Scott Pilgrim

Scott Pilgrim
Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 1 cover. Art by Bryan Lee O'Malley.
Publication information
Publisher	Oni Press
Format	Digest limited series
Genre	Comedy Action Romance Fantasy Drama
Publication date(s)	August 18, 2004 – July 20, 2010
Main character(s)	(List of characters)
Creative team
Written by	Bryan Lee O'Malley
Artist(s)	Bryan Lee O'Malley
Collected editions
Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life	ISBN
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World	ISBN
Scott Pilgrim & The Infinite Sadness	ISBN
Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together	ISBN
Scott Pilgrim vs. The Universe	ISBN
Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour	ISBN

Scott Pilgrim is a series of graphic stories by Bryan Lee O'Malley. The series is about Canadian Scott Pilgrim, a slacker and part-time musician who lives in Toronto and plays bass guitar in a band. He falls in love with American delivery girl Ramona Flowers, but must defeat her seven evil exes in order to date her.

The series consists of six digest size black-and-white volumes, released between August 2004 and July 2010, by Portland-based independent comic book publisher Oni Press. It was later republished by Fourth Estate, an imprint of HarperCollins. On March 31, 2012, O'Malley announced the series will be released in full-colour hardback editions beginning August 2012 and concluding sometime in 2014. The colour versions, coloured by Nathan Fairbairn, were released in said timeframe, with the final colour volume being released in April 2014.

A film adaptation of the series titled Scott Pilgrim vs. the World starring actor Michael Cera in the title role was released in August 2010. A video game adaptation developed by Ubisoft for PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade was released the same month.

Creator Bryan Lee O'Malley was inspired to create the series and eponymous character of Scott Pilgrim after listening to Canadian band Plumtree's 1998 single "Scott Pilgrim", a song then-Plumtree singer Carla Gillis describes as "positive, but...also bitter sweet." In particular, O'Malley was inspired by the lyric, "I’ve liked you for a thousand years."

O'Malley wanted to write a shōnen-style comic book series, although he had only read one such series at the time, Ranma 1/2; in the early 2000s, Japanese manga had not yet achieved significant popularity in North America. O'Malley gained inspiration from the book Even a Monkey Can Draw Manga by Koji Aihara and Kentaro Takekuma. In 2002, O'Malley's roommate, who worked in a comic book store, brought the book to him while O'Malley was working on Lost at Sea and was planning Scott Pilgrim. Upon reading the book O'Malley realized that, despite the satirical tone, it could be an effective guide on how the Japanese comic book industry worked. O'Malley said that Ranma 1/2 was the strongest influence and Atsuko Nakajima, the character designer of the Ranma 1/2 anime and other anime, was an influence to a lesser extent. He added that the "exploded page layouts" of Koudelka, a work by Yuji Iwahara, directly influenced the "full-bleed layouts" of Scott Pilgrim. O'Malley said that Osamu Tezuka began influencing his work as he created Volumes 3 and 4. He said, "You can see his influence start to creep in here and there but he’s a larger inspirational figure to me than just his drawing style." In regards to the FLCL anime, O'Malley said that while it was an influence, it was "not as much of a direct influence on Scott Pilgrim as people seem to think."