Edgar Wright Says The World’s End Is About Living In The Past
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The third and final film in the “Three Flavours Cornetto (Blood and Ice Cream)” trilogy is one of the most anticipated films of the summer. Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright’s The World’s End marks the conclusion of a film series that began with the horror comedy Shaun of the Dead in 2004 and continued with the buddy-cop/action film Hot Fuzz in 2007. Although The World’s End is already in theaters in the United Kingdom, genre fans in the States still have a bit longer to wait. In the meantime, we’ll have to let interviews with the World’d End crew tide us over.
In an interview with the New Zealand Herald, director Edgar Wright talks about the differences between The World’s End and the first two films in the trilogy. It appears that the central theme of The World’s End is growing up and leaving your childhood behind. Wright explains:
The difference with this one is that the actual character comedy is a little more honest and frank. I’d say it is both darker and also sillier, which seems like an odd combination, but I think when you see the movie, you’ll see why.
The World’s End is getting mostly positive reviews from film critics in England, which is a very good sign for its release in the United States. Most of the positive buzz surrounding the film focuses on its themes of growing up and its outlook on nostalgia. For Edgar Wright, The World’s End works as almost a “cautionary tale” for anyone who always lives in the past. Here’s Wright again:
Aside from all the sci-fi mayhem, it is a cautionary tale about not looking back. There’s that phrase, ‘You can never go home again’ — I think a lot of people have been through that experience, whether it’s going back to a home town or going to a wedding or a school reunion where you reconnect with old friends — it’s always bittersweet. We came up with this idea about five friends, four of whom have become adults and one person who wants to be a teenager forever, and him trying to recapture that — not even glory days, but one glory night. And you know, the sting in the tail is that he gets a wild night of a different hue.
Looking back at the whole of the Three Flavours Cornetto trilogy, it appears that the main character’s hidden personal issues are always challenged by an outside force, whether that be a zombie apocalypse, a cult taking over a small town, or alien invading robots.
The World’s End centers on Gary King (Simon Pegg), a 40-year-old man who refuses to act his age. Twenty years after King and his group of childhood friends went on an epic pub-crawl called “The Golden Mile,” Gary gathers the old crew to relive the past. As they drunkenly make it from pub to pub, they soon realize that the quiet town where they all grew up has changed. It seems killer alien robots have invaded and plan to destroy all humans… and ruin their pub-crawl in the process. Can Gary and his friends prevent the alien robots from taking over his hometown, while finishing The Golden Mile at the final pub, The World’s End?
Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright wrote the film, while Wright directed it. Pegg has described the film as “a much bigger proposition than the other two films.” The World’s End also features Nick Frost, Martin Freeman, Rosamund Pike, Eddie Marsan, David Bradley, and Paddy Considine.
The World’s End will hit theaters everywhere on August 23.
