I was speaking with friends on the internet last week about how the Friday the 13th series of movies from the ’80s has an emergent continuity. That is to say, there was nobody with an overarching vision of how the series would turn out, or for that matter how many movies there would be or on what schedule. Nevertheless, each new film built on the last, keeping track of what had gone before and incrementally advancing the gestalt image of Jason Voorhees that is now a part of the shared cultural experience.

Spectre is the, what, fifth James Bond movie since the series was rebooted? No, fourth I see. I know that the first two went in sequence, and then apparently in my head the third one contained two movies? Which makes it sound bad, but I did not and retrospectively do not find it to be so. It contains guns, explosions, chases, hot chicks, and vodka martinis. Which is to say, yep, James Bond movie. But it definitely has the same emergent continuity that I had observed earlier that week, elsewhere. (Because I saw it opening weekend and still took this long. Sigh.) Maybe it was a writer taking advantage, or maybe it was actually planned all along; all I know is it did not feel cheap or unearned when it happened. Is that because I know about SPECTRE from the previous continuity? It could be, but I’m a fan of the series and so I don’t mind if that’s why.

Lastly: Christoph Waltz of recent Tarantino fame continues to impress mightily.