I realized last week that I had never seen a single James Bond film in my entire life. Growing up, I saw James Bond ads, Nintendo DS and Wii games, and always heard the moms at the hairstylist fawning over Daniel Craig's sex appeal. I thought "that guy is James Bond". But up until last week, I hadn't even seen Casino Royale, and had only heard of the "iconic torture scene" (crazy mf sentence).

With the rise of Letterboxd and as I became friends with more movie nerds, I decided, about 2 years ago, to watch more movies, whether they're classics or new releases. But, I mostly focused on Oscar nominated movies or Oscar contenders, because who has time to watch bad, forgotten films.

I wouldn't say this is a bad strategy, but it means leaving out of my watchlist many iconic franchises, some of them deeply ingrained in pop culture. Like the James Bond franchise.

From what I understand, it's become iconic and known worldwide despite never having truly found its footing, hopping from actor to actor, flopping here and there, and being the target of criticism for wanting to evolve with its time.

But the Daniel Craig "reboot" series, spanning 5 movies, makes for one goddamn entertaining chronicle, finding balance between romance, action, political commentary, and of course gimmicky gadgets.

I binge watched all 5 films within a week, and while some of them are weaker, the overarching story captivated me, and 007's character development surprised me in a very good way (I thought the whole thing was that James Bond doesn't change his ways?).

Again, this text is all over the place, but what I mean to say is: WATCH FUN FRANCHISES! Thanks to them generally spanning many years, they give you a peak into the culture of their many entries' specific time while immersing you into a carefully crafted world.

By the way, special mention for the TITLES of those films. They all sound so badass. Quantum of Solace? Are you kidding me? Who thought of that? Holy.

Unspecial mention for No Time to Die, because this exchange happens:

― Do you know what time it is?
― No?
― Time to die!

That moment was truly awful. But maybe I gotta give it time to cook. Ok that's all bye!