I’m just gonna go ahead and say it: Scott Pilgrim vs the World is one of my favorite movies this year. The quick editing, unique visual style, impressive cast and seeing Michael Cera take a welcome departure from the usual charmingly befuddled geeky character make this film a total knock out.

Based on the graphic novel by Bryan Lee O’Malley, the film tells the story of Scott Pilgrim (Cera) as he tries to defeat the seven evil exes of his love interest, the wonderfully hip Ramona, played by Mary Elizabeth Winstead.

Scott’s life is simple before he meets Ramona. He’s the 22-year-old bass player in a Toronto band called Sex-Bob-Omb with his friends Stephen Stills (Mark Webber), Kim Pine (Allison Pill) and Young Neil (Johnny Simmons). He lives with his gay best friend Wallace Wells (played to infinite perfection by Kieran Culkin) and is dating a 17-year-old Chinese high school girl named Knives Chau (Ellen Wong). Scott isn’t particularly ambitious and is very content with his life.

That all changes when he meets Ramona Flowers, a trendy girl from New York who now works for Amazon in Toronto.

Scott begins pseudo-dating Ramona while still going out with Knives. As the relationship intensifies, he learns that, if he wants to be with her, he must defeat her “seven evil exes” in a video game-style battle to the death.

Cera has a tendency to play the same adorably awkward geek in every film, so it’s nice to see him as Scott. While Scott’s not exactly a cool guy, he has an inner confidence, bordering on arrogance, that makes him different from Cera’s previous roles. Sure, he’s awkward around Ramona, but he’s almost cocky around Knives and that break from tradition makes Scott one of Cera’s most memorable characters.

The entire group surrounding Scott is even more impressive. Wong is like a Fatal Attraction teddy bear as Knives, completely obsessed with Scott and his entire world. Anna Kendrick, as Scott’s sensible sister, Stacey, brings humor through sharp logic when advising Scott on his relationships. Still, the stand out in Team Scott is Culkin, who brings the perfect recipe of compassion and sarcasm to Wallace.

It’s hard to choose a favorite out of the evil exes, even Winstead had trouble picking one, because each has something unique and funny. There’s Matthew Patel (Satya Bhabha), the first evil ex who challenges Scott through a sort of emo Bollywood dance. Next is Chris Evans as Lucas Lee, an action movie star with a pro skateboard line and the pointiest eyebrows this side of Sylvester Stallone. After that, Scott goes up against Todd Ingram (Brandon Routh rocking blonde hair and glowing eyes) a vegan bass player in a band fronted by Scott’s very own evil ex, Envy Adams (Brie Larson). To Scott’s surprise, one of Ramona’s exes happens to be a girl, Roxie Richter, played by Mae Whitman. Coincidentally, Whitman also played Cera’s girlfriend on Arrested Development. After defeating her, with a lot of help from Ramona, Scott moves on to confront exes 5 and 6 in the Katyanagi Twins (Shota and Keita Saito) before making it all the way to the final ex, Jason Schwartzman as Gideon Graves. In typical video game fashion, this “boss battle” is the toughest of them all an involves using power ups and extra lives.

The visual style of the film is one of the most impressive aspects. The film spectacularly weaves in and out from simple scenes of Scott at home with Wallace to elaborate fight sequences with graphics and slow motion effects a la Sin City or 300. I would argue that it’s one of the best film representations of a comic ever with perfectly placed title cards, written sound effects and a visual style that makes you feel like you’re living inside the pages of the comic. When the fights break out, it’s like a journey through a wonderland of old school Sega and Nintendo nostalgia. Bill Hader’s video game narrations are reminiscent of the “finish him!” commands in Mortal Kombat, but with an extra hint of humor. The fact that the exes turn into coins when they are defeated is a fun live-action representation of a fond video game memory.

No doubt this is a movie for the younger generation, people who only remember playing Pong will probably find the quick cuts and vibrant graphics to be overwhelming. Anyone who spend hours playing Mike Tyson’s Punch Out–which happens to be one of Culkin’s favorite games–will thoroughly enjoy the Scott-vs-ex combat. I enjoyed Scott Pilgrim vs the World immensely and am already planning to see it at least four more times.

Scott Pilgrim vs the World was getting a lot of buzz long before it screened at Comic Con in July. Adapted from Brian Lee O’Malley’s hugely popular comic, the film is about Scott (Michael Cera), a Toronto native who’s dating a high school girl (Ellen Wong as Knives Chau) when he falls for a cool new girl (Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Ramona) and must defeat her “seven evil exes” in order to date her.

The cast of this geek masterpiece stopped by Denver on their press tour and I got a chance to sit down with Winstead, Brandon Routh, who is Ramona’s vegan rocker ex boyfriend, Todd Ingram, and Kieran Culkin, who plays Scott’s hilarious gay roommate Wallace Wells.

Though none of the three had read the comic prior to hearing about the film, they knew they were stepping into pretty big shoes as far as fans were concerned. “It has such a following. It’s grown with every book that has come out. The last one was number five on Amazon.” Winstead said.

Because the comic was such a hit, everyone involved with the film didn’t want to disappoint the devoted fans. Thankfully, says Winstead, director Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) was just the man to tackle the challenge.

“We really trusted Edgar Wright,” she explained. “Everyone involved in the cast were big fans of his and all of his movies–Spaced, everything we had seen of his. For me, when I read the books, I knew he was the only person that could bring it to life in a way that is cool, unique and fun. So we all, from the second we stepped foot on the set, were just like, ‘ok, you tell us what to do. You guide us and we’ll do exactly like you want and we know that’s gonna end up the best it’s gonna be.’”

While it’s impossible to exactly recreate the comic, Culkin assured us that nothing major was left out. “Fans of the book didn’t seem to miss anything. They really like the adaptation, but, some will say they missed Kim Pines making out with Knives Chau,” he joked.

Outside of the world of comics, Scott Pilgrim vs the World also has tons of video game references spread throughout the movie. At times it’s almost as if you are watching a cut scene pulled directly from a video game. Because of that, I had to know if these guys were actually into video games.

Culkin was eager to talk about games and named Zelda: Ocarina of Time for Nintendo 64 as his favorite. “This game Virtual Pro 2, which is a Japanese wrestling game for the 64, I translated it into English so I can play it, but I didn’t need to. It was just for anybody else who wanted to play,” he added. He rounded off his top five with Mike Tyson’s Punch Out, Castlevania and Contra.

Routh chimed in to list his faves. “Dragon Warrior was one of the first RPGs. Shining Force, the Sega game, Shining Force 2, the sequel. Joe Montana Football, Sim City, and Warcraft.”

With video games as inspiration, the movie has a lot of really fun fight scenes. The cast talked about the training they went through to prepare.

“It was tough. We trained together for a long time, and we were really well prepared by the stunt guys who worked with us. They were fantastic teachers. Ellen had some prior experience with Taikwando, and I had prior experience with dance, so the two of us kind of combined our abilities. Ellen was so dedicated to Knives, that character, and so it was almost scary fighting with her sometimes, because she got so into character. It felt really real when I fought with her.” Culkin then asked her who would win a real fight between her and Ellen Wong. “We got that question a few times when we were interviewing together, and we always just said that would team up because, I’m like a giant, and she’s little and scrappy and fast.”

And, of course, with all that fighting comes a few injuries. “I pulled my shoulder out a bunch. Lots of tendonitis and stuff. Went to physical therapy for that. In that scene with Ellen, I got stabbed in the eye with one of her knives and was bleeding, and had to have a paramedic help. So yeah, there were lots of little things like that that happened, but it was kinda like battle scars, like we all felt really proud of our injuries,” Winstead said.

Though Wallace doesn’t do any fighting in the movie, Culkin said he trained along with everyone else. “It was more for fun, when everyone was getting together for weeks. We got together early in the morning for training, so I went along for that. Plus, I think also, when I got the part I hadn’t seen Edgar for months, so I showed up to set the first day with long green hair and thirty pounds of extra weight that he wasn’t expecting and I was like, ‘Are you sure? Are you sure you want me? Just try to picture my hair shorter, and I’ll lose thirty pounds, I swear.’ I got to go home for a while and lose that weight for him.”

Scott Pilgrim isn’t only filled with video game references, it’s also got the perfect feeling of an underground indie rock movie. Music is one of the main themes in the movie, with the main characters all competing in a giant battle of the bands, and a huge soundtrack filled with underground music.

Winstead may not be an expert on video games, but she did list her music favorites. “I listen to a lot of oldies and stuff. But, I like a lot of indie rock. Gosh, where do I start?” Suddenly, Culkin jumped in and told her to start by plugging the soundtrack and she replied, “That’s actually genuine, I love the soundtrack. Right now I really love The XX, a lot of Mike Patton stuff, Mr. Bungle, just kind of all over the map, but I love anything from the 60s and 50s, David Bowie, and I also like Buddy Holly, and girl groups. The Shangri Las are kinda my ultimate favorite.”

In the last question of the day, I asked Winstead who her favorite evil ex was in the film. She said she loved them all, but Routh quickly told us that wasn’t true at all, so she had to change her answer. “No, the fight with Roxy, Mae Whitman, will always be special to me because I actually got to fight with her, and we got train together for months and months. So, that was just an awesome experience, and she’s so badass, and wonderful. So, I have to say that one.” Routh also added that Roxy rocks.

Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World opens everywhere on August 13^th, so make sure you go see it! The soundtrack is available now on cd and red vinyl, and it is awesome, so check it out. You can also check out the Scott Pilgrim 8-bit style video game that’s available for download on the PS3 now, and August 25^th for the Xbox Arcade version

My feet are aching, my hair looks like Chaka Kahn from all the humidity and body heat, and I just saw a guy in a bathrobe running down a hallway yelling, “I’m with Superman!” Must be Thursday at Comic Con in San Diego.

The Convention Center is daunting–it feels like it’s the size of the entire Denver airport. The various booths are colorful, but they’re really a backdrop for cool geeks of all kinds to let their geek flags fly and show up in full costume. I actually enjoyed a lot of the fans in costumes more than some official events and I was surprised at how overwhelmingly friendly everyone has been. Far from the pompous atmosphere of a Hollywood event, the Comic Con fans are happy just being themselves–even if they are wearing a Darth Vader mask.

I managed to take some pics of a few of my favorite costumed crusaders on my very first trip to Comic Con. For everyone who posed for a pic, I’d like to extend a huge THANK YOU!

I’ve been tweeting a lot of these pics too, so make sure you follow Trashwire on Twitter or check out our pics on TwitPic too.

Follow @trashwire on Twitter because Alexis will be tweeting live from San Diego Comic Con! Make sure to swing back by Trashwire regularly for blog posts, pics, videos, interviews and lots of other Comic Con stuff that just won’t fit into 140 characters.

Not on Twitter? (Are you crazy?!) No worries, because you can read Alexis’ tweets right here in the @trashwire Twitter feed…

The annual Electronics Entertainment Expo (E3) took place this past July showcasing all of the major companies in gaming like Sony, Microsoft and, of course, one of the few gaming oriented companies that has remained successful in strictly virtual entertainment, Nintendo. Nintendo unveiled a new Wii Health Pack at E3 that is to be incorporated with the latest the Nintendo Wii.

Wii Balance Board- is the latest peripheral device for the Nintendo Wii. The board resembles the size and shape of a white bathroom scale. The board is connected wirelessly to the Nintendo Wii and not only measures weight but, with certain pressure sensors located in the board, it can also record the player’s center of mass and body mass index (BMI). When you first begin to use the board there is a health check feature that establishes your stats (height, weight, etc.) and recognizes if the way you stand is healthy or unhealthy to your posture.

The board can also detect how your body shifts from side to side. At E3 the demonstration showed that shifting in body weight is an enormous factor in game play that deals with balance. Throughout a period of time, there will be an available line graph of weight or BMI measurements available to compare your results with your family.

Wii Fit-is the accompanying software that works in conjunction with the balance board. The Wii Fit software is rumored to have about 40 different activities to choose from. In the demonstration at E3, the activities shown ranged from yoga poses to hula hooping. In a similar fashion, the Wii Board will also be used as a stepper for step aerobics that is vaguely similar to the other stepping game, Dance Dance Revolution (DDR).

Shigeru Miyamoto had the idea of a Wii Health Pack while designing the beginning concepts of the Nintendo Wii. Although the design is stylish, many questions arose at E3. Can the balance board accommodate American players? In an interview with IGN’s Jeremy Parish, Miyamoto states, “We’re going to launch in Japan first and get feedback and decide if we need to make something that’s American-sized. We may need to super-size!” He also said that he would ideally want a worldwide size for release.

Will this accommodate hardcore gamers? Analysts recognize that this may actually not entice hardcore gamers because there is no ultimate end or goal. This may not be a problem for Nintendo because the Wii has been developed from the start to ultimately bring more casual gamers to the market. One actual statement that gives hope to gamers comes from Square-Enix video game director Motomu Toriyama who said that the “whole system and mechanism of using your weight and balance to control games is something we’re interested in incorporation into future role playing game titles.”

Can we lose weight? The only game that has actually shown a significant amount of success in weight loss is DDR. “I am familiar with DDR,” said Cedric Bryant, PhD, Chief Exercise Physiologist for the American Council on Exercise in an interview with WebMD. “My four boys play it. It can be strenuous and can really get your heart rate up. It has different levels of intensity.”

DDR is a great aerobic exercise and some players have reported weight loss ranging from 10-50 pounds. DDR also records calories burned in a period of gameplay and reports them in a chart very similarly to the Wii Fit function. DDR has been so successful that many schools use the game in physical education classes. The release date for the Wii Health Pack will be announced later next year and, judging by the success of DDR, might just be available at a school near you.

Yesterday, Apple announced that it’s Apple TV will soon be able to stream YouTube videos. Apple CEO Steve Jobs was quoted saying, “This is the first time users can easily browse, find and watch YouTube videos right from their living room couch.” After reading the quote, I was left feeling a little confused.

I’ve been browsing, finding and watching YouTube videos right from my living room couch for weeks now on my Nintendo Wii, which connects wirelessly to the internet and includes an Opera browser. With my Wii, which costs $50 less than the Apple TV, I’m not only able to watch videos on YouTube, but I can browse any site on the net and bookmark favorites just as easily as I can on my computer. Oh, and the Wii also plays some amazing games!

I admit, I thought the Apple TV was cool when I first saw it in the Apple store. Watching the videos in my iTunes library (and thanks to programs like TubeSock and HandBrake I have hundreds) on my TV was a cool opportunity. The other features, like watching movies or listening to my music, were pretty inconsequential. I already have speakers for my iPod and can rent all the movies I want to see from Netflix on DVD for as little as $4.99. The iTunes store, by comparison, makes me pay $9.99 for a movie that only plays on my iPod and doesn’t even include any special features or bonus material.

While the movie and music features didn’t interest me, viewing other videos from my iTunes library on my TV did pique my interest. I’ve built up quite a library of clips from TV shows, user-uploaded concert videos, and occasionally entire episodes of my favorite cancelled TV shows by ripping them from YouTube. Apple TV seemed to be the only thing that could bring all these clips to my TV.

Then I got the Wii.

One of the first things I did after nearly wearing out my arm playing all the Wii Sports games was to try out the Opera-powered internet browser. The Wii connected to my wireless network and I was able to browse webpages quickly and easily. Naturally, I checked out Trashwire and the Trashwire Blog to see how it looked on my TV.

After skimming the blog posts, I decided to try to watch one of the embedded YouTube videos. To my pleasant surprise, it loaded really fast and played right there on my TV. I immediately went to youtube.com to see more videos, finding all my favorites and playing them in full-screen mode as if they were on-demand clips. I couldn’t help but think to myself, “If someone could get the Wii, why on earth would they want an Apple TV?”

The best part of viewing the videos on the Wii is that there’s no need for me to rip them from YouTube, pay a cent for them on the Apple Store, or spend any time converting them to a format that will work on my TV. I simply visit youtube.com, find the video I want and click play just like I would if I was checking out the video on my computer.

Here’s an example. Trashwire readers know I am a huge fan of My Chemical Romance. Yesterday, the band released the brand new video for their song “Teenagers”. The video isn’t even available on the iTunes store yet, so that rules out paying $1.99 to download it to my computer. If I had the Apple TV and I still wanted to watch the video in my living room, I could go to the band’s YouTube channel, find the new video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6EQAOmJrbw), save it on my computer and convert it using TubeSock, add it to my iTunes library, then sync it to my Apple TV and watch it. That’s quite a few steps. The Wii makes it easy to watch the video on my TV without any downloading or converting. I just power on the console, go to the Internet Channel, click on YouTube (which I bookmarked to make it even faster), and watch the video right from the YouTube page. With the Wii, it’s like having the entire YouTube library on your TV on demand.

While both products don’t directly compete with one another (the Wii is a game console, the Apple TV is a home media system) their features are not mutually exclusive. The Wii also includes a photo application that lets you view pictures from any SD memory card right on your screen. You can also add MP3s to your memory card and listen to music during photo slide shows if you’re so inclined. Both of these features are hyped up as being ground-breaking and revolutionary by Apple, but they’re not even the main highlights of the Wii. The Wii does all those things and plays games, lets you create and share cool avatars called Wii Miis, includes a weather and news feed to keep you updated, and lets you play classic Nintendo and Sega games in the Virtual Console.

Since both the Apple TV and the Nintendo Wii have some similar functions, it seems like a natural choice to pick the one that does all that and more, especially if it costs $50 less.