Bryan Lee O'Malley

Some artists plan their masterpiece out for years while others seemingly stumble into it randomly. The latter is more of the case for Bryan Lee O'Malley, best known for his work on the Scott Pilgrim graphic novel series. O'Malley, who has worked in comics for his entire career, was never totally satisfied with his work on the six different Scott Pilgrim books despite the fact that the world around him celebrated the series, gave it awards, and made a movie based on it. He's a writer and artist that will likely always be known for just that one thing despite the fact that he's made other differing works. O'Malley was born in London, Ontario in 1979, and stayed in that area of Canada for much of his early life. He attend the University of Western Ontario, located in the city where he grew up. That didn't take, though, as O'Malley soon dropped out of the college and set sail for Toronto. In the big city, he started working in comics, most notably for Oni Press, a smaller comic book publisher located in Oregon. At Oni, he lettered and illustrated a number of comics, with the mini-series Hopeless Savages: Ground Zero being his biggest credit. He used his experience to work on his first graphic novel, the 2003 release Lost at Sea, a story about a young girl who travels across the United States in a coming-of-age tale set off by the main character theorizing that her soul was stolen by a cat. It was indicative of O'Malley's style, which takes pretty basic concepts (like growing older) and puts a very quirky spin on them, usually involving all aspects of his life and hobbies. Of course, the next year, he began his opus: the Scott Pilgrim series. The first book, Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life, was an under-the-radar release about a 20-something Canadian who was on a quest to date the girl of his dreams by doing battle with her seven evil exes. Once again, it took a simple boy-meets-girl story and layered on whimsy, anime-inspired fights, and tons of pop culture and video game references. It took a little while, but soon, Scott Pilgrim was a major success, especially following the yearly releases that followed, including 2005's Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, 2006's Scott Pilgrim & The Infinite Sadness, and 2007's Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together. The roots of the film version "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World" (2010) date back to 2005, when the comic's publisher Oni Press got in touch with Universal Studios, leading to Edgar Wright's involvement. O'Malley was reticent about the idea of a movie, but quickly relented, mostly because he needed the money. As he finished the six-part series, the movie version slowly got off the ground. The final book, Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour, was released only a few months before the film. The film's ending, which was done based on O'Malley's early notes for the final book, was actually changed to fall in line more with what transpired in the graphic novel. However, the movie was a financial failure despite being critically well received. After the yearly pace of Scott Pilgrim, O'Malley took a long time to produce his next work, which was complicated by a shoulder injury that made him unable to draw for months. In that period, he and the inspiration for Scott Pilgrim's beau Ramona Flowers, Hope Larson, divorced. But finally, in 2014, his next graphic novel Seconds launched. It was a story about second chances, focused on a chef who acquires the ability to go back in time to fix mistakes.