It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
^ Back to Top
The MI6 Community is unofficial and in no way associated or linked with EON Productions, MGM, Sony Pictures, Activision or Ian Fleming Publications. Any views expressed on this website are of the individual members and do not necessarily reflect those of the Community owners. Any video or images displayed in topics on MI6 Community are embedded by users from third party sites and as such MI6 Community and its owners take no responsibility for this material.
James Bond News • James Bond Articles • James Bond Magazine
Comments
Keaton was the star of two standalone Batman films - though personally that makes little difference to me. If it did, it could be easily said that Hugh Jackman wasn't the incumbent Wolverine until 2009! :) But I admit, that's a mere case of semantics.
Though as a Pattinson fan myself, I do take the point that he's possibly running the risk of being overshadowed - he ran that risk even before the Flash announcements. Snyder's JL cut would have put a dent in it already.
It's a sign that they really aren't sure what they're doing with their properties - they're just throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks. It has the potential to sour (as it arguably already has with Affleck, I guess) some interesting interpretations of the characters to the point where there's no such thing as incumbent to me anymore.
When I look at these scenarios surrounding established characters with loyal fanbases, I'm always more happy that its EoN who are still in charge of Bond.
We only have one incarnation of Bond #7 to think ahead to. It, thankfully, keeps things simple.
Well there are also multiple actors playing the Joker at the same time. And I would think Joaquin Pheonix doesn't feel short changed by not being the "official continuity/extended universe"-Joker. Todd Philips had an idea for a Joker movie that didn't fit into the other movies and WB was smart enough to let him do it anyway. I hope "The Batman" works similarly, but I don't have high hopes for that movie atm.
It would be very interesting if they did something similar with Bond. Not because I want there to be different actors/continuities per se, but because it would mean somebody came in with an idea that blew everybody away and they HAD to do it. I currently feel the franchise is slogged down by too many people being involved and too many boxes having to be ticked (nostalgia, continuity, merchandising/product placement, current action movie trends, and so on). It feels like the prevailing mode is: "Well, we have to do a Bond movie (because it's all we do) so what could happen next?" instead of "man wouldn't it be great if Bond did X, or Y happened in a Bond movie" or "Bond is the only character to express Z." And if they need to pull a different actor in for that, so be it.
One idea I'm thinking about again and again is "Old Bond" in the vein of something like "Mr. Holmes" (maybe not that old...) with either Dalton or Brosnan coming back*. But in the end that is probably more Le Carre than Fleming...
*or someone like Oldman or Mark Rylance doing a one-off.
You were taking issue with the idea that Pattinson is the current incumbent- I'm not sure how Keaton doing some films thirty years ago would change that. He's not coming back as the star of the Batman movies, neither is Affleck.
Yeah it seems like a bizarre mess, but then I thought Marvel were mad to start bringing so many aliens and gods into the relatively realistic world they'd created with Iron Man, but I guess that worked out fine. They seem to have made this parallel universe thing work on their TV shows so I guess I can see why they'd think it would be fine to do it in the films.
I wouldn't want to say that it definitely couldn't work, but Bond has been too old for a lot of his screen time over the last 40 years! :) And I don't really know what an ageing Bond would add... maybe there's some clever spin on it to be done but I think you'd have to still give folks all the usual stunts and style, and it feels like all of the 'one last job' and 'ageing gunslinger' stories in the world have already been told.
And I'm someone who wasn't blown away by Logan- it seemed pretty standard superhero stuff to me, wearing different clothes to try and make people think it was more dramatic and interesting than it was.
I was actually taking issue with the idea that there is an incumbent at all.
Either way Pattinson isn't going to jump over to Bond.
But like I said: That's Le Carre and not Fleming/Bond.
I believe I am thinking about this because I am thoroughly underwhelmed by "washed-up Craig". He goes from young Buck to "too old for this shit" in-between QOS and SF, but just never gives me the feeling he's had a whole career as a 00 Agent in between. (Or maybe I'm just bitter that they didn't make more movies)
To get us back on track: Now about Daniel Ings for a more lightharted interpretation of Bond?
I would find it very odd if Pattinson hasn't been signed for a multi-film contract: it's just what you do with these characters.
They might possibly have got him on the basis of it being a one-off, but to be honest if it were I'd have thought they'd have got a bigger star.
A Fleming timeline one could be interesting, but even then an 'old Bond', even from the novels, would be in his 60s in the 80s, and we've kind of seen Bond in the 80s already.
Funnily enough it's only just struck me how Roger Moore wasn't actually that much younger than the 'real' Bond! :)
Which Daniel Ings? ;-)
Funny: I was thinking more about this and considering how McClory apparently tried to get Connery again in the late 90s, and thinking how that actually could have been rather interesting. I was thinking about how The Rock is obviously Connery playing a sort of alt-Bond in it, and how it could have been fun if that film had actually been the next Warhead or Doomsday or whatever it was. Have an older, greyer Bond incarcerated in HMP Shrublands where he's been for many years havong been betrayed by his own Government (maybe it's in the wilds of Scotland or something), his fellow inmate Count Lippe escapes in a big action scene and Bond follows him out because he knows he's up to no good, eventually teaming up with his old friend Felix to discover Largo's plan.. you could actually make it about Bond as a character a bit more and how he was abandoned by his own side, maybe even keep the stuff about him having a long lost daughter that The Rock introduces- why not? :)
I would have loved that. I also think that would have been a huge hit in the late '90's. Had Sony backed it up we might have had a rather slick, polished production to rival Pierce in TWINE. Connery's popularity throughout the '90's was massive, so I think audiences would have flocked to see him come back. The gray hair and beard probably would have worked beautifully as well.
Connery playing a slightly more bitter version of Bond I could totally get onboard with, although perhaps you'd need a younger character for him to contrast against, to ask what happened to him.
You could even have him defeat Largo at the end in the big action climax and ask him, as he lays dying, who's behind the whole thing, and discover it's Blofeld. Then cut to a very quiet final scene where Bond walks in on a very old and decrepit Blofeld in his luxurious sick bed somewhere for the final confrontation...
As you mention the beard though, what was the last movie where he was clean shaven? I can't think. I guess he was 'tasche only in The Avengers, but no facial hair at all... ? :)
Could it be NSNA?
Which brings me back to never really liking Craig as "old Bond"...
YES!
...Considering the only thing the internet has been talking about this weekend is Pattinson as Batman. Perhaps I was wrong.
Personally, I was slightly surprised how underwhelmed I was with his Bruce Wayne. I adore the tone and mood of the trailer. But something about Pattinson seems off. Nonetheless, I'm due to see Tenet this week. He's giving serious Bond energy in the trailer (arguably, so is John David Washington).
I also noticed this new picture from The King's Man. Which, if memory serves me correctly, is coming out next month in cinemas(!). Harris Dickinson is sitting across a desk from Ralph Fiennes with Gemma Arterton at his side. I'm certainly getting some Bond vibes here...Plus I also hear that Dickinson replaced Robert Pattinson in Joanna Hogg's The Souvenir II. I think they have a similar energy. He already looks maturer than his 24 years. This kid could seriously have the goods and the career to boot by the time he's 27.
Bond should be a man.
Maybe the next Bond movie will be influenced by The Batman, especially the detective plot, just hopefully more light-hearted gentleman Bond action.
I'm sure that's where they'd be looking anyway in the hope they can get a long run out of him. Doesn't mean they'll necessarily pick one that age though: that was the aim with the last one but they found Craig instead.