So it occurred to me in the shower this morning that six of the big “tentpole” film releases this summer are “part threes”: Spider-Man 3, Shrek the Third, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, Ocean’s Thirteen, The Bourne Ultimatum, and Rush Hour 3. Sequels are the bread and butter of summertime movie-going, of course, but I can’t recall any other year that had so many of them that were the same number in their respective series. Seems rather odd to me, like some kind of harmonic convergence or that planetary alignment that took place a few years ago, when the gravitational forces were all supposed to be amplified and wreck the Earth or some damn thing.

And another thing: back in my ticket-tearing days at the old Cinemark — which began some 18 years ago (holy crap!) — the summer blockbuster season started on Memorial Day weekend and ended on Labor Day weekend. Now, the season kicks off with the first weekend on May (as evidenced by the release of Spider-Man 3 a couple weeks ago) and looks like it will be pretty much over by the first weekend of August. That feels wrong to me. If this trend continues, we’ll soon be seeing the the big mindless spectacles we all love so much around Valentine’s Day instead of the Fourth of July, and that will just be… wrong. It’ll be chaos, I tells ya! Dogs and cats living together! Yeargh!