Trivia / Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

Trivia Tropes:

• Acclaimed Flop: Despite its niche appeal, the quirky story and humor went over extremely well with critics. Because of the niche appeal, however, it ended up a Box Office Bomb and didn't recover its budget until it was released on DVD.
• Actor-Shared Background: Alison Pill, Michael Cera, and Ellen Wong are all actual Canadians, while Mary Elizabeth Winstead plays an American expatriate. Pretty much everyone else are Americans pretending to be Canadians. Brie Larson is notable for being of French Canadian descent playing a character originally from Montreal.
• All-Star Cast: Retroactive Recognition is at work here, as at the time of the film's production, only Michael Cera and Brandon Routh really had any mainstream recognition, due to their roles in Arrested Development and Superman Returns respectively. That said, the cast includes a number of actors who have since achieved prominence: Kieran Culkin, Chris Evans, Anna Kendrick, Brie Larson, Alison Pill, Aubrey Plaza, Jason Schwartzman, Mae Whitman and Ellen Wong.
• Box Office Bomb: Budget: $60 million. Worldwide gross: $47 million.
• Cast the Expert:
  • The stunt doubles of Lucas Lee are the actual stunt doubles for Chris Evans. Only a quarter of the doubles resemble Evans.
  • Lynette Guycott, the drummer for The Clash at Demonhead, is played by Tennessee Thomas, the drummer for the indie rock band The Like and the daughter of Elvis Costello & The Attractions drummer Pete Thomas.
• The Cast Showoff:
  • Edgar Wright deliberately choreographed the fight between Ramona and Roxie to show off Mary Elizabeth Winstead's gymnastic abilities and Mae Whitman's dancing.
  • Brie Larson, already established as a singer, got to further showcase her vocal talent as Envy with her cover of "Black Sheep".
  • Unlike Alison Pill and Mark Webber, Michael Cera was already very skilled at the instrument he plays in Sex Bob-Omb (bass guitar), and it shows in how much more confidence and flair he puts into playing. In fact, he had to learn how to play badly for the role to sound more convincingly like an amateur.
• Completely Different Title:
  • Latin America: Scott Pilgrim vs. The Exes of the Girl of His Dreams
  • Greece: Scott Pilgrim vs. the 7 Exes
  • Israel: The Exes of My Girlfriend
  • Japan: Scott Pilgrim vs. Evil Ex-Boyfriend Corps
  • Taiwan: Crooked Boy Scott
• Cut Song: A third song by Crash and the Boys was cut from the film. The song was a shorter version of "We Hate You, Please Die" — the version that plays in the film was originally titled "Last Song Kills Audience" (the original version can be seen in the Deleted Scenes).
• Dawson Casting:
  • Knives Chau (17 years old) is played in the film by Ellen Wong (24 years old around the time of filming). Scott Pilgrim, by contrast, is 22 in the film, though Michael Cera was 20 at the beginning of filming, adding a bit of meta humor to the idea that Cera's character is dating someone significantly younger than him. Lampshaded by the 24-year-old Wong:
    Knives: He only likes [Ramona] because she's really old! She's probably, like, 25!
  • "Rated T for Teen" Stacey Pilgrim is 18 in the film and is explicitly Scott's younger sister. Anna Kendrick was not only 24 around the time of filming but is actually three years older than Michael Cera.
  • 20-year old "Young Neil" was actually 23-year-old Johnny Simmons, two years older than Cera himself.
• Dyeing for Your Art:
  • Michael Cera underwent martial arts training for the film's fight scenes and enjoyed it so much he started training for real, making him a real-life example of Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass; he still looks like a complete wimp, but now he's a complete wimp with a black belt.
  • Allison Pill and Mark Webber both learned the drums and how to sing (respectively) to more convincingly perform their roles in Sex Bob-Omb. The only thing dubbed in was Stephen's guitar, as Webber admitted that he struggled to learn it enough to convincingly play.
• Executive Meddling:
  • The studio originally wanted the film to be shot in New York, and Edgar Wright had to insist on using the comic's setting of Toronto.
  • The use of Metric's "Black Sheep" for the movie was subject to a protacted back and forth. The filmmakers initially went to Metric to write an original song for the movie, choosing Metric as Envy Adams was inspired by the band's frontwoman Emily Haines. It's unknown if they did so and the filmmakers didn't like it or if the band just didn't do it, however, as Brie Larson listened to a lot of Metric while researching for Envy's character and upon hearing "Black Sheep", she came to the conclusion that the lyrics sounded like Envy singing about Scott,^note in reality, "Black Sheep" was written sometime before or during 2009 for Metric's Fantasise album, but didn't make the cut and was left off the album, being released on its own in 2010 before the film was released, and decided that the song was perfect for the movie, so the writers went back to Metric and asked for the rights to use "Black Sheep" instead. Metric agreed, but soon there was a disagreement on who would sing it. Edgar Wright (and Larson) wanted it to be covered by Larson, likely because Larson and Haines voices don't sound similar (especially because Haines's voice in "Black Sheep" is heavily autotuned) and Larson has a background as a singer, even having released an album back in the day. However, Metric wanted the original version with Emily Haines's voice instead, most likely due to the song being very personal for Haines (she wrote the song herself about an ex-boyfriend). They ultimately made an agreement to have Haines's version on the soundtrack and to have Larson's only in the movie, and even then the song in the movie is cut early on, so the audience can't really hear Larson's version in its entirety, and the deal extended to Metric not allowing Larson to sing the song publicly. However, Larson's version began to be demanded by fans, especially after Wright was allowed to post the full Larson version to YouTube for the movie's promotion. It wasn't until 2020 when Metric finally caved and posted Larson's full version on their YouTube channel and gave Larson permission to sing a small snippet of it on her own channel.
• Fake Nationality:
  • Matthew Patel is played in the film by British actor Satya Bhabha. Justified in that he moved from London to Chicago when he was 12 and is currently based in New York. Edgar Wright originally didn't plan on casting British actors in his first American film, but was fooled by Bhabha's accent and had no idea he was born in the UK.
  • Many American actors play fake Canadians, mostly notably Kieran Culkin and Anna Kendrick.
• Focus Group Ending: The original ending had Scott ending up with Knives as Ramona left on her own. After showing it to test audiences, the ending was changed to its current form, where Scott ends up with Ramona. Edgar Wright, Bryan Lee O'Malley, and most of the actors have all testified to being more satisfied with the new ending. Additionally, when the film script was being written, the last volume of the graphic novel hadn't been finished yet. When Bryan Lee O'Malley, the original writer, decided to have a happier ending than he originally planned, they also changed the film's ending to match.
• God Never Said That: According to O'Malley, the serial killer ending (which would have revealed that Scott was just imagining the story and was really a psychopath who'd murdered seven people) was nothing more than a joke that Edgar Wright had made up and never seriously considered to be part of the film.
• Incidental Multilingual Wordplay:
  • Wallace tells Scott to break out the L-word, which is "love", not "lesbians". This is rendered effortlessly into Japanese with breaking out the re-word, which is "ren'ai" (true love), not "rezu".
  • That part's French translation is "the A-word" because "love" is "amour" in French. Replacing "lesbian" is "abstinence", which somehow works in practice (translated back):
  Wallace: You have to break out the A-word.
  Scott: Abstinent?
  Wallace: The other A-word.
  Scott: ... abstinence?
  (later, to Ramona)
  Scott: I'm abstinent with you.
  Ramona: What?
• International Coproduction: This film is an international co-production of Japan, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
• Irony as She Is Cast: Michael Cera was the only actor in Sex Bob-Omb who was actually an accomplished musician, and while Alison Pill and Mark Webber had to learn how to play their instruments well enough for their roles, Cera actually had to learn how to play badly to be a more believable amateur.
• Meme Acknowledgement: Both Chris Evans and Edgar Wright commented on the "Captain America vs. Lucas Lee" image.
• Orphaned Reference:
  • "Is that seriously the end of the story?" — Originally, this was Kim's response to Scott's flashback about how he met Knives on the bus (she dropped her books, he picked them up), later echoed by Ramona when she hears it from Knives. The flashback scene was cut in the final version.
  • In an early, discarded version of Scott and Ramona's first date, Ramona was seen lighting a cigarette, saying she smokes only on special occasions. Scott was supposed to be echoing her after his battle with Roxy, when he says he only drinks on special occasions.
  • Scott's line "If I peed my pants, would you pretend I just got wet from the rain?" makes sense in the book because it actually was raining when he said it. It's arguably funnier without the rain.
• Queer Character, Queer Actor:
  • Roxie Richter is Ramona's ex-girlfriend. Her actress Mae Whitman would later come out as pansexual in August 2021.
  • Gay actor Ben Lewis plays Wallace's boyfriend "Other" Scott.
• Real Life Writes the Plot: Lucas Lee's response of "Why wouldn't you be?" when Wallace says he's a big fan is taken from the Edgar Wright's first meeting with Jason Schwartzman, where the actor said this in joking response to Wright saying the same thing.
• Romance on the Set:
  • Michael Cera and Aubrey Plaza dated for a while after shooting this film.
  • Anna Kendrick and director Edgar Wright began a relationship after meeting on the set of this film; the relationship ended in 2013.
• Saved from Development Hell: Probably due to the fact that only the first book was released when the project was greenlit. Edgar Wright was dead set on casting Michael Cera as Scott from the beginning, but he was around 16 at the time. He was a much more reasonable 20 by the time filming commenced.
• Serendipity Writes the Plot:
  • According to Michael Cera's commentary track, the hat Scott put on every time someone mentioned his hair also served a practical purpose on at least one occasion: Michael wore a helmet under it during Scott's fight against Lucas Lee's stunt doubles, one of whom broke a skateboard against his head.
  • The actors for the Katayanagi Twins, Keita and Shota Saitou, couldn't speak English so their role in the movie was drastically reduced from the comic, giving them no lines or backstory and the least amount of screen time of all the Evil Exes.
• Throw It In!:
  • According to the DVD trivia track, Comeau's line of how "the comic is better than the movie" wasn't in the script, but Comeau's actor threw it in because Bryan Lee O'Malley was visiting the set that day.
  • That light switch about ten feet up on the wall when Scott first talks to Ramona just happened to be in the house where the scene was filmed. The filmmakers made sure to get it in frame because it looked funny.
  • According to Anna Kendrick, the reason why Stacey is the only one baffled by Mathew Patel's sudden entrance and dance number is because those were genuine reactions. At the time, Kendrick was not sure what the movie's tone even was and if audiences would be able to buy into the premise, as the movie's script looked pretty out there on paper (she was a fan of Edgar Wright's work however, and trusted his vision for the film). When they were filming everyone's individual reactions to the fight, she kept making confused faces that made it into the final cut.
• Vindicated by Video: The movie did much better once available on DVD, earning far more than it did in theaters.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Reshoots in early 2010 were held partially to film the theatrical ending. Originally, Scott and Knives ended up together. The ending screened to test audiences and was included as an extra on the DVD.
  • At one point in development, Envy Adams was considered to be Ramona's fourth ex, combining her character with Roxie Richter. In the final film, the two remained separate characters (as a possible artifact of this concept, Roxie is defeated the same way Envy is in the comics).
  • Envy's line "Shut the [dial tone] up, Julie" was originally going to be uncensored, abiding by the MPAA's "one F-bomb" rule for PG-13 movies. However, because Scott already had the line "You cocky cock!", it would have gotten the movie an R. Thankfully, the resulting joke is much funnier.
  • Originally, Wright planned for the garage punk band Be Your Own Pet to write Sex Bob-Omb's music, but that fell through when the band broke up in 2008. Beck was then suggested by the film's composer Nigel Godrich.
  • The DVD contains storyboards and concept art for a very different conclusion to the final battle. Two words: Mecha Gideon.
  • Ramona was originally supposed to fight Gideon during the final battle, but the choreographer determined that having four people fighting in a small arena suspended high in the air was too dangerous, so Ramona spends most of the fight on the sidelines.
• Word of Gay: Mark Webber was told about Stephen Stills's homosexuality before it was revealed in Volume 6.^note Although, as Stephen says in Volume 6, it's actually revealed in Volume 5 because Scott (and by extension, the reader) were too busy focusing on the Evil Exes situation.
• Word of God:
  • Edgar Wright claimed that the battle scenes are meant to feel like musical numbers, in that they only occur when the characters' emotions are too extreme for dialogue.
  • Scott's death at the end is a metaphor, as no one dies in the movie and comic.
• Word of Saint Paul: Bryan Lee O'Malley gave each of the principal cast a list of ten secrets about their characters not included in the original graphic novels. The actors have mostly been tight-lipped about these, but some secrets have come out:
  • Mary Elizabeth Winstead has revealed that Ramona's little brother died when she was younger, and she wears one of his shoelaces as a necklace in memory of him.
  • Aubrey Plaza mentioned in numerous places that Julie Powers had an unrequited crush on Scott in college (one that possibly continues into the present), which is why she's so hostile to him (especially if, like in the books, Scott's eventual girlfriend, Envy, was Julie's roommate). Bryan Lee O'Malley contests this as Plaza "making shit up", though Edgar Wright supported Plaza's claim when both were on Doug Loves Movies.

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