It might be slightly premature to start heralding the demise of Bond, as I suspect 007 has a fair few adventures to go yet, but yesterday I took myself to see Kingsmen and was deeply impressed. I’d been wanting to go for days: I wanted to see how it squared up to the Bond phenomenon, having been quite intrigued by the trailers. To be honest I was half expecting it to suck, but what I found myself watching yesterday afternoon was a witty, self-referential, self-knowing film. It knew the characteristics of it’s own genre and pointed them out to us. There are lines, for instance, where the baddie points out what he would usually be expected to say, but that he is not going to say it. It borrows Fleming’s/Bond’s connoisseurship for fine drink, and plays with it, for instance supplying us with an alternative martini recipe (‘gin, not vodka, of course’). It was absurd, but that absurdity is pointed out when the characters say they prefer the older Bonds, before he got serious. However, unlike Austin Powers, this had fairly serious thought-provoking themes: for one, I feel it has quite a bit to say about class, male-ness etc. I found it worthy of consideration rather than just a silly, action-packed romp. It’s self-knowledge and serious edge gave it a depth Powers lacks.

We have, it seems, a new hero, and a new service more secret than MI5 or the CIA, beholden to no government. I’d be interested to see what they do with it: personally, unlikely though it is, I’m now itching to see a Kingsmen-007 crossover.