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Comments
"That, I'm afraid, is inevitable."
That's why I don't think Tanner should be recast.
Maybe the reason why Tanner has been more present is precisely because they couldn't fit Felix Leiter in SF and SP? Just an hypothesis.
Instead of having him saunter around in the background, bring back Felix and his cool attitude to get into some trouble with Bond in the field.
I feel like EON are now trying to address Tanner's lack of use by making the character a bigger part of the action, like in the early drafts of SP. The problem is that by trying to make him a bigger part of the movie than he should be, you resort to making stupid decisions that defy his character and make him nearly unrecognizable. Some may know from early SP drafts that Tanner was intended to be the big mole within MI6. From what I read, this villainized him a fair bit, and made him into someone we wouldn't recognize as being the same understated, sometimes ditzy Tanner.
I'd rather they just wrote him out instead of trying to alter who his character has been all this time. We already had to deal with a significant amount of retconning in SP already to make the CR-QoS-SF connections work, so to then also have to believe that Tanner was a backstabber all this time would be too much to take.
If I had my way I'd have had a scene at the beginning of SP when Bond is back in London with Tanner saying goodbye, stating that M's passing took it all out of him and he needed to resign promptly. I think it would have been a far greater, more interesting use of him than the few shots we got of him following Bond and Q around like a cow to slaughter.
I've only just thought about it but perhaps the reason he nearly let M get shot in SF was because he's a baddie?? You see its all brilliantly connected not the botch retcon job people think.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=bxU2eqZtYmc
I agree about writing him out but consider he has had so little impact he doesnt even deserve a line, let alone a scene, explaining why. Apart from the fact he's now popped up in 3 films hes replaceable as Villiers. Tobias Menzies he is more memorable in 1 film than Rory has been in 3 and no one explained why he didnt come back.
But to be honest the character is largely redundant if you ask me. Even in the books he only ever pops his head round the office door and says 'fancy a chat later James?'
In film, which is a leaner and more stripped down medium, its M's job to do the exposition which leaves us asking just what is the point of Tanner? And honestly I cant think of one.
I quite agree. Tobias Menzies was inspired casting; they caught him early-ish in his career as well and he's only gone up since then.
That said, I also liked James Villiers' authority figure Tanner who behaves like he's M in For Your Eyes Only. I like that presence about him as he criticizes 007's downpoints of his assignment in Spain during the Gonzalez case.
I'd love to see a sequence in a Bond film that is relaxed - something like Bond & Tanner playing golf or cards. Kinnear's Tanner has basically just been a guy who gets orders from M and has no real personality. Kitchen was perfect in the role without being given a whole lot to do either. I think Damien Lewis would be great in a role like Tanner or as a new Leiter down the road.
Cleese:Lazenby::Whishaw:Moore.
As for the next one I posted this in Mission impossible and realize it could work here. I would like to see the ramification of an organization where the head is incarcerated. again rarely to spy films deal with the fallout of an organization for example Tomorrow Never Dies didn't deal with the fall out of Janus losing it's head even though there is no way every single janus agent was killed by the end of goldeneye. I would Argue the same is true with Spectre there was a room filled with spectre agents and yet Blofeld is arrested and we are still going to focus on him?
I am curious if the film at least partially focused in on the fallout of an organization without a head?
I could take or leave Whishaw and Harris, however... difficult to put my finger on what I don't like about their Q & Moneypenny respectively, but I find their parts a bit too over-written - they are far too 'posed', if you know what I mean. They seem to overthink their performance too much.
Quite. The trust between M and Bond was vital in the books, MR (novel) being the best example of this. Cinematic Bond is long overdue a proper Blades' scene with those two, and Fiennes + Craig seem the ideal combo to put that MR chapter to film...
in contrast his line "don't cock it up" is a highlight within SF.
He is so wonderfully English that you wonder if there is potential for him to go up against Felix's boss or similar character from USA with an under-current of culture clash . Someone like Alec Baldwin who has real menace about him (but too late as MI got him)
And to think people were still insisting post-SP that Scott would've made a better ESB than Waltz. It's just laughable. There was a discussion the other day about having a peer from an international agency for him to go up against (in fact Gogol was mentioned) which I would welcome. I'd love to see Fiennes going toe to toe with another heavy-weight actor.