A wildly fun Canadian rock adventure about relationships.
Summary:
Boy meets girl. Boy dates girl. Boy must defeat her seven evil exes? Scott Pilgrim is in love with Ramona Flowers. But they both have pasts. For one, Scott may have cheated on his old girlfriend to date Ramona. For another, Ramona's exes have formed a league to destroy her current love interest. Will their relationship survive?
Verdict: 6/10
Having seen the movie before and with the anime soon to be released, I figured I should go back and read the original Scott Pilgrim series. I think I did enjoy the movie better as it sped up certain plot points, but overall the series was good and provided fun bonus content.
One of the things I liked most in comparison to the movie was that you got to spend more time with the side characters. There was so much more depth to Envy, Kim, Knives and Ramona. Knives' dad may have been one of my favorite parts that wasn't in the movie, along with the fight with NegaScott (the only villain I thought the movie did better was the twins.) And Scott's history and own journey was explained in more detail. It really added to the theme of self-appreciation and being conscientious of the relationships you're in.
Maybe the biggest drawback I have with both the books and movie is everything is driven around Scott's quest for Ramona... but I don't really like Ramona. Her character was a bit bland, and she tends to use people. And Scott is the same way! It makes them an unlikely and somewhat unlikeable power couple. But they do grow throughout the story which I guess is the point.
The story could use clarification at some points too. Between the time jumps, lack of transition and the coloring, I got a little confused at times. The black and white made it difficult to identify some characters (for me specifically, I mixed up Scott and Young Neil, or Lisa and Kim, or even Julie and Envy sometimes). So I probably should have opted for the colorized version.
The cartoon video game style fit the story perfectly. The author could experiment with actions too bizarre to do in a realistic format or that would be too bland without the visual. O'Malley interwove cool additions like providing the chords to the reader so we can play the songs or describing a recipe so we can cook it if we want. I appreciate intentionality, and that was very apparent throughout the series.
All six volumes were artfully crafted and unique in every way. From the plot to the style to the characters, this perfectly captured the struggles of dating and being in that awkward phase after college... but with the added fun of telepathic vegans and ninjas and stuff.
Comments