In From Russia with Love, Bond’s decision to sleep with Tatiana Romanova directly beneath a mirror feels uncharacteristically sloppy for a seasoned operative who already knows she’s entangled in espionage. The predictable result is surveillance by Rosa Klebb, turning intimacy into leverage for a staged murder plot, as revealed by Red Grant. Bond must have been truly taken by Tania to commit such a blatant lapse in judgment.

But by Die Another Day, almost 40 years later, 007 appears to have learned from that humiliation. At the Rubyeon Royale Hotel in Hong Kong after his escape from treatment post-North-Korea-abduction, he instantly exposes a similar mirrored honeytrap involving a masseuse, Peaceful Fountains of Desire, and the hotel manager, Mr. Chang. Although the masseuse had to have been tempting for Bond, especially after a stint as a prisoner of war, he doesn’t relent.

The contrast is a perfect example of Bond learning from his mistakes, and makes an interesting connection between two Bond movies that could not be any more different.