The World's End (2013)

Five friends who reunite in an attempt to top their epic pub crawl from twenty years earlier unwittingly become humanity's only hope for survival.

Director:

Edgar Wright

Writers:

Simon Pegg, Edgar Wright

Stars:

Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Martin Freeman

5 wins & 22 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Thomas Law	...	Young Gary
Zachary Bailess	...	Young Andy
Jasper Levine	...	Young Steven
James Tarpey	...	Young Peter
Luke Bromley	...	Young Oliver
Sophie Evans	...	Becky Salt
Samantha White	...	Erika Leekes
Rose Reynolds	...	Tracy Benson
Richard Hadfield	...	Young Shane
Flora Slorach	...	Young Sam
Francesca Reidie	...	Teenage Twins
Charlotte Reidie	...	Teenage Twins
Pierce Brosnan	...	Guy Shepherd
David Bradley	...	Basil
Michael Smiley	...	Reverend Green

Storyline

20 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, a 40-year old man trapped at the cigarette end of his teens, who drags his reluctant pals to their home town 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 is for the future, not just theirs but humankind's. Reaching The World's End is the least of their worries.

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Plot Keywords:

paranoia | twin actresses for twin sisters | doppelganger | group therapy | alcoholic | 

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Taglines:

Good food. Fine ales. Total Annihilation.

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Genres:

Action | Comedy | Sci-Fi

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for pervasive language including sexual references.

Did You Know?

Trivia

The bartenders ("publicans") of the first two bars are, by complete coincidence, real-life cousins Teddy Kempner and Mark Kempner, who hadn't seen each other in years, until they were reunited at the audition, according to Director Edgar Wright.

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Goofs

During the first big blank fight in the pub toilets, 'Peter' falls against a urinal, and comes away with white paint on his back. (Presumably the damaged urinal was touched in with white paint between takes). When we see his back again, the white marks are gone.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Gary King: Ever have one of those nights that starts out like any other, but ends up being the *best* night of your life?

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Crazy Credits

Sisters of Mercy's "This Corrosion" is used over the end credits. If this track sounds very familiar to you, it might be because other's have described Hans Zimmer's "Las Vegas" music from Rain Man as being a "dead-on swipe" of this Sister's track.

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Connections

Featured in WatchMojoUK: Top 10 Simon Pegg Performances (2017)

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Soundtracks

Loaded
(Bobby Gillespie, Andrew Innes, Robert Young)
Performed by Primal Scream
Courtesy of Sony Music Entertainment UK Ltd & Courtesy of Warner Bros. Records
By arrangement with Warner Music Group Film & TV Licensing

User Reviews

A surprisingly witty satire for the summer doldrums of August

"We're going to see this through to the bitter end. Or... lager end." Gary King (Simon Pegg)

Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright are at it again satirizing pop culture, this time with an entertaining send up of zombie movies (even their own spoof, Shaun of the Dead) and boy-man buddy vacations like Hangover. Five middle-aged blokes, led by the perennially immature Gary King (still the "King," he'd like to think), return after 20 years to their hometown to finish the crawl to the 12th and final pub, The World's End.

The obvious allegory is fun to follow as robotic replicas of actual humans try to take over the world. Their mission is to make earth and humans perfect, a goal any lame brain knows is impossible. Aliens have been trying to conquer earth since movies began with little success given our need for independence and ingenuity finding the alien weaknesses.

The real strength of The World's End is in the dialogue with its rapid repartee. For example:

Gary King: And here we go! Just like the five musketeers. Steven Prince: Three musketeers wasn't it? Gary King: Well nobody knows how many there were really do they? Oliver: You do know that The Three Musketeers was a fiction right, written by Alexander Dumas. Gary King: A lot of people are saying that about the bible these days. Steven Prince: What, that it was written by Alexander Dumas. Gary King: Don't be daft, Steve; it was written by Jesus.

Covering authorship and ignorance issues while being amusingly clueless is the endearment of Pegg and Wright's democratic humor—after all, none of the players is exempt from stupidity.

Perhaps more importantly, however, is the thematic point about never being able to go home again. The protagonists grew up in the same town, and returning to finish their crawl reveals that no one remembers them! Of course, since the townies are almost all robots, they couldn't remember them anyway. Yet the point is figuratively well taken: Nobody cares about you after you're gone.

Details

Official Sites:

Focus Features [United States] Official Facebook

Country:

UK USA Japan

Language:

English

Release Date:

23 August 2013 (USA)

Also Known As:

The World's End

Filming Locations:

Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, England, UK

Box Office

Budget:

$20,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$8,811,790, 25 August 2013

Gross USA:

$26,004,851

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$46,089,287

Company Credits

Production Co:

Universal Pictures, Focus Features, Relativity Media

Technical Specs

Runtime:

109 min

Sound Mix:

Datasat Dolby Digital Dolby Surround 7.1 SDDS (uncredited) DTS (DTS: X)

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1