Scott Pilgrim’s adventures popped out of the comic’s pages and onto screens for a television series adaptation, “Scott Pilgrim Takes Off.” The beloved cast of its previous movie rendition, “Scott Pilgrim vs the World,” all reprised their roles for their characters’ animated counterparts.
Pilgrim’s show released Nov. 17 this year, streaming only on Netflix. The show ranked seventh in Netflix’s Global Top 10 list for shows, with about 2 million views in its first two weeks of streaming.
Pilgrim, played by Michael Cera, is a hopeless romantic known only for strumming with his indie rock band. He meets his love interest, Ramona Flowers, played by Mary Elizabeth Winstead, but must defeat all seven of her exes in order to win her over.
The beginning plot is the same as previous installments, with Pilgrim complaining about his boring life and financial struggles. Then, one night at a party, Pilgrim spots Flowers—who he has only seen before in made up daydreams—for the first time in real life. As they warm up to each other, the founder of the ‘League of Ramona’s Evil Exes,’ Gideon Graves, played by Jason Schwartzman, awakes the council to strike up against the new rival posed for Ramona’s love.
After the first episode the series avoids rehashing the same plot by changing up a few major story beats. This shakes up expectations for older fans and provides a fresh new take on the retold story.
As for characters, despite Pilgrim being the face of the franchise, the focus is shifted away from him in this installment. Older fans have already heard Pilgrim’s sob-story and understand him as a character, however newer fans don’t see the same amount of Pilgrim in this series.
This change creates a downside to new audiences meeting the world for the first time through this show.
Despite this, the positive side is that less Pilgrim means more time with other characters within the universe. His absence results in the viewers following an unexpected protagonist who receives more development than people predicted.
Some characters that originally had a vague personality are now more fleshed out and have more meaningful interactions with the new main protagonist, Flowers, and plot. Characters surrounding Pilgrim also have had flaws that were not fully acknowledged previously. Not only are they acknowledged, but are also grown out of by the end of the season.
The result is an addition to the Pilgrim universe that feels like a love letter to established fans of the series. The show delivers through its characters and succeeded in taking such a risk by creating an entirely different what-if to the universe.
