There are few things that define a millennial’s film journey in the way the Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy did. You either saw them all and think about them constantly, or you didn’t watch them, and that’s fully on you. Edgar Wright’s beloved trilogy includes Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, and The World’s End, and all three star Simon Pegg and Nick Frost.
It was a staple of the late ’00s and early ’10s, and to this day it’s still one of the wildest trilogies. The stories are filled with new characters (with Pegg and Frost at the center), but they’re all so beautifully woven together and immensely rewatchable. I just had to convince myself to not rewatch them for my Letterboxd stats. Point is: They’re brilliant.
So when Tom Cruise decided to wish everyone a happy holidays by jumping out of a plane, his Mission: Impossible co-star Simon Pegg decided to pay homage to the movies that made him an icon to many a millennial.
“Oh hey, this week Tom Cruise did a video where he jumped off a helicopter and wished everyone ‘Happy holidays’,” Pegg says as he’s walking down Nelson road. “And I just thought that was really, really cool, you know? So I thought, well, what can I do that is sort of keeping in my own sort of cinematic universe to wish people a Happy Christmas and holidays and what have you. But I couldn’t really think of anything. So I thought, what I’d do, is just pop across the road and buy a cornetto and have a think about it, you know? Because it’d be really nice if I did something that was kind of special, that was kind of about what I sort of do. Tom does all the jumping off shit but that’s not really me. So just give me a minute and I’ll come back and I’ll wish everybody a Merry Christmas.”
The importance of this walk
Now, if you’ve never watched the Three Flavours Cornetto trilogy, you probably don’t know what this video means, but if you’re a fan, you know that Pegg is recreating the famous walk that Shaun takes over to the corner store in Shaun of the Dead. After a night out with his girlfriend Liz (Kate Ashfield) and his friend Ed (Frost), Shaun goes home drunk and alone, and has to go about his life again the next morning.
On his walk to work, Shaun stops at a shop for a drink and a snack, and that’s what we get to see Pegg recreate in this video. It’s so simple and sweet, and it’s a reminder of why we all love this movie so much. I’d watch Simon Pegg trip over that curb every single day if I could.
Happy holidays, and maybe try to convince your family to watch Shaun of the Dead this holiday season.
(featured image: Universal Pictures)
