So Scott Pilgrim wasn't perfect. Although I'd read some of the books before watching the film, I went to see it with friends who were less familiar with it and, therefore, what it would be like. (Mind you, I always find suggesting films to people a faintly traumatic experience.) But much as I love Edgar Wright — of which more, I suspect, later — I'm not sure that I don't agree with David Cox's assertion,
over on Guardian.co.uk, that "After the second fight, the knowledge that there are five more to come induces mild panic". There was a
lot of fighting.
And fighting, particularly as fighting as woosh-y and pretty as this, is not in itself a bad thing. All of the fighting, though, crammed from six books into one film, did sometimes feel like it had squeezed out some of the character development. Yes, Scott Pilgrim's ability to have a string of relationships with incredibly attractive and cool people while continuing to be something of an idiot is remarkable. But the secondary characters, in particular, are ones that I'd have liked to have spent more time with.
But... but... So much of it worked, and worked in a characteristically Edgar Wright way, that it does feel a little churlish to be too negative. The cinematography was as inventive and as, well, as animated as you'd expect. The bits where the scene changed, mid-conversation, were inspired. There was a bit with a giant hammer.
Maybe it's just that, in a film featuring contributions from Wright, Beck and Nigel Godrich, I expected to be completely won over. And I was, nearly. But not quite.