Trailer Trashin’: The Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy Concludes with The World’s End
In the spirit of summer movies, this week brings the third-ever Trailer Trashin’ Double Feature, as I examine the new previews for White House Down and The World’s End. Now, let’s take a look at the UK teaser trailer for director Edgar Wright’s sci-fi comedy The World’s End.
Premise: Twenty years after attempting an epic pub crawl, five childhood friends reunite when one of them becomes hell-bent on trying the drinking marathon again. They are convinced to stage an encore by mate Gary King (Simon Pegg), a 40-year-old man trapped at the cigarette end of his teens, who drags his reluctant pals to their hometown and once again attempts to reach the fabled pub, “The World’s End.” As they attempt to reconcile the past and present, they realize the real struggle for the future, not just theirs but humankind’s, and reaching “The World’s End” is the least of their worries.
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My take: I am a huge fan of Edgar Wright, the English director who helmed Shaun of the Dead (2004), Hot Fuzz (2007), and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010). He is responsible for some of my favorite comedies, and is a director whose work I will always support. Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz are the first two parts of a thematic trilogy of genre comedies, one not connected by narrative but instead by shared traits and motifs, all directed by Wright, written by Wright and Simon Pegg, and starring Pegg and Nick Frost. The trilogy is alternately known as either the “Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy” or the “Blood and Ice Cream Trilogy” – because of the shared elements of gory violence and a running joke about the British ice cream product Cornetto and its supposed effectiveness as a hangover cure. For a number of years now, Wright and company have talked about The World’s End, the planned third film which would take on the genre of science-fiction, but it kept being put on hold because of other projects. But now, the film is finally on its way. The first UK teaser trailer for The World’s End has arrived, and I think it looks like it could be another laugh riot.
A big factor in why the first two films of the Trilogy worked so well is the excellent casts, and that definitely seems to be the case here as well. In the lead roles, as always, are Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, who here play, respectively, Gary King and Andy Knight. They’re both incredibly talented, and I like that Wright and Pegg have kind of flipped the dynamic between the two this time around. In both Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, Pegg played the more level-headed of the two while Frost was the bumbling but well-meaning one. But here, Pegg’s Gary is the irresponsible one while Frost’s Andy is serious and buttoned-up. The gang of five friends is rounded out by Paddy Considine, who worked with them in Hot Fuzz, Martin Freeman, who had brief appearances in both previous films, and Eddie Marsan. Rosamund Pike plays a woman apparently named Sam, who will probably be a love interest for either Gary or Andy. And the cast also includes Reece Shearsmith, Rafe Spall, Alice Lowe, David Bradley, and Michael Smiley, all of whom have appeared in one or both of the previous two films.
Judging from this trailer, the humor looks spot-on. So much of the laughs in the Cornetto Trilogy come from having these sort of momentous events happening in mundane settings, and the whole idea of a potentially apocalyptic alien invasion happening as the backdrop to five guys trying to complete a pub crawl is just inherently funny. We’ve got hilariously skewed priorities (“We are gonna get to The World’s End if it kills us”) and funny wordplay (“…to the bitter end. Or lager end.”). Even the names of the pubs make me chuckle and, given Wright and Pegg’s love of symbolism and foreshadowing, it’ll be fun to speculate about what we can expect based on those names. And the final moment shows that they are keeping up the running gag of each film having a scene where a character tries, and usually fails, to jump over a fence.
Simon Pegg in “The World’s End.
I also like what we see of the sci-fi elements of the film. While we know that it’s an alien invasion story of some kind, the exact nature of that invasion is not clear in this trailer. It’s also not clear whether the villagers are people who have been taken over by aliens or just aliens disguised as people, but I’m onboard with either scenario. And given the quick shot of Nick Frost dodging between three pointy metallic legs that stretch past the top of the screen, it looks like we might be getting some War of the Worlds-style alien tripods.
All in all, I think this is a great first look at what could be one of the best comedies of the year. I’ve been excited about The World’s End ever since it was announced, and this teaser has only increased my anticipation. I love both of the previous films in the “Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy,” and this looks like a worthy conclusion. When the latter part of August rolls around, you can be sure that I’ll be checking out The World’s End on opening weekend.
ANTICIPATION: This looks brilliant, mate! Better go grab a pint and watch it!
Release Date: August 23rd, 2013
Starring: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Rosamund Pike, Paddy Considine, Martin Freeman, Eddie Marsan, Thomas Law, Zachary Bailess, Jasper Levine, Flora Slorach, Reece Shearsmith, Rafe Spall, Alice Lowe, David Bradley, Mark Heap, and Michael Smiley
Director: Edgar Wright
Writers: Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg
Timothy Monforton
