“Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” is a bit of a visual spectacle with killer karate that has no basis in reality. Okay, yes, it’s wicked cool to watch the “K.O”s and the kicking and the punching and the skating and the comic book words that pop onto the screen, but at no time does any of it really make any sense. Cera plays Scott Pilgrim, a base player and member of the band “Sex Bob-Omb” (really?). Pilgrim falls for the beautiful Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) who has seven evil exes, each of which he must defeat to win her heart – nothing new to reveal that the trailers haven’t already.
Director Edgar Wright, best known for “Shaun of the Dead” and “Hot Fuzz”, throws absolutely everything at us including video game referenced, comic book reference, and even sitcom references at us to distract from the plot holes. How does a guy like Pilgrim get a girl like Flowers, and how the hell does he and all the evil exes develop super powers? Blah.. who cares it’s fun to watch, right?
There isn’t enough here to keep one entertained for the duration of the film. Some funny moments and a lot of good martial arts moves don’t make it palatable for the almost 2 hours. The action sequences are a nice distraction included to keep the audience from going “huh” during the entire movie.
Maybe I had to be an actual Super Mario Brother to get what was going on in this film. Perhaps director Wright was trying to show us how complicated love is by portraying the barriers one has to break as “evil exes” and in order for a woman to love you, you have to break those barriers down. Ehh… Who knows, makes as much sense as this movie does.
“Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” is visually stylish with great fight scenes (super hero/comic book movie styled) with awesome ninja moves. Maybe it would have been more enjoyable with a little explanation of the “alternate universe” that seems to have been created for this film.
