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Well said. I'm all for B25 featuring elements from TSWLM novel as well as YOLT.
The story arc can be fixed. As I posted in a different thread, there needs to be a storyline that makes the Blofeld-Bond connection more than just coincidence:
1. Hannes Oberhauser was a Spectre agent--perhaps even a/the founding member.
2. The Bonds were good friends to him, unaware of his ties to crime.
3. After young James was adopted by Oberhauser, British Intelligence took a keen interest in him. In effect, they recruited and trained him, with the intent that he could be extremely useful in infiltrating Oberhauser and Spectre.
4. But then Oberhauser, father and son, had died (presumably).
5. Nevertheless, young Bond ended up at MI6 and eventually realized that he'd been molded by the British government, hence his line to Madeleine about the life he's living: "I never really had a choice."
6. Somewhere between QoS and SF, M became aware that Oberhauser's son was still alive and began setting up the means by which Bond could find him, without revealing too much of MI6's role in it all.
7. The box of items wasn't found at Skyfall. This was a ruse. It had actually been recovered from the MI6 headquarters after Silva bombed the place, but M (Fiennes) had the details changed.
This isn't the best idea, but EON has put forth an even more ridiculous notion that a master criminal and a super spy had once been foster brothers. This has to be undone and rebuilt to make sense, somehow, and the above explanation might be the only path.
That's not bad, it works but how would they even begin to tell that on screen, I some how don't mind a wrap up just have Craig in a yolt type storyline and then after b25 we're free for just a. Mission again.
I'd prefer that they don't mess this up any further. Just ignore it all. Bring some key Fleming scenes back. Have Blofeld escape and end up in his castle, and his garden of death, calling himself Dr. Shatterhand. Forget the brother/sibling crap, forget trying to dig out of an already ugly hole by making it any worse. Forget it ever happened and just go back to basics. Bond on a mission, going after Blofeld. End of.
and killing Blofeld?
Exactly, we don't need to spend a whole film cleaning up after Spectre. Casino Royale didn't introduce some kind of sci-fi reality warping device to explain the wonky CGI parasurfing in Die Another Day, and I think we can all agree Casino Royale is better off for it.
Best case scenario: Send Craig off with a killer standalone and play out the YOLT/Shatterhand storyline with the next Bond, completely ignoring any of Craig's SPECTRE/Blofeld development to date. Just treat Blofeld like they did in the 60s, as a malleable foe they can work into whatever film with whatever tone with whatever actor playing him. They could even bring Waltz back to play a completely different Blofeld for all I care, like how Dench ostensibly played two different Ms for Brosnan and for Craig. Let Waltz do what he was originally going to the do with the character, or something else entirely.
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It helped that CR had nothing to do with DAD or the other films, hence it's reboot title.
Yes, kill him off, just like the ending in the YOLT novel. They've resurrected a character in a reboot era that has nothing to do with the original character that Fleming wrote.
At least do the right thing now and kill him off, but in the way Fleming described. Try and right the wrongs of what they did with Blofeld in the last film.
With a new Bond and in a new continuity that would make perfect sense. Just like Judi Dench. But of course they could move on from Waltz and cast a whole new actor.
Yes, it did! And it would help if B25 has nothing to do with Spectre either! ;)
Waltz wouldn't come back if it wasn't a Craig Bond film, and this character wouldn't be cast for another era.
People might as well prepare for disappointment, as Bond 25, if Craig is back, will continue to address what the past films have explored.
I just hope they understand what went wrong for so many fans and try to give us a half decent film this time with some tension, meaningful & witty dialogue, unpredictable action sequences, and characters who give a damn.
Then bring on B26 with a whole new crew (yes, recast the entire Scooby crew. I'm really not that much of a fan of them)!
I really hope not. I'm done with this fabricated family character arc back story invented by Mendes and Craig. It has absolutely nothing to do with Fleming.
SF was supposed to be a return to Fleming, yet other than Bond's parents names being mentioned on a grave stone, there isn't one unused scene or character taken from any of the Fleming novels. Maibaum knew how to skilfully do this in the 80's, with LTK being a prime example. That film feels like it could have been written by Fleming. SF unfortunately doesn't, and neither does SP.
I think P&W would be able to bring back Fleming too if they were given the chance.
You're right, I forgot Waltz mentioning he would return if Craig did.
But they are absolutely going to continue using Blofeld beyond Craig. In fact, I fear an overuse of the character down the road. Hopefully they can restrain themselves.
1. Waltz cast as Blofeld
2. The re-imaging of the Spectre meeting
3. Spectre's role in planning and then profiting from terrorism
4. The lair in Morocco (though the exposed gas pipes were all too convenient)
5. Bond's discovery of Spectre
6. Hinx as a henchman
What was a disaster (and all of this was unnecessary and frickin' avoidable!!!!):
1. The damn brotherly relationship
2. The connection to Quantum and Silva and Blofeld's supposed "authorship" of Bond's pain
3. Mr. White's presence (while pretty cool, it was mismanaged)
The basic framework of SP was pretty good. I liked Bond's journey. But that damn brotherly thing sticks like a craw in my side, and the final act, in London, is dreadful and unsatisfying as can be.
OK.
carry on.
That's a good idea, kill him and clean up this arc, reboot it with the next actor
I don't mind Spectre being behind Quantum, since the connection is pretty easily made. What rubbed me the wrong way was incorporating Silva, who absolutely should have been Craig's Goldfinger, and the hamfisted Nine Eyes plot, which added so much time, had the worst resolution ever, and was a blatant ripoff of The Winter Soldier.
Anything seems better when you don't give a damn about it in the first place. Not exactly a compliment to whatever you've just seen.
Nail on the head, @RC7. It was clear that Quantum was a fill-in SPECTRE for the modern era, then when the rights were gotten there was clear room to fill in Blofeld and the old organization in a way that made sense given what we knew to transpire in the films. I think it was a treat to Dan from EON, them saying, "You've done amazing for us, have SPECTRE."
I think Bond 25, with Craig, would explosively go out with Blofeld and the organization, and close off the era with that ultimate climax wrapped up. Then the villain would be put to rest, certainly for the next actor such that Bond #7 would only face standalone villains on standalone villains. It makes no sense for EON to bring Blofeld back in another continuity for the next actor to come right after he'd already appeared, as he's already stale and should've stayed in the 60s anyway. They haven't found a way to make Blofeld truly feel like Bond's Moriarty, not even in OHMSS, which is as good as we're probably going to ever get.
Here is how I see the next era after Craig, in regard to the villains:
There will likely be a return to the "old" template where Bond is doing some uninvolved activity before being summoned to action, or the PTS finds him on the case of some lead. He will them go back to MI6 and meet with M, after which he'll be given a standalone mission with a standalone villain most of the time, if not all the time.
With this model, there will be no heavy continuity, and each threat in each film will be independent of the rest in order to make the next era feel different from Craig's. In the same token, there will be no overarching organization for Bond to face for the same reason, as this era has pilfered those creative depths and made it necessary to retire characters like Blofeld and the organization of SPECTRE for a long time, if not forever.
I understand that this approach is what most people want anyway, and I think EON will answer that call, not only because of demand but because they know they have to do something different than the past decade or so. I think the result will be as described above, which would essentially take the 60s template of structuring the plots, mesh that with the unconnected villainy of the 70s and 80s, and restrain the formula as in the Craig era to fit modern sensibilities to make the adventures less "tropey" and more natural in their wit, fun and overall spirit.
:)>-
The tape viewing was for Madeleine, not Bond.
The schemes of The Winter Soldier and SP are not one and the same.
To be fair, it's been a very conscious decision to make Craig's Bond a military man. How he carries himself, wears his hair, even how he runs is very military in style.
I don't get the harping on the suits. They can be tighter than we're used to seeing, but I have never minded it. A suit can look just as bad if it's too loose, and we've had that in Bond before. Sean's suits are the only ones were there was consistent style before Craig, and even by YOLT that consistency was dying. George's suits were tainted by the coming 70s sensibilities of loud colors and closer fits with wacky stylings, Roger's overuse of double-breasted suits and loose elevator pants made Bond look like an aristocratic diplomat instead of a spy, Tim's Bond looked like he dressed off the rack in loose items and Brosnan far too often was dressed like a car salesman or low-end corporate leader.
Dan's suits have hit a better sweet spot I think than any since Connery's. His CR suits were fine and dignified, his QoS suits were the best in color and tailoring since the 60s by far, and SF and SP's suits, while sometimes closer to the chest, were beautifully made and color fit to Craig in a way that no other tailors seemed to bother with from the 70s to the 2000s. Where the tailoring dips, the overall function and presentation balances it. It also helps that the style of today is more geared to the 60s than the wild 70s, dull 80s and pattern ties of the 90s.
While it was fine to have Spectre behind Quantum, it would've been much more interesting to have Spectre and Quantum be rival organizations, with the former overtaking the latter. Also, it would've set up Blofeld and Spectre as more formidable foes. The sibling story wouldn't have worked as well in that case, but since it barely matters in the film, it could've just been removed. I'm just intrigued by the idea of rival criminal organizations duking it out, with intelligence services caught in the middle of their activities. It reminds me a bit of an earlier draft of The Spy Who Loved Me, which would've seen Blofeld and his people removed from power and Spectre overtaken by a new generation of villains.
I thought that as well, but with Quantum falling out, leaving Spectre to take over all their biddings. This would have made White a very "useful" pawn, whose death was brought on due to a lack of cooperation.
Yes I agree.its clear that the very fact they've brought him back at all is causing them headaches. In the past there was minimal to zero continuity between films. Now with this lame story arc they've box d themselves totally unnecessarily into a corner. They'll be keen to avoid doing that again in the future I imagine.
But if Craig comes back they have little choice but to continue down this rather uninteresting avenue