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Which film was M the nastiest towards Bond ?
I just got done watching TMWTGG and I had forgotten how mean he was towards Bond. At one point telling Bond that he wished Scaramanga had shot him rather than the other fella on the street. Obviously he didn't really mean it but I can't remember a time where he was quite this insulting toward him.
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http://www.mi6community.com/index.php?p=/discussion/10342/m-angry-at-bond-in-tmwtgg
I would say though it's a toss-up between CR and QOS. M's maternal instincts were a little overbearing.
Honorable mentions:
DN
OHMSS
LTK
GE
DAD
My thoughts exactly...
It's more than just that. The film goes out of out it's way to paint M in an almost villainous light. In his first scene the movie teases us by not showing us his face or letting us know it's M but rather showing us his hands stroking a cat (ala Blofeld) with some ominous music. This was deliberate. It's the film telling us that this time M will be more of foe to Bond than a friend.
I agree M came off the meanest in TMWTGG.
Runner-up: Casino Royale
M: "And how the hell could Bond be so stupid? I give him double-O status and he celebrates by shooting up an embassy! Is the man deranged? And where the hell is he? In the old days, if an agent did something that embarrassing, he'd have the good sense to defect! Christ I miss the Cold War!"
M: "You've got a bloody cheek!"
Bond: "Sorry. I'll shoot the camera first next time."
M: "Or yourself."
M: "Utter one more syllable and I'll have you killed. I knew it was too early to promote you."
M: "Go stick your head in the sand somewhere and think about your future because these bastards want your head, and I'm seriously considering feeding you to them."
Third place: Die Another Day
M: "You're no use to anyone now."
My vote would definitely be TMWTGG. M was really on a tear for most of the movie. I believe the phone scene at the end was a bit of Bond saying screw off to M after all the lecturing and lashes he had taken from M the entire movie! I think this was maybe an experiment they were testing out to give M more emotion, but in my opinion it didn't work. He just came off like a crotchety ole man.
Like many on here, I'm hoping the new film will leave some of the tiresome trust issues, rogue aspects, and M having too much of a presence behind. Let's just see Bond being Bond on a mission for once. Easier said than done I guess.
Agreed.
Again, I seriously don't get where this is coming from. Where is it even implied that M was ready to have Bond shot to death? Because he came with armed guards? Surely that is simply protocol when reigning in a renegade 00 who has been using his licence to kill outside of company orders? We see the very same thing when M tries to pull Bond in in Quantum of Solace: armed guards. The only action we see M himself take is to tell one of his men NOT to shoot Bond, so I really don't understand the reasoning here.
That's not what I meant. I'm talking about the sniper posted on that tower that fires at Bond. And the only reason M stopped the other guard from shooting Bond was that there were "too many people".
M didn't specifically order the sniper to fire at Bond. The sniper sees Bond make an attack on M's bodyguard (and presumably M as well for all we know from the sniper's vantage) and takes action. Purely protocol. There was also a "capture or kill" order placed on Bond in QOS so that doesn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary.
About the "too many people" line, yes, that's the explanation M gives his man to stop him from shooting 007, but in fact, there weren't any other people there. And the way he looks after Bond with a worried, almost saddened, look on his face and says, "God help you, Commander," suggests M is deeply concerned for his agent, far from ready to shoot him to death.
That sniper seemed a little excessive don't you think? You'd think 2 or 3 trained and armed MI6 guards would've been enough. My reading of the scene was that M would have no qualms about putting Bond down. I guess it's up to interpretation.
First he kicks Bond off the solar mission with unofficial instructions to hunt down Scaramanga. But once Bond has tracked down Lazar, M instantly sets up shop in Macao without informing 007. He does leave Bond a little surprise though: by far the most useless element in the entire service whose only talent - good looks - can only serve to draw his attention away from serious affairs. Naturally Bond assumes, as we all do, that M is still in London because the Gibson thing apparently fails to spawn result, so maybe after Bond has dealt with Pistols Scaramanga, he can pick up whatever trail he had last been pursuing concerning the solex. Remember, M specifically states that Bond is off the job! Yet when Bond and Hip fail to retrieve the goods from Gibson's corpse, M goes totally jerk over them. Look, he should have given Bond a call to allow things a slightly bigger chance of success: "we're here too STOP working with Hong-Kong police guy named Hip STOP Gibson here too STOP shadow him, find solex STOP". Instead, not a word from HQ, Bond's mind only on Scaramanga and his showering mistress, he now takes all that dirt just because he couldn't figure things out? That's like telling old Buford who's milking his cow that he should have kept LHO from shooting JFK because he was in Dallas too.
And what's with that attitude towards Q? Q gets dragged along for whatever reason - were they planning a surprise party for Bond? - and he actually tries to have some constructive input. Yet M tells him to shut up! - twice! The expert is shushed while offering his expert contribution. Oh man! Of course after all that Hai Fat business, M goes green like Hulk, when in fact Bond's only mistake was not to hop into the water with Chew Me and give that pathetic excuse for a mission the finger.
But the absolute pinnacle of M's nasty behaviour in this story comes with his perverse interruption of Bond and Goodnight's horizontal debriefing. Since M somehow managed to track down the right phone to ring in all of East-Asia, his intelligence might also have warned him that Bond is on a boat with a cute blonde wearing close to nothing in a bed full of broken glass and with a midget hanging in a pirate's cage outside. Putting 2 and 2 together, the only logical conclusion is that Bond and Goodnight, whatever they're planning, are clearly in for some kinky stuff. And yet he insists on being the party crasher. Let them have it! If pain and people in cages and stuff is what grown-ups in the 70s like, play along. And all M yells is "Goodnight! Goodnight!" as if a girl who nearly killed Bond by getting her behind involved in the mission has anything to add to this mission...
Nasty bugger, that M. Nasty bugger indeed.