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So am I.
To be fair I find the clown scene at the end of Octopussy really tense. I'm a big Fleming fan but I love that moment. Inflatable gondolas... well, it is what it is.
Anyway, this is obviously a big topic after NTTD and how the fandom seem a bit split at the moment. I get why those 'resistant to change' don't like the ending, or indeed the idea of Bond's daughter. I personally don't find the end works on an emotional level (a lot of people have said this too). I do think Bond as a character and certain aspects of the series should always outlive the individual actors/films if that makes sense. Having Craig's Bond 'die' in this closed off timeline feels a bit odd in that sense. Same for killing off Felix etc. I personally don'd find Mathilde even adds much to the story and it'd have made more sense to adapt what Fleming did and just have Madeline shag Bond in the Norway house and put a hand to her stomach after he 'dies' (or goes missing or whatever) in a sort of nod to YOLT. Ah well, not that it matters. Bond will return.
If they were made more often, maybe fans like myself, would be more open to changing aspects of the series
It'd be way easier for me to accept change and forgive the installments I don't like as much if we were still getting them every other year (or at least one every three years consistently). Waiting 4-5 years for a stinker is incredibly disappointing.
Yep exactly mate. It's disheartening when you wait years and it seems rushed and poorly planned
It didn't worked in No Time To die, because:
1.) It was poorly executed and rushed.
2.) The theme that they went, again was already played in the previous movies, it's like you're just changing your clothes but you're still the same person. A villain from the past who comes back to hunt this character because he wants revenge and there's some family connections, Bond was retired and called back for a mission, it's played in the previous films, there's nothing new, they just added some new colors (They just added the daughter and the killing of some characters and Bond) but the idea was still the same, it's like they've just rehashed Skyfall and Spectre and combined them in this movie, again recycling. They didn't planned the movie's plot and story well.
3.) It's not a new ground already, what happened to Bond was also happened to Logan, to Iron Man, so those scenes of him with daughter and dying was a bit redundant because other movies have done these before and it feels like a trend.
And these reasons why the changes in NTTD feels contrived.
I'm welcome for a change, but in the way of new ideas, new plots, new storytelling.
Give us a new stories and ideas and we're happy.
No more remakes and recycling.
I've read posts from fans claiming they didn't like Craig because Bond should look as Fleming described. But then when you had instances in Craig's Bond where things he went through were similar to what Fleming's did - getting hurt physically and emotionally, losing people he was close to, being betrayed - the same people complain it's not the Bond they're used to.
They complain he doesn't get the girl or doesn't have sex - because that's what James Bond does was what one person said about that. But then you had the scene in SF where he gets in the shower with Severyn and they complain he's an insensitive brute by taking advantage of a woman who has been forced into a life of being a being trafficked. Or he takes advantage of a recent widow in SP.
Others have said Bond was a pawn for falling for Madeline, who they considered a SPECTRE agent; which she wasn't. But at the same time, they praise Elecktra as a great villainess, but don't complain Bond was basically duped and didn't realize it until it was too late. And that's okay cause she's a great character and he eliminated her and used a cool line.
The Craig era was unique, it took chances and it wasn't all successful and some fans obviously didn't like some of the decisions or most of them in some cases. I was glad for the break from the model-handsome, always wins, shagging everybody in sight, bad one-liners formula. Yet I also was frustrated with a lot of the choices the era made. But overall, is there any era we look at and are totally satisfied with?
I like all eras of film Bond and the literary works. All I ask is thrill me with some great action, have James Bond do cool James Bond-like things and give me an experience that makes me look forward to owning the film and looking forward to the next one.
Beyond that I expect a viewer likes or dislikes a Bond film based on their own tastes and personal experience. If they dislike a film and continue to focus on it, they find fault after fault.
And ten years on, as with OHMSS and LTK and QOS and others, history says they may have a totally different take on it.
I love OHMSS, LTK and CR-QOS, though after those last two I was hoping to go back to a more traditional standalone type of mission until the next guy for the next shake-up.
I’m not resistent to atypical Bond films, but I’d like my Bond films to still be recognisable as Bond films.
The ideal scenario for me is a good few standalone missions alternated with the occasional personal stakes story.
I used to advocate for "strange Bond" films all the time. Old Bond. A one-off female Bond. Bond as a one-man play. Bond from the perspective of the villain. Comedy Bond. Hard-core action Bond by the guy who made The Raid. Basically all with the idea in mind that this would help illuminate what is at the center: Bond.
But I have come around on that and that is mostly down to that exact issue: We just don't get enough Bond films. If they did one every two years, I'm totally cool with every third or fourth movie being a crazy experiment. Not so much if it's 4-5 years between films.
The best example for this, to me, is that we have been kind of stuck in "Old Bond" territory for 10 years now - 14 years since there was a "young Bond" (we can quibble whether the second half of SF and all of SP actually is "Old Bond", but he clearly isn't a young man) and although I will defend Craig's comedic chops until the day I die, I think we can all agree that it has been at least 20 years now since we've had an out-and-out fun Bond film.
For me, a fun Bond film means thrilling and exhilarating garnished with wit and cleverness.
i agree Brosnan in that sense was a better bond than craig. Craig is a better actor and more akin to a jason bourne character. thats not what james bond was about.
I thought that the sentiments of McCarthyism and "reds under the beds" were a thing of the past but it seems not. Well, I suppose this is a James Bond forum and paranoia and plots are the order of the day. Still...
Wow... Lemme guess @meddle ... You're from Alberta, right?
It’ll happen, and you’ll have to live with that, especially when communism wins.
I have little patience for newbies who blow in with this kind of behavior. Banned.
I understand that our politics inform our opinions of films and such to some small extent. But to barge in with terms like 'commies' and 'liberal left' when we are talking about the future of Bond is to beg for being mercilessly shown the door, especially within mere hours since registering.
I'm still here. I'm always here, forever.
No one ever leaves MI6...
Personally, I don't think "sticking to the old" is particularly appealing. It's good to give audiences the thrills they expect without reinventing the wheel, but this can quickly lead to creative stagnation. On other hand, doing everything "different" can alienate fans and wider audiences alike. The best path probably lies in the middle: making the familiar feel surprising again. In that sense, I though the Craig Bonds worked very well. Especially CR tried to combine elements of the classic Bond with some innovative approaches. Am I making sense?
I think Bond is always subject to 'reinvention' as the producers like to say, and it's applicable to each new era. Arguably even each film. I can understand some people get a bit nervous about the word, and I also think that Bond as a character and a series has fundamentals that you can't really deviate from. I agree and understand what you're saying about the Craig era. Just on a very broad level Craig's Bond in CR was harder edged and even more brutish than his predecessors (very much the sort of hero of the early 21st Century), and yet at the same time we got all the things that make the character who he is - the womanising, the gambling, even the dry humour, arrogance, swagger etc. It felt recognisable while being a different take on the character. You can apply that to each actor. They're all different and unique but paradoxically the same.
The Craig era as a whole is an unusual one for the Bond movies in many ways. They frequently deviated from very broad tropes of the formula and of course it ended with him dying. That said Q and Moneypenny were eventually introduced into this world, as well as the gadgets and increasingly otherworldly villains/scenarios. I think it worked well and really gave a sense of how the world was changing around Bond. I always view the Craig era as a sort of loose adaptation of the character's journey in the Fleming novels (even down to his personal/physical issues, and of course him having to depart from a family/happy life), insofar as I think a bit of Fleming is still integral to the films. So there was still a sense that those fundamentals were still in place and a conscious effort was being made to tell a Bond story, albeit a very particular one. Not sure if that was felt by every fan or how resistant to change they are, but in a sense it doesn't matter. Most people who watch these films aren't fans and want a gripping story. That idea of reinvention balanced with tradition/deference to the source material is probably the best approach in that sense.
The same fans who have accepted multiple actors as Bond?
I think there is more Fleming in NTTD than people admit. Fleming did kill Blofeld, Fleming wanted to kill and almost killed Leiter, Fleming "killed" Bond literally (FRWL) and metaphorically (YOLT). People may not have liked the execution in NTTD, but Fleming did take bolder swings than Eon did, until Craig.
The same fans who think Craig is almost irreplaceable?
Even Craig's fans are a little nervous about the change and Craig's Bond is dead!
Oddly enough the latest Bond film is still the same as at the time.
Also, I guess a traditional standalone mission for the next guy could be, in a certain way, considered a shake-up by now.
That being said I’m sure there will be plenty of people who cast judgement on the next era of Bond before it even starts.
Of course not, and we would never become resistant to change. Ever.