The World’s End (2013)

Movie Info

This is turning into a bad weekend…I knew we should have gone white water rafting in the American South…

Gary King (Simon Pegg) is a man who never grew up.  On graduation, he and his friends decided to complete the “Golden Mile”  pub crawl in Newton Haven…which unfortunately never happened.  Now, Gary is rounding up Peter (Eddie Marsan), Steven (Paddy Considine), Oliver (Martin Freeman), and his best friend Andy (Nick Frost) against their will to complete the Golden Mile…but returning to their hometown unveils a darkness that could change the face of the world!

Directed by Edgar Wright and written by Wright and Simon Pegg, The World’s End is a sci-fi comedy.  The movie was well received by critics and a box office success.  The movie is considered the final film in the Three Flavous Cornetto trilogy which also included Shaun of the Dead (2004) and Hot Fuzz (2007).

I’m Bond…alien Bond!

Shaun of the Dead was a great horror comedy, Hot Fuzz was a great action comedy, and The World’s End is a good sci-fi comedy…good, but not great.  It is a fun movie, but it is also a movie that probably should be watched more than once to catch all the layers.

The story for the movie takes a bit too long to make its turn.  The first part of the movie deals with King and his insecurities and trying to “get the gang back together”.  It is fast and loaded with jokes, but it doesn’t have the punch of the other two films.

The movie changes direction after a couple pubs and becomes a sci-fi movie.  Much of the layering begins here and there are multiple references to Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz.  This is smart, but it just felt it took too long…and the idea that the characters are almost incidental to the aliens is fun but takes away a lot of the tension in the plot that could have been used.

I get it…you make lights from your mouth…turn them down!

The cast still works great together.  Pegg and Frost are a great team and seem to have fun.  The movies show a reversal of roles with Pegg being the completely irresponsible one and Frost trying to keep control.  The rest of the group is also fun, but it doesn’t show as much development as the characters in Shaun of the Dead or Hot Fuzz.

Visually, the movie doesn’t push it as far as Shaun of the Dead or Hot Fuzz.  It does succeed in looking like an ’80s sci-fi film, but it feels like they could have done even more with the visuals.  It didn’t help that for me all I could see when I saw the aliens was Bonnie Tyler’s “Total Eclipse of the Heart” video…

The World’s End isn’t bad, but it isn’t great…which is disappointing.  I think it is a movie that could grow on me with another watching or two, but it didn’t have a lot in it that made me want to rewatch it.  Overall, I enjoyed “the trilogy”, but I wish it had ended a bit stronger.

Related Links:

Shaun of the Dead (2004)

Hot Fuzz (2007)