By Gem M.
Bryan Lee O’Malley continues to be a legendary name in the comic industry. For those who don’t know, O’Malley created Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, which unbeknownst to him at the time, would go on to get a popular movie adaptation, animated show, and multiple runs of the book series in publication. At San Diego Comic-Con 2024, fans celebrated their love of Scott Pilgrim with him and were excited to hear O’Malley’s thoughts in the “20 Years of Scott Pilgrim with Bryan Lee O’Malley” panel.
The panel kicked off when O’Malley recalled his first comic-con and how he was supposed to submit the comic to be printed but he didn’t do so in time. This led him to not have anything to showcase at the convention which earned a laugh from both him and the audience. He then talked about how he started making comics and how it eventually led to Scott Pilgrim coming to life.
“I knew I wanted to make comics,” O’Malley said while he answered questions from the moderator. When O’Malley tried to get serious he made Lost at Sea, which his friends said was a very emotional as a comic. As a result, O’Malley wanted to make a different type of comic. One that would make people laugh…
That comic would end up being Scott Pilgrim.
O’Malley then went on to explain that he put all his experiences in that comic and it led “to a beautiful thing” to be made. Most of the inspiration and creativity he got was from the manga boom at that time. He then went on to explain Scott’s influences from shonen manga.
“A little dumb and has inconsistent ideals,” is how O’Malley describes Scott’s overall character.
The moderator then points out that Scott Pilgrim is inspired from an indie band who had a song with that name. O’Malley agrees and then further explains that he chose that particular name because he loves the band and song. In addition, he tells the audience that he was going to name Lost at Sea originally Scott Pilgrim, but it wasn’t fitting, and so he wanted to save it for later.
O’Malley then answered a question about his musical background. Fans got to hear about his band experience days and how music was a part of his family. Which explains why there is a lot of music involved in the series.
Another topic the moderator asked O’Malley was how he created such dynamic movement in the character despite the drawings having no actual movement at all. He answered by simply drawing the characters with an animated face or movements just like the ones in manga. Afterwards, someone asked which character he related to most. To which, O’Malley replied:
“I feel like i’m all of them.”
The panel wouldn’t be complete without the talk about the popular character, Ramona Flowers. The question came up of how Ramona was conceptualized. O’Malley replied, “Girls were a mystery to me.” He adds that while he was writing about her, he was trying to understand women. He projected himself in her character since he didn’t know much about women.
This was important because fashion of the characters was important to O’Malley. When he was writing or drawing characters he wanted to make them feel distinctive with their own identity. For instance, the seven evil exes had its own interesting origins. When he was designing those characters, he had to introduce them very quickly and early in the story.
O’Malley wanted to make a film of Scott Pilgrim work which is how the seven evil exes were created before the whole series was released. In fact, O’Malley compares Gideon, the main evil ex, to a guy he met at a bar who was rude. Which the audience laughed at.
The conversation then shifted to talking about how Scott Pilgrim slowly changed it’s art style from the beginning of the series till the end. O’Malley believed that happened because each time he was drawing, it would be improving at the same time. And not because he wanted to change his art style.
Edgar Wright, the director of the big movie adaption, was already invested in the series when O’Malley gave him access to volume 1. He tells the audience that the reason why he let Wright take the reign on creating the live-action film was because of Shaun of the Dead. O’Malley got to watch the film first before anyone else could. As he watched the film he realized there that Wright was the real deal and he could trust him to make it happen. Admitting Wright was being as faithful as he can to the books as the film was being created.
It was here where fans then learned what O’Malley thought of the animated series. The main reason for the animated series was because O’Malley is now different and older than he was 20 years ago. He admits that he wanted to go off the cliff and risk it with the animation.
“I wanted to make something that feels alive to me”, O’Malley said. He admitted there was no intention to retell the story and that “Scott Pilgrim isn’t a manga”. So he thought it would be more fun doing it differently.
As the panel was ending with Q and A and his fans, O’Malley tells his fans that he always wanted to create a community… and he did! With that community he built he was able to celebrate 20 years of Scott Pilgrim at SDCC with his fans.
Miss any of our earlier SDCC ’24 coverage? Find it all here!
