Pow! Crack! Whap! These are sounds that you most likely hear during bar room brawl or the campy version of Batman. But these sounds of pain belong to Bryan Lee O’Malley’s epic love story comic book called Scott Pilgrim or what its upcoming film poster describes as an epic of epicness. In this indie comic story, our title hero faces what every guy will eventually come across with the love of his life — the issue of her exes. In the case of Canadian bassist bum for Sex Bob-omb! Scott Pilgrim, he must face them literally in a head-to-head combat. And as his charming and chic Ramona Flowers corrects him, she says “defeat” her seven evil ex-boyfriends to continue dating her.
Battle Royale
And what ensues in each volume of Scott Pilgrim is a battle royale against one of her super powered and Ninja-trained ex-boyfriends. As awesome as the concept already is, creator O’Malley churns out a perfect pop mish-mash of east and west graphic storytelling. He does this by balancing the silliness of Japanese Manga seemingly well with the pop culture/emo sensibilities of western indie tales that Scott Pilgrim inhabits. The outcome of this creative tussle is a formula that is entertainingly simple to read that you can’t put it down.
Scott Pilgrim’s Asian influence is evident in the fight scenes that are teeming with glowing energy and electricity everywhere, a la Dragonball Z and Street Fighter. The theme of the brawls is drawn from videogames and you can’t help but snicker at it as energy bars appear and the word Fight! appears in bold letters. It is a showdown that only a videogaming generation would understand.
On the inside, Scott Pilgrim’s Manganess comes from his blind optimism that cannot be denied as sunshine rays appear at his back to push him on. Like any Manga such Ghost Fighter or Macross, our zero hero believes that he’ll do his best in every fight even if his girlfriend Ramona has a glowing uneasiness about the arrival of her exes, especially the last one, Gideon. His charming character flaw is something that makes readers like myself cheer and jeer at him at the same time.
Welcome To Slackerville
At the same time, Pilgrim’s Ontario city universe is similar to Kevin Smith’s Clerks and Silent Bob and Jay series that was also published by Oni Press. In short, it is slackerville with quirky personalities tossing pop culture references a lot. The center of slackerville is again our bass guitar- wielding hero Pilgrim who lives with his wealthy gay roommate Wallace who waits to pay for lunch and all as he hangs out with his basement band and his 16-year-old girlfriend groupie Knives.
As the series presses play and continues, Scott learns to be independent from the coins he gets from beating Ramona’s evil ex-boyfriends. He eventually buys his own stuff and moves out of the house, too. So, the series is also a tale of how love saved the slacker, like many western teen punk dramas such as Trainspotting.
A Genuine American Manga
And after the series ends this July, the future for this street-fighting slacker looks rather bright. You’ll see the Scott Pilgrim phenomenon grow after the film, starring Michael Cerra who perfected the awkward teen silence, hits the theaters this August. The trailer that magnetically drew me into the series captures the fight scenes very well with a comic timing of a bam and kapow that would do Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill proud.
You’ll see Scott Pilgrim mimics everywhere as kids start to believe that life is a videogame. This isn’t so bad compared to the vampire virus the past years. Most of all, it is a fun way to teach audiences around the world where people are scared to risk anything for comfort. There are always heroes willing to fight for love in whatever form even if it involves seven evil ex-boyfriends.
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Scott Pilgrim available in bookstores and comic shops. Watch the trailer at http://www.scottpilgrimthemovie.com.
E-mail me at readnow@supreme.ph.