Friday, April 29, 2016

Death Battle Analysis: Scott Pilgrim

…..so yeah I lied and decided to do Scott Pilgrim instead of Ice king or Pacman (what can I say I was short on time, and this was easier). Anyway I composited feats and abilities for Scott from all 3 of his major medias, the original manga, the movie and the game.

Background
A 20-something year old slacker living in Toronto Canada. Scott’s life struggle is centered around his …..Interesting romantic relationships, particularly one he formed with a girl named Ramona flowers. Due to some very bizarre circumstances Scott not only ended up getting into a relationship with Ramona when he was technically supposed to be dating another girl named knives(thereby cheating on both), but Scott got entangled in conflict with her “7 evil exes”. These evil exes known as Matthew Patel, Lucas Lee, Todd Ingram, Roxie Ritcher, the Katayanagi twins and Gideon graves, all had superhuman abilities and were determined to prevent Scott's relationship with Ramona from going anywhere, often through physical violence. Because of this Scott had no choice but to literally fight for the love of his life, eventually putting all of the evil exes down just so he could be with Ramona. Thankfully he also managed to smooth things over with knives in the process as well.

In terms of personality Scott is somewhat of an asshole. For a long time he refused to acknowledge his own faults and consistently hurt the people around him through indifference. Luckily however he learned his lesson at the end of the movie,game and comic, and decided to make a conscious effort to change his behavior. Scott can be surprisingly smart when pushed into a corner, as he’s beaten at least one or two of his opponents with quick thinking or deception rather than outright brute force.

Equipment
Extra life
An ace in the hole that Scott obtained after defeating either Todd or the twins depending on the media. The extra life, like its name suggests, revives Scott and gives him a second chance at life upon being killed once by an opponent.

In the movie time the extra life actually reverses time itself upon its use, allowing Scott to begin his fight against an opponent all over again without their foreknowledge to what had happened the first time around. However in the original manga Scott simply came back to life immediately at the time and place of his death, allowing him to continue his fight from where he left off. For the sake of fairness it can probably be assumed Death Battle would probably go with the second interpretation.

Weapons
The power of love
A long sword katana blade that represents a physical manifestation of Scott's love for Ramona. He gained it upon outwardly admitting his love for Ramona in both the manga and movie. The sword has an intense fire aura surrounding it, and sends out sword beams when swung. The sword is not unbreakable, as it shattered against another katana blade wielded by Ramona’s evil exe Gideon in the movie.

When not in use the sword is stored inside of Scott's own chest….somehow, allowing him to call upon it again whenever he desires. Additionally in the manga and movie simply possessing the sword gives Scott a “stat increase” of sorts. This increase is Guts +2, Heart +3, Smarts +1, and Will +1. While these stats are somewhat akin to a joke out of universe, it can be assumed that these stats are meant to be a representation of Scott’s improved mental state and emotional maturity in universe.
The power of self-respect

A second long sword katana that represents a physical manifestation of Scott's own Self-respect. He obtained it after realizing the importance of self-respect and his need to stand up for himself in the face of Romona’s exes in the movie version of scot pilgrim vs the world. The sword has a fiery blue aura and gives Scott a boost in stats as long as he is in possession of it. This boost is Guts +5, Heart +6, Smarts +7 and Balls +8. Like the Power of love Scott stores this weapon in his chest, and also like the power of love it can be broken with enough physical force, such as when it shattered against the force of Gidion’s pixel katana.

The power of self-respect is portrayed to be more powerful than the power of love in the movie, although exactly how much is unclear.
The power of understanding

The final sword that Scott obtained in the original Scott Pilgrim manga series. The power of understanding represents a physical manifestation of Scott’s emotional understanding of himself and the evil exes he’s fighting. Unlike the power of self-respect and the power of love, the power of understanding is not a long sword katana blade and is instead a larger single edge cleaver like sword. Scott obtained it after coming to a personal understanding about his difficulty in forming/maintaining relationships and how his opponents (Gideon and the rest of the evil exes) where actually quite similar to him on a fundamental level.

Like Scott’s other swords it comes with a boost in stats. This boost is Guts +1, Heart +3 and Balls +2. The power of understanding has never been broken in battle, although it assumedly is not unbreakable.
Special abilities
Street fighter moves and misc fighting techniques

Scott can mimic several of the attacks used by famous street fighter characters Ryu, Ken and Makoto in his various media. These attacks include the Shinku Tatsumaki Senpukyaku, a powerful mid spin air kick. The shuryken, a jumping uppercut attack. The Joudan Sokutogeri, a powerful side kick. The Hayate, a dashing punch and finally the fukiage a straight overhead punch that surrounds scot in an energy field.

Scott is also known to use judo throws, quick countering maneuvers, a mid air spinning roll attack akin to sonic the hedgehog, a downward stomping attack and various other punch/kick combos in the game. Finally he can also perform an air recovery and various ground dodging maneuvers in the game as well.
Shield creation

When fighting Matthew Patel in the manga Scott put up some kind of black defensive barrier to protect himself from Matt’s fire based projectile attacks with the help of his friends. Whether scott can do this on his own is unclear.
Environmental use

In the game version of scott pilgrim vs the world, Scott is very adept at using objects and pseudo weapons scattered around his environment to his advantage. This includes throwing stray objects like glass bottles, chairs and other heavy objects at opponents as projectile attacks, as well as rapidly swinging blunt objects like baseball bats or metal signs as melee weapons.

Fighting style
Given that Scott copies some of the moves used by Ryu, Ken and makoto from street fighter, it stands to reason that he may also have at least minimal knowledge of their fighting styles, which are the Ansatsuken and Rindo-kan Karate respectively. Additionally considering those two fighting styles have roots in the real world Shotokan karate fighting style, it also stands to reason that scott's fighting style may be influenced by Shotokan as well. This collectively means Scott's fighting style is centered around being dynamic, fluid, speedy and maintaining relative ground stability. This is given credence by his swift movements and adaptability to most of his opponents fighting abilities in his various media.
Scott may also have some limited understanding of Judo due to his throwing techniques, so he probably incorporates that styles emphasis on immobilization and takedowns into his fighting style as well.

Feats
Endurance
In the manga and in the movie Scott gets thrown about 2-3 stories into the air and into the side of a stone building when fighting Lucas lee. He gets up immediately afterwards no worse for wear.

Scott takes a beating from about 7 Lucas lee stand in doppelgangers in the movie, and is not only able to shrug off their attacks, but defeat all 7 of them on his own.

When fighting Todd Ingram in the movie he gets flung hundreds of feet into the air by Todd’s psychic powers and then falls back down onto a concrete alleyway with only a handful of discarded trash bags to break his fall. He get back up perfectly fine.

Conversely Scott can’t survive impanation and can be easily cut, as he dies both in the manga and movie when Gideon impales him with his katana.
Strength

In the game Scott can grapple,lift and throw opponents his own size dozens of feet away with relatively little difficulty. He can also overpower the strength of about 9-10 people if they pile on top of him when he gets knocked downed in that game as well.

Scott can easily destroy large stone blocks, building walls, human sized fighting androids and even a 3 story tall giant robot in the game with his bare fists in the game.

When fighting random security guards hired by Gideon graves in the movie, Scott showed that he can one hit kill all of them with both his Power of lover or power of self-respect blade.
Speed/agility

Scott could throw his punches fast enough to land 64 hits on Matthew Patel after propelling him into the air, without Patel himself reaching the ground again.

Scott can deal with Romaona’s evil exe Roxie, a ninja with teleportation abilities, with little difficulty.

Has dealt with opponents using rocket launchers and gun-ish projectile weapons in the game.

He displayed the ability to jump at least 1-2 stories in the air when he first fight against Matthew Patel in the manga and movie.

Training/experience
Scott pilgrim apparently took “sword proficiency” when he was in 5th grade. This presumably gives him either intermediate or master swordsmanship skills based performance with them

According to his friends scott is supposedly “the best fighter in the providence where he lives”.
Most of Ramona’s evil exes have supernatural or superhuman ability that would spell the end for most normal, untrained human beings. Matthew Patel has pyrokinetic abilities and can summon several “demon hipster chicks” to attack his enemies. Lucas lee has immense superhuman strength and leads a small group of doppelgangers that can attack his opponents. Todd Ingram has psychic powers, can fly and had enough power to leave a huge indent on the moon with a single attack. Roxie Ritcher can slice through giant subway cars in the game, has the ability to teleport and uses a chain whip in the movie. The katayanagi twins have giant robots at their disposal. Finally Gideon has multiple forms with hulk like power, a one wing angle form in the game that puts sephiroth to shame and a sword that can seemingly cut through almost anything.

Scott has also dealt with a wide assortment of enemy types in the game, including human thugs, androids, Zombies, ninjas, various animals, ect.

Scott has also used the hubris of his enemies against them on occasion. He goaded Lucas lee into performing a dangerous skate boarding trick that got him killed. He also tricked Todd into drinking a coffee filled with half an half so he would break his Vegan diet and lose his psychic vegan powers(because that’s a thing in the scott pilgrim universe). Granted this may speak volumes more to the stupidity of his opponents, rather than his own cleverness.

Weaknesses
Scott is somewhat over reliant on his friends or plot convenience to bail him out of tough situations. He needed his friends to defeat Matthew Patel in the manga, he defeated Lucas lee by tricking him into skating down a dangerous set of stairs and Ko-ing himself in the manga/movie. He only defeated Todd Ingram because Todd got a powered down right when scott was about to lose in the manga/movie. He beat Roxie either because of conveniently gaining the power of love katana just at the right moment in the manga and/or relying on Ramona to give him info on a very specific weakness of hers he could exploit. He needed backup from his friends to take down the twins in the movie and nearly lost against them in the manga before getting some extra encouragement from them. Finally he needed either Knives or Ramona to fight Gideon alongside him in both the movie and manga, as he lost both times against Gideon initially when it was 1 on 1.

The entire Scott Pilgrim game  takes place with 4 player characters (who also show up in the cut scenes of said game).This means that for the entirety of that game Scot has 3 friends backing him up.
Additionally Scott seems to have issues fighting women, and initially refuses to hit characters like Roxie in the movie of manga without being spurned into doing it by his friends(though this moral qualm would probably be removed in a Death Battle).

If the power of love sword is stolen, such as when Gideon reached inside scott’s chest and ripped out the blade in the manga, the stat increase Scott normally receives from possessing the blade will disappear. It can also be presumed a similar stat decrease might occur if Scott's other blade were stolen, although this has not happened in cannon.

Summary
Advantages
  • Decent knowledge of various fighting styles.
  • Fairly strong and can overpower around 9-10 people his own size.
  • Strong enough to destroy androids and giant robots with his bare hands.
  • Decent durability to blunt force attacks, although he can be cut fairly easily
  • His enemies have fairly varied move sets and abilities, meaning he’s decent at adapting to different opponents.
  • He can survive at least one deadly blow per battle (through the use of his extra life).
  • Has several powerful sword weapons that all give him a stat increase.
  • Fairly good at using items in his environment to his advantage.
  • Has used wit or deception to take out opponents who outmatched him physically on occasion.
Disadvantages
  • To reliant on friends and plot convenience to pull him through the majority of his fights, neither of which he would have in a Death Battle.
  • His blade weapons tend to get destroyed far too easily to be considered really reliable in a fight. His swords can also be stolen from him. Which can result in a stat decrease.
  • He has a hang-up with fighting women, although such moral qualms would probably be removed in a Death Battle.
Possible opponents
Travis Touchdown


Personally I’m not very familiar with the no more heroes video game series, but I hear from friends that Travis is surprisingly similar to Scott in some ways. He’s an otaku, with correlates nicely with all the video game fan service and references in the Scott Pilgrim series. He’s uses a sword as his most iconic weapon, he’s a slacker 20-something and apparently some of his conflicts involve fighting for the love of some girl. He’s also made cameo appearances in the Scott Pilgrim series before, making him somewhat connected to the character in a more direct way.

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