated film “Megamind.” Although the world of “Megamind” often follows our laws of physics, there are many instances in which those laws are broken in order to create entertainment value for the audience.

One area in which the laws of physics are broken is path of action. In one scene, Titan tosses Roxanne Ritchi over a building. While she begins by traveling almost completely in a vertical direction, she begins traveling horizontally when she reaches the top of the building. This can be seen in the following image:

 

 Although this breaks the laws of physics, it makes the scene more dramatic as Roxanne falls through the sky. Another example of a strange path of action is when Titan flicks the mayor with his finger. Titan’s flick should have sent the mayor in a backward direction, but instead the mayor went flying upward. In the following images, the leftmost is from the mayor's point of view.

Titan is taller than the mayor, meaning the force from Titan's flick should be sent horizontally, if not downwards. Therefore, it does not make sense that the mayor flew upward. A third instance in which a path of action defies physics is when Titan throws Metro Tower during the final battle of the movie. Titan threw the building from a very high location, so by the time Metro Tower hit the ground, most of its force should have been directed downward instead of horizontally. Despite this, Metro Tower barrels down the street, chasing after “Megamind” (which was actually Minion in disguise) and Roxanne at an alarming speed.

Not only are there strange paths of action in this film, but there are a few moments where inertia seems to be absent. When Metro Man is first introduced in the beginning, he is seen juggling three babies. When Metro Man returns the baby dressed in pink, he tosses the baby back to its mother. This doesn’t seem all that strange until we consider the fact that Metro Man’s hand was under the baby, and not behind it.

This shot could closely resemble the well-known tablecloth trick where one pulls a tablecloth from under a flower vase. In this case, the baby should have stayed where it was (like the flower vase), while Metro Man's hand was pulled out from underneath (like the tablecloth). Later on in the film, Titan is introduced. He greets Roxanne Ritchi and presents her with a cart full of flowers. As he emerges with the cart, he spins it on one finger very quickly.

The spinning should have caused the flowers to fly out of their containers, but they remain in place in order to better convey Titan’s cockiness. During the final battle between Megamind and Titan, there is a scene where Titan rips the door off the invisible car, and Megamind is clinging tightly to the inside of it. When the invisibility wears off and Titan finally sees Megamind, Titan throws the door into the air like a discus. The force that was put into that throw should have shaken off Megamind. The only way Megamind could have stayed with the door is if he were holding onto it with a grip of superhuman strength. The lack of inertia in some scenes such as these helps to give more appeal to these moments.

Alongside with path of action and inertia, there is a third way in which the laws of physics is broken, and that is through inconsistencies in resilience of objects. One example of this is when Megamind puts on his Black Mamba suit and controls a giant robotic combat suit. As he marches out in preparation to do battle with Titan, we see that the weight of his suit causes the asphalt crumble beneath his feet (left).

However, when he jumps onto the roof of City Hall, the building looks fine (right). He can even spin on the steeple without breaking it. This shows both an inconsistency in the weight of the robotic suit as well as the stability of materials, but it creates a dramatic effect as Megamind walks down the street. Another example of inconsistency is when Megamind tries to trap Titan in a copper dome. At first, Titan is able to peel away a sheet of the copper like a malleable metallic material.

However, seconds later, Titan blasts through it as if it were made of rock. Instead of peeling or shredding, the copper shatters and breaks. This shows an inconsistency of the flexibility of the copper material and how it reacts to force, but it lends itself to creating a more dramatic effect as Titan breaks free of the cage. A third example of inconsistent resilience just after Megamind and Roxanne discover that Metro Man is still alive. Megamind, disbelieving what he is seeing, reaches over to Metro Man’s face, and touches it. Metro Man’s face reacts like normal skin as Megamind presses and squeezes his face.

However, when Roxanne gets angry and begins throwing objects at Metro Man, his face does not react at all. In the following image, Roxanne has just smashed a guitar onto Metro Man's head, but his face remains unchanged.

Likewise, Hal's face is just as unchanging as Metro Man's, since they have the same superhuman DNA. In the image below, Megamind punches Titan in the face while wearing his Metro Man imitation suit, but Titan’s face barely shows any change at all. This shows an inconsistency in the elasticity of Metro Man's and Titan's faces, but it shows how physically strong they are.

Although these are some jarring inconsistencies, the audience doesn't notice them as much because they lend a more comedic effect to the movie.

Throughout the movie, it is clear that the laws of physics are broken in path of action, inertia, and inconsistent resilience. However, each time the laws are broken, we can see that it is not because the animators didn't do their research; the animators are simply pushing reality. The animators were able to push the situations to the extremes, and still make the audience accept it as part of the movie. Breaking these laws serves to create a more entertaining film for the audience, and "Megamind" was a highly entertaining film because of it.