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
M is the chief executive, and would have a private office. Moneypenny is in charge of that private office, and is a key role. She would have no time for popping out on missions.
Similarly Q is the senior quartermaster, running a large department with a significant budget to manage, developing new technologies. He does not have time to pop out delivering messages to Bond in the field.
If you want Bond to have a support team ,then fine. But they are different characters.
At MI6 Bond can be introduced to whatever expert he needs for the job at hand. Jim Fanning comes to mind.
That keeps it fresher because there are new characters with limited roles in the story.
Which, just by the by, is the reason why the Craig films make much, much, much more sense if the Bond crew are all just working at/in charge of the 00 section instead of all of MI6. Dench-M is the boss of over 3.500 employees while running mission control for a single op? Not likely. Eve being put into admin duty as the executive assisstant to said boss of an entire government department? Again, not really. Makes much more sense if there are only a small number of employees and understanding the field side already is actually an asset. All of those employees being re-located to some bunkers? Nope. C even goes on and on about how the 00s are obsolete, as if Fiennes-M is only responsible for them and not a huge apparatus responsible for all kinds of foreign intelligence work around all that. Because that's what M is in that timeline. They just never say it.
Edit: Oh, and this is one of the things Deaver got right in Carte Blanche and they should at least take as a background reality, even if they don't say it out loud. MI6 isn't the MI6 of Fleming's days anymore (if it was like the book version even in that time). It's a major bureaucracy. Taking the Bond support cast and putting them into their own side entity - the Overseas Development Group under the cover of Universal Exports in Carte Blanche - that very few people in the British government and Civil Service even know about makes way more sense.
That's why I wouldn't mind the new films showing M having the idea for the 00s and setting up his own section of 'Red Indians'.
It really does make you feel like Bond is on his own at Casino Royale, the danger and isolation, not unlike OHMSS. I love that feel, and I hope that Bond 26 does something similar.
Yes, I've noticed that Fiennes actually has done a lot of movie sequels and franchises in general. From that viewpoint it would make sense for him to comeback as M (and hopefully be better written).
He's also a respected veteran actor and a bona fide thespian. Wishaw might come back because Paddington.
Must admit I've been reading some Bond books recently and increasingly seeing Fiennes in my mind's eye. He's got the right sort of authority I think, I would not be upset to see him back, although I think they likely won't.
Does the series actually need them is the pertinent question.
His authority was undercut in NTTD. Saying 'i messed up but I believe in democracy' isn't really good enough, even if you do get a comedy f-bomb. The Troubles-era backstory is something they can't reasonably develop without prompting an argument (a frequent bother with SF).
There's too much of Q, Moneypenny, M and the new 007 in NTTD, and none of them particularly
add anything past padding. They feel like adverts for potential spin-offs, which is not something we should become burdened with.
I'd be in favour of losing them outright never mind recasting them.
Honestly, no. She lacks gravitas, the aura of authority and the kind of charisma that comes with it.
Have you seen Black Bag, by chance? She plays a spy therapist, quite authoritative imo. Good performance, I could see her as M.
Haven't seen it yet, but I want to. I like Naomi Harris, she's a good actress, but so far there's nothing that makes me think M. She's also too attractive, (heck, I thought she looked too sexy for Moneypenny). Not to mention putting her in another role would be distracting.
IF they want to bring back the old team, it should be in their initial roles. And because of their status as actors, I could only see Ralph Fiennes and Ben Wishaw returning.
A cgi bernard lee now voiced by Brian Blessed would be awesome. Michelle Yeoh as Moneypenny and Danny Dyer as Q.