The Cornetto Trilogy Golden Mile, Day 1: The World's End Ice Cream Goes Glow-In-The-Dark

Many, many things about Edgar Wright's films need to be translated for American audiences, but it all starts with the Cornetto. The cheap, horn-shaped ice cream cone has featured in all three of Wright's films in what's called the "Blood and Ice Cream Trilogy," or the "The Flavours Cornetto Trilogy"-- that extra "u" is important. Shaun picks up a strawberry flavored one at his local mini-mart near the beginning of Shaun of the Dead, cops Nicholas Angel and Danny Butterman eat the original blue-wrapped ones in Hot Fuzz, and in the upcoming The World's End… well, we won't spoil it for you, but the green-wrappered mint flavor makes an appearance, to make the trilogy complete.

As fans of the previous entries in the trilogy we're as excited as a gaggle of zombies who smell fresh brains for The World's End, and today we're kicking off our countdown to the film's North American release on August 23. For the next 12 days-- a nod to the Golden Mile pub crawl at the heart of The World's End-- we're celebrating the Cornetto Trilogy in some way, from digging up viral videos and fan art to writing lengthy essays about our own love for the films. There will be interviews with the talent behind the movies, heated arguments, returns visits to favorite film moments… the works. And how better to kick things off than with the Cornettos themselves, and this newly released video of a stunt that Cornetto pulled at UK screenings of The World's End, thanks to some kind of unknowable ice cream chemicals and some handy black lights:

If you've caught the trailers for The World's End you might have noticed that glowing things are key part of the film's story is, as Pegg puts it, "robots filled with blue stuff" who have colonized the lead characters' hometown. I don't think Cornetto was trying to imply that paying audiences for The World's End are like those robots-- not the nicest thing to say about your customers-- but it makes for a neat tie-in anyway. Too bad Attack the Block-- which featured monsters with glowing blue mouths-- wasn't big enough to get the same treatment.

Stay tuned for much more celebration of The World's End and the entire Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy, and check out the trailer for The World's End below in case you still need reason to be excited about the latest Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost collaboration.

Katey Rich

Staff Writer at CinemaBlend