It seems that with the passing of another week is another review of another installment of the Scott Pilgrim saga. I have seen this saga from the first volume where it was basically little more than gags with an excuse plot to the third one where everything shifted into focus even if it was at the expense of gags. So now we are at the fourth volume of Scott Pilgrim and once again the big question is will it follow the pattern of each volume being slightly worse than the previous one. Well, we will find out as we dive into Scott Pilgrim Gets it Together.
It's the same old story by now, Scott Pilgrim and Ramona Flowers are going out and very much in love and stuff. Ramona's evil exes, that Scott must fight and defeat to win Ramona's love, hasn't come bothering him in a couple months and life is going good. Then Ramona kinda sorta demands that Scott stops his slacking ways and get a job. From there, things quickly go to hell as the next evil ex shows up and it's a half-ninja WOMAN! And one of Scotts former high-school friends show up causing tension between Scott and Ramona! And then there's Knives Chau, Scott's 17 year old ex high school girlfriend, father shows up with a sword ready to kill!
At first, I was a bit put off by how the writing evolved from a gag-a-page type of graphic novel into something that was being infused with a sense of maturity and character development. I wanted to laugh, not feel emotions about Scott Pilgrim. But like it or not, ever since the second volume the characters have been getting some good character development and I have been starting to care about them since the third volume. Now with this, the shift from characters to say funny things to real characters who say things that happen to be funny is complete. Every action and dialogue has some weight to it and it makes everything that much richer and fuller to experience.
And boy do we need that substance since this volume's evil ex is the worst one yet with Roxanne. I'm not saying she's the worst since she's the most evil but I'm saying she's the worst since she's horribly boring. All she does is do half-assed ninja things, appropriate since she is half-ninja, and gets real pissy when Scott accidentally punches her in the boob. There's no depth like Todd in volume 3 nor is she even endearing like Matthew Patel or Lucas Lee in the other two volumes. Thankfully she's in like a tenth of the book and even Knives revenge-driven father has a slightly bigger part.
This volume is the best one since the first volume and better than the previous two volumes. It still has everything you want in Scott Pilgrim with hilarity and video game references but it's more real. The characters, the situations and even the dialogue has substance to create this rich world. The only flaw is how poorly done Roxanne is but in the grand scheme of this volume, she barely matters. If you get this at this stage of the game, you'll know you'll like it.
9/10
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