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Comments
Very true.
How would Oscar Wilde have put it:
'Making a pig's ear of one Bond's 4th film may be regarded as a misfortune. Making a pig's ear of two seems like gross ineptitude.'
Somebody should certainly have been sacked after DAD and it shouldn't have been Brozza.
I can remember during the period of recasting and speculation 2004/2005 Pierce had strong support in favor of him staying on for B21 (especially on the fan forums). I thought he looked great in the 2000's and probably could have remained Bond thru his Mamma Mia- 13 years after his Bond debut.
This time it s impersonal!
Brilliant!
It's very hard to improve on GE.
Did they also have connections to Bond s childhood? If so, I am over the moon.
Over the Colonel Moon? Yes, he had blood ties to Bond's family no question.
I am into sucking films. On a research basis.
Someone in the EON camp did say that, but I don't think it was Wilson.
Perhaps, but Wilson never co-wrote a Bond film again. Which is perhaps a shame, because Maibaum and Wilson were a good team.
Would Mr Wilson get on with Dennis Villeneuve?
If this is a hidden kick towards the administrator and the mods, PLEASE what bad taste.
I mean. Who on this site isn't? lol
I know, but I will see it once maybe twice if it is really good, whereas the haters will see it 20 times in hope it will improve.
I've never heard that myself.
Me neither.
I always understood that there was a writer's strike or something that precluded Maibaum working much on LTK hence MGW pretty much wrote it himself.
And then of course by the time 1995 rolled round he was a literal has been having died in 91.
What's your source for this?
Given that Maibaum died in 91, a year when they were more worried about if they would ever make another film rather than who they should be getting to do the first draft, and I've literally never heard any mention of this ever before it all sounds highly speculative.
I do think, however, for B17 Eon was looking to freshen things up with a new writer and director, hence Alphonse Ruggiero on the script. LTK wasn't exactly the hit in the US Eon was hoping for, and I imagine they were conflicted on what type of approach to take Dalton's Bond next.
Agreedl And as others have pointed out, Maibaum was dead long before 1995 (would that he have had some input on that script!).
What's my source for what? Wilson initially getting solo writing credit?
A trailer I saw (and recorded on VHS) that was shown on the U.S. cable channel E! At the time, the channel had a half-hour show of movie trailers. It was introduced by actor Jim Varney who said the word was Licence to Kill was "the best James Bond movie in years."
Also, in those days, the weekly edition of Variety published a digest of movies in production. It listed key cast and key crew members. While Licence to Kill was in production, it only listed Michael G. Wilson as the writer. I looked it up at the time at a local newsstand that got Variety.
Later trailers (including the two on the 1999 or 2000 release of LTK) changed it to "Written by Michael G. Wilson and Richard Maibam." That's, of course, how it ended up in the final film.
And, yes, there was a 1988 Writer's Guild strike. Maibaum didn't cross the picket line. He had participated in the plotting prior to that.
Meanwhile, Michael G. Wilson and Alphose Ruggeiro turned in a 17-page treatment dated May 8,1990 (a year before Maibaum died) for a Bond 17 story that was never made. That included a fembot. I have a copy. (Page 15: "Nan is a lethal security robot!")
This was before everything got bogged down in lawsuits. But it shows Eon was moving forward without Maibaum.
I've read that Maibaum thought LTK suffered from the villain's scheme not being big enough (I'd respectfully disagree), but his tone hardly suggested his feelings on the script were as negative as you remember. Maibaum occasionally complained about Roger Moore or John Glen, but I don't recall him having any harsh words for Wilson.
Bond also went rogue in Spectre, but no writer's strike occurred. A substandard movie did. Perhaps the real lesson is that certain plot gimmicks yield diminishing returns.