By: Bryan Lee O'Malley
Published by: Oni Press
Issues: Six Volumes
Came Out: 2004
I heard about this infamous comic series nearly a year ago and decided to take a dive-in to see what the fuss was about. I managed to make it through two-and-a-half volumes before I stopped. It was boring and outside of the parts I did like, I couldn't get into it. News of a movie, a game adaptation, and more fan praise forced me to try again recently. Surely I was just missing something? After all, it proudly caters to my geeky side with its abundance of video game lore. So I managed to sit down and read through all five of its currently planned six-issue series. EDIT: And now I managed to read all six of them.
Well, I didn't think it was boring this time, but unfortunately, I still can't see the appeal. Scott Pilgrim isn't a bad comic series - not in the least - and it delivers a lot of killer awesome moments other comics of its kind should take cues from, but I still found troubling moments within it that prevented me from fully absorbing it. To demonstrate how I feel, I've presented a pro and con chart to emphasizes my feelings for the comic. Pictures are larger then usual because this comic is in black and white and a smaller image will be harder to see them.
Art
Pros: Let's not mince words, I love the art. It's unique, it's different, and it's clearly the artist's distinct style. The characters have this adorable appeal with their big eyes and round faces, but he can be diverse and give them elongated gazes that are suited for a sultry former ex-girlfriend or a manly square chin for two buff Japanese twins. They're very simple designs, but he inputs smaller details such as individual lines of wavy hair, logos on character's shirts, etc. His clothing design are stylistically geeky without making it seem like they raided a cosplayer's closet (my personal favorites are pretty much anything Ramona wears and Knives' fighting attire - especially the scarf).
Cons: But for all intents and purposes, he does suffer from drawing the same six or so faces. This doesn't really bother me, but I really, really wished the comic was in color instead of its manga-ish black and white approach. Because it is devoid of it, I sometimes can't make heads and tails of who is who. The character Neil looks exactly the same as Scott with a minor hair change, Ramona goes through several hair style and color changes that I either think she's some new girl or a previously established character (I must have mistaken her for Kim like fifteen times). I usually end up figuring out its her if the characters call her name or if she's hanging around Scott. I got better recognizing them over time, but throughout the five volumes, I still feign confusion and had to do a double take to realize that isn't Kim, but Lisa I was looking at. It also doesn't help that there are many characters being introduced at a frequent pace and nearly 90% of them in the same scenes throughout the books, forcing me to exercise my eyes and figure out which talking head is which.
Story
Pros: The story and concept is an interesting look that requires you to suspend your disbelief. Scott's goal is to face and defeat Ramona's seven evil ex-boyfriends so they can be together. What we get is a homage to video games and I figured if anything would draw me to Scott's world, it would be the excessive game references (Come on! The band is named SEX BOM-OMB! How is that not the greatest pun ever?!). And the creator delivers: references are made to Mario, Sonic, Bomberman, Final Fantasy, the Mother series, etc. When Scott kills the boss (the ex-boyfriends), change comes flying out of them ("$2.19?! That's not even enough for the subway!"). He gets a 1-up after he's briefly mystified over his own floating head, and he quickly rushes to save his game before a boyfriend boss interrupts him. It's never explained why the boyfriends are evil nor why Scott has to defeat them (outside of sheer jealously, but given the circumstances, it's kind of an exaggerated excuse). We're given no backing on what mysterious forces causes Scott to gain experience points or a prized skateboard for defeating a boss. Hell, we're not told why several characters have super-special awesome fighting skillz. But the absurdity and major love letter to video games as a whole (especially platformers) would have been enough for me to suspend said disbelief. It is utterly good at paying its homage and makes for hilarity whenever Scott reacts to his bizarre situations...
Cons: ...But it's the general story structure that ultimately forces me to question its illogical offering. Reading the first volume will not prepare you for the madness and chaos that will ensue. For the first 2/3rds of issue one, Scott Pilgrim is a slice of life comedy that rarely emphasizes its implausible offering. Everybody acts like normal people and the world revolves around their problems and solutions like the real world would do. They talk about real life problems, concerns, and interests: Scott is a struggling young man who's in a struggling band. He gets in over his head over his dating issues - dating the one he may love, breaking up, cheating, and meeting several girls he wooed over the years. When he cheats on Knives for Ramona, she goes through pain and confusion. A character complains Scott is overdue with the videos he rented, and so forth. In short, it's as real as fictional writing can get. Then we suddenly see Scott busting out kicks and punches against the first boyfriend who challenges him. He counters with a squad of deadly cheerleaders and is ultimately defeated through the power of rock (see the first black and white pic above). It's...out there and I was left speechless after some 100+ pages of sedation.
What's worst is that this pattern continues throughout the series. One minute it's calm with realistic situations and stories, next ZOMG! epic battle of unbelievability. It is jarring. If the author wanted me to be so invested in the comic's bipolarity, I wished he would have done a better job merging the two elements. I also wished he gave us a warning, a sneak peek of the kind of craziness we would encounter in the beginning stages of the book. To put in comparison: No More Heroes has an equally bizarre story of Travis defeating assassins to reach the top alongside the average, everyday life of Santa Destroy. Instead of a boring tour around the city doing mundane tasks like flipping burgers or pumping gas, the game (both the first and second) opens with Travis beating the shit out of someone with a fuckin' lightsaber beam katana. It was the perfect opening for me to accept the out-of-touch nature of the plot.
Scott Pilgrim isn't as successful. I was prepared to take in the suspension of disbelief, but I couldn't because it's so broken from the rest.
Characters: Pros: One of things I love about Scott Pilgrim is how the characters talk and interact. Just take a read at its wikiquote entry: The characters ALL talk like how we (as in the we of their age) talks; casual and littered with stumbles and pop cultural references. They don't say anything outdated, they don't get so cliche with their dialogues to make me wonder what automatic scripting machine they came from, and the "Buffy Speak" are genuine. It's clear the creator knew what he was doing and I was fully impressed and convinced of their speech.
The main characters or the ones relevant to the plots are all genuinely likable. I didn't cater to Scott first. I didn't mind that he was a perpetual loser (though this is an annoying cliche for a lot of male protagonists), especially when he slowly develops into a better person (slowly but surely, but at a good pace), but I instantly disliked him when he cheated on poor Knives for Ramona simply because she was in his dreams before he met her for real. I'm suppose to root for their romance when he did something so despicable? Alright, Knives IS irritating in that curious, overall naive, hopeful romantic seventeen-year-old way, but dude, not cool. Thankfully, in Vol. 3, he did apologize for being a douche (and he does realize it). Later in the series, we also find out that love is not as one-sided as I suspected. O'Malley explores many different shades of romance and treats them neither as wrong or right or especially as wrong or right. Ramona is a girl of many secrets and as the book progresses, we get hints of her abilities and who (or what) she may be. Knives is a "Scottaholic" who is madly in love with him despite the cheating and eventual confessed love for Ramona. It's pathetic, but her devotion to him is oddly sweet and is an appropriate behavior for one her age and another observation of a type of love. The seven evil ex-boyfriends usually have short scenes, but they each have determination, passion, and personalities during their brief segments.
Cons: Too bad the same can't be said for the rest of Ramona and the other cast of characters. Ramona may have a mysterious side that has some interesting notion behind it waiting to be discovered, but out of the important characters, she lacks much of a personality; she fits two major roles: being secretive and being Scott's goal to obtain. Knives may have teenage naivety, but at least she is compelling. You know this comic is in trouble when the main female lacks anything of worth and it takes until the last volume to give Ramona any sense of insecurities and reactions that is beyond her role as the hero's girl.
Man, I don't want to have to write a con for the other characters, but if neither of the cast aren't central to the main plot, they're mostly dead weights. Now this isn't a bad thing. One of the ongoing subplots is the band trying to make it big. The problem is that I didn't care for anyone in it outside of Scott. They don't do much of anything to contribute to the main story (they're mostly spectators at best) and any subsequent changes to their backgrounds is ruined because they're so flat. They either possess a general, basic personality or just bodies spouting snappy one-liners. The five volumes continuously introduce more and more characters, but most of them are simply uninteresting and unneeded. Scott's little sister? Who cares? What does she do? Julie and her roommate? Whatever. Those two chicks who works in the same store Scott is eventually employed? Fuck them. I don't give a damn about. This provides a key problem with the story because I'm suppose to endure their bullshit, but I just kept crying for the goddamn action to come because it kept dragging on. This, like the story juxtaposition above, wouldn't be a giant concern...if the characters were in any sense, intriguing.
Wallace may be the possible exception; he provides a nice, calmer contrast to Scott's hyperactivity and provides a refreshing look at gays in the media by exhibiting none of its tiresome stereotypes. He is, for all intents and purpose, a normal guy. No more, no less.
Scott Pilgrim isn't a bad graphic novel at all. When it works its elements right, they do it right and they are always, always fun. The dialogues are funny, entertaining, and true to our culture and the art designs are different and amusing to look at. It has enough charm that I was able to be enthralled for a few hours (and the story does up the ante by Vol. 4), but it's not enough for me to buy them or get into the fandom. So yeah, maybe I do understand what it was doing and why us geeks adore it; I just can't get past its flaws to see its full potential appeal. I think it's an acquired taste and unfortunately, I'm not part of it.
6/10
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Article written in: Jul. 3, 2010
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