The World's End (2013)

Title: The World's End

Director: Edgar Wright

Starring: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, and Martin Freeman

Rated: R

Released: 2013

Personal Rating: 5/6

Oscars: N/A

Plot:  Five friends who reunite in an attempt to top their epic pub crawl from 20 years earlier unwittingly become humankind's only hope for survival.
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Great Humor
I am not a comedy person. Comedies are just hard for me to either watch or enjoy because I am confused on what is supposed to be funny about the movie or show I am watching. Hell, even in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy book series the humor was hard for me to pick up. No disrespect to the great Douglas Adams intended. In this movie, however, I was able to fully enjoy myself. In fact there was one scene, can't recall it now, where I laughed so loudly that people in China heard me and the dead awakened. But the nearly packed theater's audience was laughing too so I wasn't noticed. Though I was embarrassed for my outburst.

Ending Both Sad and Funny
I can't say much about the ending here as I don't want to spoil the movie for you. Suffice it to say that the final confrontation between Gary King and the robots (though the movie's terminology for them are Blanks) is hilarious. Throughout the movie King has been painted as someone who you can't argue with and that is played up to great effect in the confrontation. But after you leave the theater you start to realize the implications about King's arc and it made me a little sad. I might make another post talking about the ending so that I can talk without fear of talking about major spoilers.

End of the World
In the trailers it seems that reaching The World's End is an end goal to save the world. In the trailers the plot seems to be that if they reach the that pub then they can work on saving the world. While reaching that pub does bring along the final confrontation, King's reason/obsession to getting there isn't to save the world. I don't think he really cares about saving the world at any point during the movie, really. He wants to get to the pub to do something he couldn't when he was younger and to bring solace to himself.

Final Thoughts
Out of the few movies I've seen released this year, this is my favorite. I haven't seen Iron Man 3 or Man of Steel yet so I can't say for certain what my favorite movie of the year will end up being. For now, though, this is my number one. The humor is done extremely well and fans of the Cornetto Trilogy will be happy to note the presence of some returning gags. Being a fan of Simon Pegg and Nick Frost's works I had expectations that had to be met. They were.