Scott Pilgrim Takes Off Doesn't Need A Second Season

Summary

• Scott Pilgrim Takes Off is a hit, with high ratings and positive reception from both critics and audiences.
• Despite fans clamoring for a second season, the show's creators have stated that the first season is self-contained and complete.
• The obsession with demanding more and more content can diminish the originality and satisfaction of a standalone work like Scott Pilgrim Takes Off.

Ever since Netflix’s adaptation of Scott Pilgrim, Scott Pilgrim Takes Off, hit the platform, it’s taken the internet by storm. We at TheGamer have written about it a few times already, as people who have enjoyed the show despite it being a surprising departure from audience expectations. If you haven’t heard by now, Scott Pilgrim Takes Off is pretty good, and critics and audiences seem to agree on that – the series has an excellent rating of 96 on Rotten Tomatoes and 82 on Metacritic, for whatever that’s worth.

It’s no surprise, then, that fans have already been clamouring for a second season, especially considering that there was a sort of post-credits scene at the end of the show. Marvel movies have hard-coded us into believing a post-credit scene is indicative that a sequel is on the way, but comic creator and co-showrunner Bryan Lee O’Malley explained to Polygon that that stinger was “a parody of those Marvel end credits scenes… and it also leaves the door open to do stuff in the future”.

More Remakes Need To Do What Scott Pilgrim Did

Reboots can be more cognisant of the flaws in their source material and confront them head-on, like Scott Pilgrim Takes Off did.

That means a second season still might happen, but we shoulstatic.aayyy.com/topic/dn/’t expect one. O’Malley told Rolling Stone that the first season is “self-contained”, and that, “We don’t have any ideas lying on the floor. We pretty much put them all in.” Co-showrunner BenDavid Grabinski also said, “We put everything we had into this, and we think it has a really great ending that we’re proud of.”

I’ve noticed recently that, whenever a good show or movie is made, the automatic reaction from the audience is to demand more. Nothing can ever just exist. There must be sequels, follow-ups, spin-offs, an endless stream of content pushed to streaming in an attempt to satisfy an insatiable audience and squeeze every possible bit of profit out of a good idea. Scott Pilgrim Take Off, as a standalone adaptation of its source material, works. It is as its creators intended: self-contained and complete on its own. It doesn’t need another season to make sense or to make the journey its characters take worth it. Why do we, as an audience, feel the need to call for more and more of the things we love until they stop being interesting and original? Can we be happy with something that works as intended?

O’Malley is very cognisant of the effect that streaming has had on the process of making television. It is precisely because shows get cancelled so quickly and seemingly with no reason that they decided to make a self-contained season instead of planning for multiple. Many shows never make it to a second season, even when they do well, and even if they’re designed to span several seasons - I’m still mad that 1899 got cancelled after an intriguing first season. Scott Pilgrim is designed to tell a complete story about toxicity in relationships, forgiveness, and growth, and wraps it up with a nice bow for us. Maybe we should just be grateful that this daring reboot did such a great job of what it set out to, and stop breathlessly demanding more from its creators.

It’s Actually Good When Franchises Change

Franchises shoulstatic.aayyy.com/topic/dn/'t stay in the past, and going against our expectations can help a series grow.