Review: "The World's End" is witty drinking thriller

"The World's End" R
     Edgar Wright, (Hot Fuzz, Scott Pilgrim Saves the World), returns to Simon Pegg comedies with this coming of age has gone comedy about a band of friends who back in 1993 attempted to visit every pub (bar) in their hometown in one night and get hammered, but never finished.
     Years later, Pegg's character is a loser who reunites his four friends under false pretenses to have them join him in a reenactment of the World's End pub crawl but shortly after a few oddball gags and some mishaps, it's clear the main protagonist is lying. The odd thing is though he also tangles with a strange robot with blue goo for blood. Soon they are finding robots all over the sleepy town, and they're out to get the wayward band.
    The names are forgettable but the wry British humor is not, and there are some quirky good lines in this. It seems to channel both goofy party movies and old science fiction exploitation movies, a cross between Invasion of the Body Snatchers and any number of drinking films.
     The antiheroes must get to the final pub before the robot monsters kill them, even though their plan seems to be to all be friends, so long as they obey. This is similar to the cult in Hot Fuzz whereas the town was in fact crazy in that one and causing accidents to get rid of dissenters. The robots also dispatch their objectionable patrons.
     Funny spoof of those 2012 movies and the whole crackpot doomsday genre.
Review by Adam Browne