The World's End - Movie Review

Who's in it?

Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Rosamund Pike and Martin Freeman What's it About? The final in the ‘Cornetto’ trilogy, the hilarious Shaun of the Dead and blackly second best Hot Fuzz being the first two, The World’s End is the tale of Gary King (Pegg) desperately trying to relive his youth and bringing along four schoolyard pals (Frost, Freeman, Considine & Marsan) as bit part players on his nostalgic, beer fuelled quest. Things go awry about three pubs in though, as oft happens with pub crawls. Can they make it to the eponymous pub before the literal world’s end? Any Good? There’s been huge anticipation for this Edgar Wright finale way back as far as Spaced and if initial rumblings are to be believed, the die hard fan-base are very pleased with the result indeed. Unfortunately I wasn’t quite so enamoured. That could be because the imagery of middle aged men clinging to their youth through the medium of terrible puns and run down pubs doesn’t particularly resonate with me or it could just be that The World’s End is pretty much repeat performance of its predecessors with a couple of chuckles but not as many actual laughs. She didn't like the jokes?.. Gary (Pegg) is on point as the epitome of a man that’s refused to grow up, a man baby, ‘a maybe’, with his consistent needling selfish assholery, backed up by Andy (Frost) as the responsible tee total mate this time. Their support comes in the form of money obsessed O Man (Freeman), Daddy’s boy Pete (Marsan) and the woefully underused Considine as Gary ’s rival love interest for Rosamund Pike.   Their mission is simple, to (reluctantly for the most part) relive the glory days of their final day of school 20 years previous and their epic pub crawl on their old stomping ground. What they didn’t bank on and what’s unfortunately given away in the trailer is that Newton Haven is not the town it once was. It’s been overtaken by aliens filled with blue goo and an instant distaste for the middle aged mates. Ahahaha a 'maybe' haha!! *Pssst..pssssst.. Simon, I don't get it..* The signature clunky editing, ridiculously gory action packed fight scenes and hat tips to nostalgia are all present and correct here, bound with a stomping 90’s soundtrack and more B movie references than you can shake an empty pint glass at. At times it almost feels as though Wright and Pegg were shoehorning references in to the detriment of the script and story but it’s that ‘couldn’t give a toss’ attitude that makes their specific type of movie making so very popular in the first place. I know it’s what I loved about both Hot Fuzz and Shaun. Not wanting to fall into the world of cliché but considering that most glowing reviews for this movie have been written by male reviewers and the laughs in our screening were notably baritone, The World’s End, in my honest opinion, really is ‘one for the lads’. Serious fans of Spaced and this trilogy will be satiated by this ‘Starbucked’ offering. For the rest of us though, this is the movie we wanted, it’s just not the one we deserved. Rating: