Hot Fuzz/Fridge

Throughout the movie, notice how despite his joviality and friendliness, Frank Butterman always somehow manages to stick Angel with any demeaning, tedious and shitty job just guaranteed to tick him off, while the other officers get the easy stuff, the day off to enjoy the fete, ice cream, etc. In light of Frank's role as one of the NWA ringleaders, it's actually a clever ploy; he not only dulls the other officers' instincts and makes them resent Nick when he actually makes them do some work, he isolates Nick from the other officers, increases his resentment of and annoyance with them and either dulls his instincts or drives him out of his mind with boredom, thus making him seem increasingly irrational and diminishing his credibility. He also ensures that Nick will get so sick of the job that it would be entirely credible if he just upped and 'disappeared' one day.
In a mixture of this and Late to the Punchline, in Hot Fuzz, the song at the end of the "tribute" to William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet ("Lovefool"), along with the gun thing, is a reference to...William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet. ~Old Man Ho Oh
Since I first saw this film I've been scratching my head over where the NWA got all their guns and ammunition from. American viewers might be unaware that it's actually quite difficult for people in the UK to get hold of the sort of weapons the NWA are armed with. Yes, I know it's a comedy and there are certain things you should just take at face value but Pegg/Wright movies tend to be better thought out than that and there is usually an internal logic that explains most things. Recently I realised that, with the exception of an occasional handgun or shotgun, all the weapons are pretty old, many of Second World War vintage. Even the FN rifle that Nick Angel uses for all too brief a time has been out of British Army service for about 30 years. Then it hit me ; they were collected during firearms amnesties, of which there have been several in the UK during recent years. Such amnesties usually scoop up quantities of wartime souvenirs as well as a small amount of unlicensed modern weapons. Although they are then meant to be melted down for scrap, this is clearly not what was happening in Sandford. Instead, with the connivance of the Chief Inspector, the choicest items were being siphoned off and handed out to the NWA's members, with a strategic reserve being stored in Arthur Webley's barn. Given that it's been nearly five years since I first saw Hot Fuzz, I have to say that this is either Fridge Brilliance of the highest order or I am a complete idiot. YMMV. ~Darren R
- Take an internet, sir. I'd written it off as Rule of Funny, but that makes perfect sense.
- Even better, the timeline puts this as having happened for about twenty years at the time of the movie, which means that when the NWA started their crusade it was before the real crackdown on firearms in the UK (the two main laws of which were passed in 1988 and 1997) When every other police force got tough on guns, the NWA just stockpiled them. No wonder they can get hold of the types of guns they have. - Melas Zepheos
Angel only starts chewing on the toothpick in the evidence locker for one reason: to spit out in the the town square. The town, obsessessed with neatness as it is, now has a little tiny piece of litter laying on the ground, just another part of Angel's giant 'Fuck You!' to the NWA.
At the end, the first officer to believe him is Walker (Oi r'ck'n e's gut summat thar) This didn't seem particularly significant to me until I started to think about the timeline of the movie. In it, we know that Sandford has been living the lie for approximately twenty years, at least since Danny was a young child. Since most of the officers on the force are about Danny's age, they would have been children when the NWA first started as well. Walker is the only one who is older, and is definitely old enough to remember a time before the NWA were in charge, and thus the most likely to be able to realise that Angel might be telling the truth. It's a tiny moment, but when I got it it suddenly made the film come together in a whole new way. - Melas Zepheos