Jess Pardoe In what ways can Scott Pilgrim vs. The World be considered postmodern? Scott Pilgrim vs.

The World is a film made up of intertextual references to various video games, comic books, and fictional films. The film was made in 2010 and includes references from all periods of time, this is typically postmodern as postmodernism claims that everything goes with everything, and remixes can be made from anything. Postmodernism was created in disagreement with modernism, this means they ignore all traditional boundaries and structures and create their own from remixes and other sources. Postmodern films often use intertexuality from previously made films from any time periods; the use of other films can either be presented in an homage way, or a pastiche. Homage is showing respect to an existing film and acknowledging where the idea has been taken from, whereas a pastiche is imitating an existing product but in a parody style, making fun of the original product. Postmodernism according to Jonathan Kramer also typically distrusts the original binary opposites of modernist products. For example, in Scott Pilgrim the binary opposition of genders is distrusted; Scott Pilgrim as a character is represented as being a sensitive male, with an idea of true love and the girl of his dreams. This differs strongly to the character Ramona Flowers, her character is represented as a strong female, who fights with people, and has a reputation for breaking up with males and being cold-hearted. There are a large amount of intertextual references in Scott Pilgrim, for example: some of the more obvious, typical references of graphic novels are: the visual effect when the doorbell rings; Ramona Flowers as a name; and her multiple hair colours used throughout the film which resembles that of a comic book or fictional film. The name of the film is also similar to that of the 1991 computer game The Simpsons: Bart vs. The World. The first scene of the film starts in the kitchen and introduces all the characters, in many action video games a small black box appears by the side of new characters to introduce them, this technique is used in Scott Pilgrim. As the black box appears, there is a name, age, and rating of coolness written in the box; Scotts sisters black box has a rating of T for Teen, this is a rating used in North America and Canada as an age rating for video games. The storyline of the film is based around a battle of the bands style competition, set in Toronto, Canada. The band that Scott Pilgrim is a bass player in is called The Sex Bob-ombs, the logo on the drum kit is a bomb that is an intertextual reference of the bombs used in the Original Mario Bros game. One of the other bands in the battle is the band of which Scotts ex is the lead singer, The Clash at Demonhead. The name of their band is taken from the 1990 video game Clash at Demonhead. Ramona Flowers character is very significant because she is the love of Scott Pilgrims life. Her character dyes her hair multiple times during the film, including pink, blue, and green; this represents a typical cartoon character as they often have bright coloured hair and an otherwise quirky appearance. A factor of Ramonas character is that she has 7 evil ex-boyfriends that Scott Pilgrim has to fight in order to be Ramonas new boyfriend. The logo of an x is represented throughout the film, firstly in chapter 2 when Scott and his previous girlfriend walk through snow cut out in the shape of an x; this is followed by Ramona giving Scott her phone number and drawing 7 xs underneath it, which

Jess Pardoe Scott thinks are innocent girly kisses written below her phone number. A symbolic feature of Ramonas phone number is that her number starts with 212 which is the New York City area code, so he would always know it was Ramona ringing as the usual film reference area code is 555 and is not a real phone number. There are some television program intertextual references, including the sound of cheers and laughter during a scene in Scott and Wallaces flat, which is typical of popular sit-coms such as Friends or Two and a Half Men. The director, Edgar Wright has also used an intertextual reference from an American sit-com, Seinfeld, in which Scott acts as Cosmo Kramer. Cosmo Kramers character in Seinfeld is based on Kenny Kramer who wears clothes that are too big for him so that he appears laid back and loose. The character of Cosmo also makes statement entrances into the room he is going into, how Scott Pilgrim makes his entrance into Wallaces flat in the sit-com scene. There are many references to video games throughout the entire film; some main references are from Tony Hawk, Pokmon, Dragonball Z, and Superman. One of Ramonas exes is a famous actor in the film, called Lucas Lee; he is one of the exes Scott Pilgrim has to fight in order to win Ramona. As they fight, they run towards each other, this is shot in the style of both Pokmon and Dragonball Z fights in both the video games and TV programs. Lucas Lee is also a professional skateboarder, the Tony Hawk game reference is used when Scott asks him to skate a really long rail down to his death, the speedometer appears on screen exactly how it does in the video game. Brandon Routh is the actor who plays the bass player in the band, The Clash at Demonhead; Brandon Routh previously played Batman so him acting in this role is a contrast to his previous role in itself. Rouths character, Todd Ingram, claims to have vegan powers, these powers are then taken away from him later in the film by the vegan police; the vegan police have a green light emanating from their fingers as they remove Todds powers. The green light symbolizes kryptonite from the Batman films, as kryptonite is the only thing strong enough to kill Batman, and is also green. Envy Adams is the name of the lead singer of The Clash at Demonhead, also Scott Pilgrims ex-girlfriend; she is referred to by Scott and his sister as she who shall not be named. This way of addressing somebody who is represented in a negative light comes from Harry Potter, everyone addresses Voldemort, the evil sorcerer as he who shall not be named as it is considered a curse to say his name. Another girlfriend of Scotts before Ramona is Knives Chau; Knives is a 17year-old Chinese schoolgirl. Knives is a typical fan girl of a band, and is crazily in love with Scott Pilgrim and is the number one fan of their band, The Sex Bobombs. Knives Chaus first name is a joke throughout the film as she then uses knives as her chosen weapon to fight Ramona at the end of the film. When Knives finds out that Scott Pilgrim dated Envy Adams, her face morphs into an emoticon shocked face, often used on computer games to show emotions. Finally, the last few references include talking about love, but saying the L word instead of the actual word; and using a beep sound effect over the top of a characters voice when they speak to blank out swear words, this feature is often used in video games.