The release of The World’s End marks the end of the Cornetto trilogy, directed by Edward Wright. The first two movies were Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, starring Simon Pegg and Nick Frost. The movie opens with Gary King (Pegg), an alcoholic burnout, getting his old high school friends back together for a challenge. The goal: completing the Golden Mile, a bar-crawl that involves going through twelve different pubs in the small English town of Newton Haven. A few pubs in, they discover that the town has been overrun with robots. Together, they must figure a way to get out without getting caught. The problem? They are all completely wasted.

 The World’s End falls into the “social science fiction” genre, where the humans deal with both an imminent alien threat and each other. Director Wright handles this quite well. The “robot town” is not introduced for some time in the movie. He first gives viewers the chance to understand the five protagonists’ relationships and personalities before revealing the core of the movie. Gary King stands out from the rest of the ensemble due to his stark unpleasantness. The man possesses almost no concern for his friends and acts purely on self-interest. Gary King’s fall after his high school years is so stunningly sad and terrifyingly possible that you can’t help but feel sorry for him. Simon Pegg’s top-notch acting plays an essential role in this. When Gary expresses sadness, viewers can’t help but sympathize.

Other characterization contributes to the success of the movie. Nick Frost’s character Andy Knightly manages to shake off the traditional “cleaned-up after high school” or “ex-party boy becomes lawyer” stereotype. He seems to be heartless towards Gary at the start of the film, but reveals his true colors later on.

Also, the comedy in the movie is killer. The friends’ back-and-forth dialogue, Gary’s selfishness, and their extreme drunkenness lead to clever jokes. The climax of the movie was  well-written, profound, but extremely anti-climactic. The movie often tugs at the heartstrings whilst dealing not-so-witty, well-timed one liners that elicit laughs.