Tina Fey as Roxanne Ritchi in "Megamind."

BEVERLY HILLS -- Heroes are made, not born. And in some cases -- or at least Megamind's case -- villains are made into heroes.

"No matter how much you screw up your life, whatever wrong decisions you make, it's never too late to do the right thing," director Tom McGrath says at a news conference for DreamWorks Animation's new 3D film Megamind, the tale of a blue, big-headed CGI villain who changes his course in life. "We all need a nemesis but sometimes we get off path," McGrath says. "Megamind gets off path as a baby, and really it's sort of about redemption. We can all be redeemed."

But not before he wreaks havoc in Metro City, or "Metrocity", as the pronunciation-challenged title character voiced by Will Ferrell likes to put it.

Never one to shy away from a good bombing, Megamind and his sidekick Minion (voiced by David Cross) use the tools they gathered while being raised in a penitentiary to terrorize the city and fight beefcake superhero Metro Man (Brad Pitt). When he finally destroys the hero, Megamind aims to create a new one in an unassuming camera man (Jonah Hill). But when that plan goes terribly awry -- and when he falls for local news reporter Roxanne Ritchi (Tina Fey) -- his life takes a turn.

"I loved this premise, which felt so original," says Ferrell, who shares some uncommon traits with his character.

"I have a lot of tight leather pants in a vault. I don't wear them, but I just keep them there. And there is a part of my body that I cannot comment on that is blue. It's just a genetic disorder."

Even within the confines of a recording studio, Ferrell (Old School, Curious George, The Other Guys, etc.) managed to put his own spin on Megamind's lines, as did fellow comedians Fey and Cross with their characters.

"I would say 30% of what we hear in the scenes is improvised," says McGrath (Madagascar). "Sometimes Will and Tina got to record together, but David would improvise one month and we'd get Will in next month and he'd play off what David had done, and we'd go back to David a month later."

Fey -- who took time from her schedule shooting NBC sitcom 30 Rock (and impersonating Sarah Palin) to record the voice of curvaceous heroine Roxy alongside her former Saturday Night Live castmate Ferrell -- was big on the fact that she didn't have to follow a script, or a dress code.

"I found the recording sessions very freeing because you can really try things," she says. "When you're improvising on film you're wasting film and you're wasting a cameraman's time. And it doesn't matter how you look while you're doing it. There's a complete absence of vanity."

Well, perhaps not for Ferrell.

"I didn't show up dressed up in T-shirts and sweats," he says, deadpan. "I was in a three-piece suit and full hair and makeup for every recording session because I view myself as a professional."

Ferrell, who's known for his physical antics, admits he had trouble articulating his emotions with just his voice. "Playing the comedy is one thing, but I think that the real skill is to effectively do that consistently."

Ferrell has still made it clear he's the voice behind the 'mind while generating hype for the film. In July he showed up at Comic Con in San Diego in a handmade Megamind costume -- big blue head and all. He also helped stage a world record-setting event where more than 1,500 people showed up dressed as their favourite superhero in L.A. earlier this month. And of course, DreamWorks has been promoting Megamind to death on Facebook and Twitter, and even released a video of the film's first five minutes to the web a couple weeks ago.

Not to mention, Megamind is riddled with pop-culture references. When training his self-made hero Tighten (Hill), Megamind morphs into "Space Dad," who looks like Ted Kennedy and sounds like Don Vito Corleone; Fey's Roxanne is the archetype of Superman's Lois Lane; AC/DC and the Jonas Brothers are on the soundtrack; even Cross' Minion looks an awful lot like Spider-Man's fishbowl-headed supervillain Mysterio -- though McGrath denies it.

"It wasn't so much pop-culture reference and it wasn't so much parody, as opposed to the comedy coming out of the character," the director says. "For example, when Tina would be doing a scene with Roxanne, she would think of three different alts on the line that were always much more funny.

"There were a couple things we referenced but we tried to keep the movie and the comedy coming exclusively from the characters they were playing."

What could have been one of the film's biggest buzz builders -- Mr. Pitt -- was MIA come publicity time, and had to make himself invisible when coming in to record as well.

"He pretty much had to ride his motorcycle into the recording studio," McGrath says of Pitt's paparazzi-avoiding tactics.

While Fey and Ferrell did record some -- ooo la la! -- loves scenes together, actors almost never cross paths when voicing roles for animated films. But McGrath says Megamind's cast sound "like they're speaking as one."

And even though Megamind is able to redefine the term "supervillain" the first time out, Ferrell hints that he might have a future.

"This experience was really gratifying to the point where it'd be fun to do another one."

Fey in a familiar role

BEVERLY HILLS -- Tina Fey finds herself in a very familiar spot in the new animated film Megamind: In front of the news camera.

"I am one of America's foremost fake reporters," says Fey, 40, who voices the character of journo Roxanne Ritchi in Megamind, opening Friday.

Fey gained faux-reporter cred playing a co-anchor on Saturday Night Live's Weekend Update for six years, and also works on a TV-show-within-a-show as Liz Lemon on her NBC sitcom 30 Rock.

In Megamind, she finds herself faking it again as Roxanne, a feisty heroine with whom Will Ferrell's title character falls madly in love.

"It's fun to step into this very archetypal Lois Lane type of character and I really like that in this story she's a modern version of that," Fey says. "She is active and intelligent and she looks like Sharon Osbourne -- a young Sharon Osbourne."

Not to mention, Roxanne has Barbie-like curves.

"I like her short hair and I like that she's a brunette -- and I like that she has an ample can, I'm not gonna lie to you."

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