Scott Pilgrim Takes Off Provides Something The Comic And Movie Never Did
This piece contains spoilers for "Scott Pilgrim Takes Off."
The "Street Fighter"-inspired directive in Bryan Lee O'Malley's "Scott Pilgrim" comic and its Edgar Wright-directed 2010 movie adaptation is a simple one: 23-year-old Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera) must defeat the seven Evil Exes of Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) in order to date her. He kicks all of their butts and does some soul-searching to better himself for Ramona. Loosely inspired by O'Malley's early adulthood, the Toronto-set "Scott Pilgrim" is a superlative tale about starting new relationships after messy breakups and the past romantic ties that haunt you and your new partner. In Scott's world of video game vernacular and shōnen-inspired duels, an ex might try to behead their ex's new beau with a ninja katana.
Almost two decades after the first "Scott Pilgrim" comic, the "Scott Pilgrim Takes Off" Netflix anime (animated by Science SARU, directed by Abel Góngora) signifies that O'Malley rethought Ramona's dynamic with her Evil Exes. Flipping the script of his comic and the movie adaptation (penned by Wright and Michael Bacall), Scott abruptly disappears during his destined fight with her first Evil Ex (Satya Bhabha), so the seemingly aloof Ramona can take the reins of her romantic history as she investigates the matter. No longer does she rely on Scott to punch her Evil Exes into oblivion to clear her past baggage. She has to confront her past head-on to contemplate her future with Scott.
Ramona and Roxie
Ramona had good reasons to leave her exes, but she stayed self-aware that many of those breakups had to do with her infidelities and fickleness. Before, Ramona's contrition mostly concerned the health of her current love life with Scott, rather than the emotional collateral she left behind. If O'Malley wanted to tackle Ramona's checkered past in a new light for the anime, it hits as an instinctive choice that Ramona's first confrontation would be with the temperamental Roxie Richter (Mae Whitman), her only known Evil Ex-girlfriend and ninja college roommate, given how Ramona often treats her past with Roxie with flippancy. Ramona also once insisted, "Relax. It was a phase," a line that was amplified in Wright's film as the more dismissive "It was just a phase ... it meant nothing."
When knowing the "Volume 4" source material, the original annihilation of Roxie (where she explodes into woodland creatures) feels ruder than the movie adaptation for a few reasons: Ramona was on speaking and make-out terms with her and they bickered like a couple. It's clear Roxie was an ex who meant something to her and shaped her (and taught her all her fighting prowess). Meanwhile, Scott was undergoing a reunion and romantic tension with his old schoolmate, Lisa Miller (who also appeared in an Adult Swim-produced "Scott Pilgrim" animated short to commence the 2010 movie, and was voiced by Whitman), who had a one-sided crush on him. These parallel meetings convey the emotional complications of romantic histories compromising your current relationship. Scott's meeting with Lisa is treated with awkward amiability with some bittersweet understanding, whereas Roxie simply just fades from their consciousness and Ramona doesn't reckon with why she displayed some attachment to Roxie.
Friendship
Restoring Ramona and Roxie's bickering exes moment, the anime now illustrates some of their good ole' days and their breakup. And it wasn't so much a breakup as Ramona bailing out on an emotionally vulnerable Roxie without a word. Having no Scott Pilgrim to beat up, Roxie exerts her rage at Ramona in an epic fight of Science SARU's surreality, teleporting their battle across several movie genres. Roxie screams this heartbreaking line, "All I wanted was for you to see me!" The battle culminates into something that Ramona didn't do in the source material: tearfully apologize for the way she left Roxie, grasping the gravity of what she left behind. Because reconciliation takes time, it takes a while for Roxie's grudge to die down. Both concede they have been immature during their college years and decide to be friends. By giving Roxie and Ramona this understanding, it does more than the movie to not reduce Ramona's one queer relationship as a chuckle-worthy chapter in her past or a biphobic micro-aggression like a "sexy phase" (which queer writers have critiqued). They demonstrate that a painful breakup can be reshaped into an existence of healing together.
It's a refreshing 180 from the older sources. In this anime's new timeline, Ramona gets to meaningfully engage her past and even her antagonist exes get a chance to move on with life. Ramona and Roxie's anime scene also stands in for the "closure" between Scott and Envy Adams in the comic, highlighting how O'Malley chose to re-center Ramona in her romantic history when her love life was previously filtered through Scott's lenses.
The Different Shapes of Closure
Right after reconciling with Roxie, Ramona also engages in a tenuous reconnection with Hollywood bad boy Lucas Lee (Chris Evans), a high school ex she cheated on, in episode 4 "Whatever." By opening the episode with Lucas' point-of-view, the anime's scenario hits as more sympathetic to the brooding Lucas in "Volume 2" of the comic, given that Lucas wept in front of Scott when recounting Ramona's infidelity. In those pages, his lament was framed as a warning to Scott about the perils of dating Ramona. As in the comic, the anime lays bare Lucas' lingering hurt, but instead of skateboarding to his death on Scott's dare, he makes peace with the fact that his breakup with Ramona inspired his acting ambitions, making him the person he is today. His career and jerkwad persona are practically built on this angst and made him feel big, bigger than when he felt worthless over Ramona's dumping. So when Lucas lets his career fall into shambles, it can be read as him finally letting go of his grief for what might have been with Ramona. In the finale, he finds satisfaction in a new beginning as a hot barista.
From then on in the anime's timeline, most of Ramona's exes move on with their lives and new infatuations. Even Ramona gives a then-downtrodden Gideon (Jason Schwartzman), the worst of her exes, a warning to better himself for his new girlfriend, Julie (Audrey Plaza). Otherwise, when restored to power, Gideon still has his villainous eye on Ramona and Scott for whatever reason in the mid-credits stinger. Regardless, "Scott Pilgrim Takes Off" takes measures to illustrate the various shapes of post-breakup life. Exes don't always have to be "K.O."-ed out of existence.
"Scott Pilgrim Takes Off" is currently available to stream on Netflix.