10 Reasons Why The World's End Is Secretly The Best Of The Cornetto Trilogy

2. A New Direction

A common misconception about the Cornetto trilogy is that it's little more than a series of parodies of other genre films. Though references to such films are rife throughout Shaun and Fuzz (reenacting sequences from films as diverse ass The Omen, Night of the Living Dead and Lethal Weapon), this has never been the case €“ each film is its own beast, and at the most can be called an homage to its respective genre. This time round, it's quite clear that Pegg and Wright have grown weary of this erroneous reputation, and the end result reinforces this in spades. The World's End tones down the genre references considerably. There are few, if any, direct riffs on past sci-fi movies and more so than either of the films that went before, it stands firmly on its own two feet €“ not afraid to mark itself out as a wholly original outing for the Cornetto team. The essential 'trilogy' jokes are there €“ the fence jump, the fruit machine and the Cornetto itself €“ but while the premise may feel a little familiar, that is far more down to the notion that many sci-fi plots have been done to death in the hundred-plus years since the genre's inception. The "Starbucking" plight of the corporate Network is actually quite a novel idea, when applying the spin that the Network is an ambitious, intergalactic chain with an outlook akin to a coffee giant or franchise pub company, and Gary King is a protagonist not plucked from any existing work - which sets him apart from Shaun and Nicholas Angel who with a few alterations could well be Tim from Spaced and Murtaugh from Lethal Weapon respectively.