Scott Pilgrim

Sometime in March or April of 2008, I heard that Edgar Wright, of Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead fame, was writing and directing a film adaptation of a comic series called Scott Pilgrim and that it would star Michael Cera. I love Edgar Wright, I love Michael Cera (note that this was just before Michael Cera fatigue swept a good portion the nation along with the backlash against Juno), so I immediately went and checked out the series and fell in love with it. I've eagerly anticipated each new volume (up to the final one, which released in July) and this movie ever since. I just recently finished re-reading the books and tonight I finally saw the film, so I figured it was about damn time I blogged about it.

The comics and the movie are really cut from the same cloth, so most of what I can say will apply to both, and the same can be said of the most common criticism: what's really at stake? By far the most common criticism of the movie was that it was hard to care about Scott and even harder to see why he was fighting for Ramona. That's a pretty legitimate complaint, until you take a closer look and see the point: None of this is about being in love. It's entirely about growing up. This relationship is just a catalyst, as they so often are.

Scott and Ramona are, quite frankly, the two least likable characters in this story. Scott is an idiot with no attention span, job, or prospects. He doesn't particularly care about anything and moves through life on a whim, unwittingly hurting people left and right, often times without even remembering how things went down. Ramona is slightly more responsible in that she at least has a job and her own apartment, but she's similarly capricious. The only difference is that she's fully aware of the hurt she's created and simply runs away from it any time it catches up.

Scott's battles with Ramona's exes simultaneously force him to fight for something for a change and make Ramona confront her own baggage and acknowledge that there are things and people in her life worth keeping around. Whether or not she's "the one" or Scott really loves her is hardly the question. The issue at hand is that both of them are realizing that we have to live in this world as it is, not as we'd prefer it to be. We can't live by mooching off our friends and wasting our time on idle fancies or by staying ahead of the inevitable changes. More importantly, we can't live our lives thinking we're the perfect hero of our story. We need to take charge of our affairs and of our faults and face the hard fact that reality is tough and being a good person in spite of that is tougher.

The book and the movie, which entered development and writing about halfway through the series, have different ways of letting Scott come to terms with these facts. In the movie, Wright has Scott acknowledge that he's fighting for himself and "earning the power of self-respect" when he confronts Gideon for the second time. This is slightly more straightforward and certainly happier than the comic's approach. In O'Malley's version, Scott encounters nega-Scott and he finally admits to himself what he's done and how many people he's hurt more than necessary by being willfully oblivious. Being the guilt-ridden penance junkie I am, I think I like this better, but both work well. In either case, Scott comes to terms with the fact that his life is his life, and he can't continue brushing it off if he wants it to turn around, and that's the important part.

So, that's my big reason for not caring a whole lot about whether Ramona appears to be worth fighting for. The other one is simply this: who are we to judge? As a rule, I've generally given up trying to figure out what it is that draws people to each other. We all have our own criteria, and it's hardly our place to judge. Most movies and books try to establish that people are right for one another with grand arm waving and a showiness that just doesn't happen in life. I prefer it when I'm allowed to just trust that these people are making the choice that they feel is best for them in their lives.

Not much else to say on the matter. The other big component is just the referential/stylistic component, which is the upfront draw. Both O'Malley and Wright have a near perfect understanding of homage and parody, and they keep the in-jokes coming at a blinding pace while keeping the bulk of the overt material readily accessible. Especially as a member of the in-group, I can't think of anything to complain about on this end.

Short version: Check out both the movie and the comics. They're not perfect, but you'll still be glad you did.