Review: 'Scott Pilgrim vs. the World' truly a hybrid film

Dear “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World,” I think we should break up.

It’s not you, it’s me. I admitted when we first met that I’d never read Bryan Lee O’Malley’s graphic novel on which you’re based, but that hasn’t stopped me from enjoying similar films I was ill equipped to see.

I think you’re great. Seriously. You did everything right. But I’ve been told by those who adore you that at your core, you’re all about heart and love, and if a film about heart and love left me this cold, how can you be anything other than a failure? At least for me.

Your plot is certainly … unique. Scott (Michael Cera) is your ordinary geeky Toronto 20-something who plays bass in a garage band, nurses a broken heart given him by an ex (Brie Larson) who became a rock star and left him behind, is bedeviled by a younger sister (Anna Kendrick), sleeps (platonically) in the same bed as his gay roommate (Kieran Culkin), and is in love with a clingy high-schooler (Ellen Wong). That is until he meets the girl of his dreams (literally), Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), a punk princess with whom he becomes completely obsessed.

There’s just one problem. To win her heart, he’ll have to fight each of her “seven evil exes” in a battle to the death (among them Brandon Routh, Chris Evans and Jason Schwartzman).

You are the first truly hybrid film — part movie, part video game, part comic book — but does that make you a better movie? Here’s the problem: You can’t sit still for a second!

On a purely visceral level, your aesthetics are dizzying and pervasively creative and visually arresting. But you’re the natural result of a hypercaffeinated, juvenile pop-culture sensibility that British director

producer/co-writer Edgar Wright (“Shaun of the Dead”) obviously gets too well.

You’re very pretty to look at, but the emotional stakes never seemed very high. There don’t seem to be enough rules grounding your universe to give it any sense of anxiety or drama. Let’s face it, you don’t make much sense, and, worse, I think you’re OK with that.

Sure, the fanboys will love you. But will anyone else?

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

Cast: Michael Cera, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Kieran Culkin, Chris Evans, Anna Kendrick, Brie Larson, Alison Pill, Aubrey Plaza, Brandon Routh, Jason Schwartzman

Director: Edgar Wright

Theaters: Hollywood, Tinseltown, Carmike, Chapel Hills, Cinemark

Rated: PG-13 (for stylized violence, sexual content, language and drug references)

Running time: 1 hour, 52 minutes

Grade: B-