MegaMind is the sparkling sleek and deferentially mature third outing from DreamWorks Animation — the other two being Shrek Forever After and the about-to-be-Oscar-nominated How to Train Your Dragon. On the meter it is flanked by originality, cliché and the customary cramming of compulsively referential material. In MegaMind’s case, the reference itself is the seed that becomes the baby.

MegaMind borrows heavily from Superman, and flips the setting to what if Lex Luthor was a bald, blue-skinned alien with a snappy-mouth and a scrawny persona, who crash lands on a prison for the criminally gifted outside Metro City after his planet is swallowed by a nasty black hole.

MegaMind’s mother and father put him in a space-pod, give him a sharp-toothed fish in an air-tight bowl as his guide and protector named Minion (voiced by David Cross who later parades around a big robotic suit). In their final moments his father says: “you are destined for…” before getting his last bit cut-off by a closing hatch. As Will Farrell, the voice of MegaMind recalls, “I didn’t hear that last part, but it sounded important.”

MegaMind’s main villain, and the film’s initial protagonist, is the one fate-ordained to greatness. Metro Man — a superhero celebrity rip-off of Superman with bulky shoulders, an over-puffed chest, dingy legs and a stretched chin — voiced by Brad Pitt (in according to my ears, his best vocal work for any animated feature). Metro Man was the next planet neighbour to MegaMind. Patently, his parents had the same idea before their planet was guzzled by the black hole.

The Lois Lane here is Roxanne Ritchie (Tina Fey) and the would-be Jimmy Olsen is Hal (Jonah Hill), her cameraman, who is also MegaMind’s second shot to salvation and an awkward pest in love with Roxanne.

Never mind the plot holes, because MegaMind is promptly paced. It manages to jog through its 96-minute running time without gobbling up scenes half-chewed or running out of breath.

Farrell’s MegaMind runs gags with the ferocity of a geeky-looser fanboy. In the film’s best sequences MegaMind, donning a holographic guise, guides a newly powered-up Hal to be the next superhero of the block. The guise he chooses is that of a midget Jor-El, complete with a picture perfect Brando parody.

MegaMind is rated PG-13. It features velvety action sequences, not-too-serious superheroes, a loser egg-shaped villain and a matter-dehydration/hydration gun that should be patented.

Released by DreamWorks Animation/Paramount, the film is directed with an eye for zealous 3D cinematography by Tom McGarth (both Madagascars); written by Alan Schoolcraft and Brent Simons; edited by Michael Andrews, featuring not-so-overbearing music by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe.

All this and not a peep about Pixar’s The Incredibles…oops.