No time to pee (Bond spoilers)

Very puzzled about the ending – they haven’t killed 007, they’ve killed James Bond. Anyone who plays 007 now will need their own back-story, their own DB5, their own ‘shaken not stirred’. By killing James Bond they’ve killed almost 60 years of character development.

Not really. The Craig movies were a reboot, he started Casino Royale as a fresh agent without 00 status on a new timeline but with it being the same character with the same origins as previously (avalanche, orphan, raised in Scotland, school at Eton etc)*. They could have done what they did with the Craig series if they had ‘killed’ him at the end of the Brosnon movies, so I guess the same applies this time round.

*Having said that, that was the aim – they then completely screwed it up the moment the DB5 in Skyfall was demonstrably the same one as in the ‘previous’ Bond timeline.

Some kind of reboot will be coming, I doubt Barbara Broccoli will just leave it there. I mean not the first time Felix has died either. Personally I’d like to see some origin films (done to death with superheros but not one for Bond) there must be enough material with the Higson books.

The reboot worked last time as the Bond series had suffered a bit over the years, the Timothy Dalton years where there was no budget for them, then the Brosnan years where it just got silly towards the end and made Casino Royale look like a breath of fresh air.

I just struggle to see how they move it on to another tranche of movies after the way this arc ended, it’s a hard act to follow and the reality is a lot of film franchises in similar areas struggle the same, look at Bourne, it tried to break away from Jason Bourne, failed, it tried to come back, didn’t do much better, same with Wick and the plethora of other attempts.

So again, i struggle to see how they progress, a real origin movie would be just filler of a script on some mission during his navy days that’s like his MI6 stuff, but while he’s a commander.

The more i think about the ending as well, i do think they had a real chance to give a Bond a happy ending, but they went for the dramatic ending and it just seemed a wasted opportunity for Bond at last.

Meh, can see a 20 year time jump for a reboot: Madeleine died off screen at the end of this film, Mathilde (now an orphan) will have trained to avenge her parents, recruited by a 00 agent, convenient Bond surname.

Queue many “I knew your father” references and shoe horn a DB5 family heirloom as well.

Wasn’t that meant to be the follow up movie to Leon, maybe Matilda and Mathilde could join up ;o)

favourite moment was the whole Blofeld scene, being brought out like a prize on bullseye

It made me wonder how many other international master criminals they hold in Belmarsh if they have to store them like a fizzy pop dispenser?

I quite like the idea of a dangerous criminal vending machine…

Like I said, it’ll be several years before they pick a new bond and/or start on a movie. In the interim a Nomi based spin-off (more likely as a mini-series) would at least be an interesting opportunity for them to flesh out the “Bond cinematic universe” without bond himself, even if it falls a bit flat.

I think the mistake you’re all making is the idea that a reboot has to make any sort of sense or have any sort of nod towards continuality. Bond has been going since the 60’s FFS if there had been any sort of nod to continuity he’d be about 100 years old by now.

They’ll just carry on and ignore all the times they changed Bond over the years, just as they’ve always done. There’ll be a new Bond, and it won’t be a black woman.

I think the mistake you’re all making is the idea that a reboot has to make any sort of sense or have any sort of nod towards continuality. Bond has been going since the 60’s FFS if there had been any sort of nod to continuity he’d be about 100 years old by now.

Yeah, the whole continuity thing has been up in smoke for decades. Judi Dench as M across both Brosnan and Craig, a whole load of actors who have played “Felix” and “Blofeld”, the reference in Licence to Kill about JB being married once – a clear throwback to OHMSS without any acknowledgement that it’s two actors later.

You can pretty much bin off most of the previous Bond films and just focus on the Craig era as it’s own storyline. The Brosnan ones just about hold up as a series in their own right albeit with a million plotholes in them.

Anyway, I’m off to see it tomorrow, can’t wait!

The links to OHMSS are strong

The uphill drive at the end looks like it was along the road where Diana Rigg bought the farm but in the opposite direction. Although the lay-by has been surfaced now and there’s a decent crash-barrier.

Yes that’s my anorak there!

Different anorak – that NTTD final sequence is the same road in Matera where the film starts with Bond and Madelaine in the DB5. But yes very clear OHMSS homage. Craig said in a Guardian Q&A that he really enjoyed the Lazenby outing

I saw it last night with my daughter, really enjoyed it.

When it’s rebooted I’d like a few changes though:

– get rid of the Walther PPK. A pre-WW2 concealed carry pistol in .32 ACP makes no sense. If Bond needs a compact / subcompact pistol there are lots of better, modern 9mm alternatives. At least he had something more modern when assaulting the bunker.

– give the bad guys appropriate guns. Using submachine guns fired full auto all the time is lazy. At least 007 fired aimed bursts in this film, and Bond had a sensible rifle for the assault on the bunker.

– stop making the bad guys disabled in some way. Most people are not disabled so I’d expect most evil super villains to be not disabled. It’s lazy and insulting to equate a visible disability with evilness.

Things I’d like to keep:

– violence looking painful. If a character is shot / kicked / blown up they shouldn’t just drop and lie still or get up and keep running. It was mostly done well in this film.

– Bond not being a (perhaps borderline) rapist. If he has to seduce some for the job (e.g. From Russia With Love), so be it but we’re beyond him getting off with the new girl who then gets killed in every film.

– Great locations. Bond has always been a travelogue with sex and violence. Seeing beautiful places for the first time is an enduring part of the franchise.

A bit late to the show but got to watch it last night. I’m still surprised that they’ve killed Bond but it does seem a tricky situation to come back from without seeming utterly ridiculous.

I thought it was very touching and kinda liked the way that he got to [sort of] choose when to die and at who’s hands – an adversary never got the better of him – (right up til the end he was asking if there was a way to rid himself of the nanobots – if there was then he’d have clearly tried to escape/survive.)

End of an era for me. Always thought that DC has been [probably] the best Bond, but I’m biased as I met him a few times pre-Bond (fixed his Mac a couple of times as I looked after the IT at his dad’s recruitment business in Chester – all the females in the office went gooey when he came in…. and that was before he ‘bulked up’!).
His dad even told me about a year before it was announced that they’d asked him to play Bond….. should have put a bet on that!!

Great way to sign off – not sure how/if they can better that.

(right up til the end he was asking if there was a way to rid himself of the nanobots

And of course there would have been a way to disable the nanobots. He just needed to be isolated until they’d had enough time to do some research. Even his reasoning for dying was logically crap and purely designed to make a big bang at the end. (Would you really believe the supervillain who said there was no cure for the thing he’s just infected you with? )

Plus, there’s no reason that the missile explosions wouldn’t have blown all of those nanobots into the atmosphere causing more of a problem than not blowing up the island in the first place.

Why didn’t his EMP watch disable the nonobots?

It occurred to me the whole thing would make much more sense if instead of nanobots the threat was a targeted virus that circulated through contact pandemic style. How are the nanobots powered, how do they replicate etc would be much simpler and more believable to use a virus – which leads me to think that it was originally a virus but with Covid they decided to change it, maybe even re-shot those scenes.

As for the EMP Bond blew an electronic eyeball up without it blowing the in-ear radio out of his own head. So a very selective EMP anyway.

which leads me to think that it was originally a virus but with Covid they decided to change it, maybe even re-shot those scenes.

Interesting theory. I got talking to someone who works at Double Negative* and he said they were still fiddling with the film long after the original release date. I assumed it was stuff like updating the phones for product placement reasons, but perhaps not.

*What I really wanted to ask was whether anyone got fired for the Die Another Die surfing scene, but I managed to stop myself.

The nanobots made no sense at all, and a lot of reviewers believe that this was added after the fact due to COVID, as all mentions of nanobots are off screen style adds, should’ve just kept it as a virus, as nanobots made absolutely no sense, if we had that technology you’d be doing a lot more than just targeting ‘terrorists’ or the likes.

I get the feeling they calmed down the rivalry between 007s as well due to the feedback after the trailers, which worked in its favour, don’t think many would enjoy Bond being minimised in his own film. The Cuban agent also seemed to be a bit of a weird one, one huge scene, then that’s it, i think everyone wanted a bit more of her on the screen, she did seem like a very Phoebe Waller-Bridge style character.

Watched it last night at an IMAX. Enjoyed it. I’ll confess to not being a Daniel Craig fan, and whilst I’ve seen one of his Bond efforts, I’ve not seen them all. This movie was good though (for a Bond).

I enjoyed the nods to older films, although it maybe milked IHMSS a bit hard… It felt like a blunt hit the 5th or 6th time it was referenced. There were so many references tp other movies that there must be dozens that I missed… If you spotted some I’d love to know.

IHMSS is actually my favorite of all Bond movies… That was a very uncool preference before, but maybe that will change now. Same goes for my preference of the AM V8V (not IHMSS DBS) too.

The road at the end of NTTD is the same as the road in the beginning. Which I think is Italy, possibly near Sapri (I don’t think it could be Matera, but happy to be proven wrong). The internet suggests Tracy (Dianna Rigg) was shot on a road in Portugal in IHMSS. Perhaps a missed opportunity, but maybe they’d milked it enough already anyway. The parallels are enough.

I also liked the Archer reference(s)… Archer is obviously heavily Bond influenced, so to have Bond reference Archer (M named Mallory) was, I thought, quite a hat tip. And it’s so obvious it can not have been unintentional. I actually thought the script was quite Archer like at times… But maybe that is because I’ve watched more Archer than Bond recently.

I thought it was average; really didn’t rate with the new 007, far too cheesy, and Remi didn’t have enough screen time to seem menacing. Nice to be back in the cinema mind having last been very disappointed with Tenet.

Same goes for my preference of the AM V8V (not IHMSS DBS) too.

That’s my favourite car too although it’s only appearance in the Bond films was The Living Daylights and then got blown up at the end of the car/ski chase.

Same number plate though. The previous DB5 has the same number plate as the original one in Goldfinger too. Homage or mind-stretching continuity matter?

Anyway, I thought it was a good film although Safin’s death was a bit too simple/uncomplicated. Something that referenced the opening sequence would have been better.

There were so many references to other movies that there must be dozens that I missed… If you spotted some I’d love to know.

The dots in the title graphics sequence was a direct copy of Dr No. There must have been loads in there that I missed as well.

I thought it was great. I thought Craig was very much at his best. Comfortable with the character and his take on it. The plot was good (more so at the start than the end) but I really didn’t get much menace from Safrin. Paloma was bloody excellent. Somewhat reminiscent of Rebecca Ferguson in Mission Impossible, but with more fun. I don’t think they made enough of the new 007. I very much enjoyed the character interplay between Bond and Mallory.

Don’t buy the idea that you can continually reboot it with different people. The reason they killed him off is so they can mix up the main character and are not limited to a white male – the white male name was problematic. But will get a bit tedious to have to explain a new and fresh backstory for every new 007…people wont care, they wont be as invested as they were in Bond. By killing the character all they’ve done is turned any future films into yet another generic spy movie like Bourne, Mission Impossible and all the plethora of other generic spy and espionage movies which were all inspired by and based on Bond. They’ve lost the USP and now just another turn of the handle generic Hollywood movie.

We’ll see, but not sure I would be too fussed sitting though a 007 movie that wasn’t Bond. I’m very choosy about movies I watch at the cinema now and going to the cinema now its a rare event for me as the quality of movies being churned out has dropped off a cliff these days.

The general chitter chatter of people around me when I left the theatre last night was “how are they going to bring him back for the next Bond movie” rather than …cant wait to see who they pick for the next 007. I’m sure people will change and get used to the new direction the franchise takes.

The nanobots made no sense at all

Why didn’t his EMP watch disable the nonobots?

I’m still surprised that they’ve killed Bond but it does seem a tricky situation to come back from

– get rid of the Walther PPK. A pre-WW2 concealed carry pistol in .32 ACP makes no sense.

You all seem to labouring under the misunderstanding that Bond movies operate in any sort of known reality…

Saw it last night, thought it was superb. Pacing was excellent, didn’t feel long at all, never felt it was too slow or needed to hurry up. Had tears streaming down my face at the ending.

Didn’t have anything to touch the opening scene of Spectre with the festival of the dead, that was probably as good as it gets visually.

‘She’ has been assigned 007 and taunts him with the fact, then later relinquishes the 007 moniker to Bond…

I made it through the film and I have a ridiculously sensitive bladder, just restricted the amount I drank earlier in the day a bit and paid my last visit at the end of the 20-30 mins of adverts. Also ate a pizza during the adverts which probably helped soak up the coffee I had at the same time.

Also unbuttoned my top trouser button just in case…

I had contemplated using one of those thermacare heat patches on my lower abdomen to mask any sensation of wanting to go, but didn’t in the end.

Ahh, the good old days of the interlude. I used to look forward to a mid-movie Cornetto.

Don’t buy the idea that you can continually reboot it with different people. The reason they killed him off is so they can mix up the main character and are not limited to a white male – the white male name was problematic. But will get a bit tedious to have to explain a new and fresh backstory for every new 007…people wont care, they wont be as invested as they were in Bond.

Why are you worrying about future films with 007 being different characters? That may or may not happen…but what will happen is there will be future James Bond films. It literally says “JAMES BOND WILL RETURN” at the end of the credits! Unless they totally screw the thing, he’ll have the same backstory, just as the Craig reboot did, no need for a new one.

Well I didn’t hang around for till the end of the credits to see the ‘James Bond will return’. At 11:30 at night and after 3hrs I was kind of eager to get home just like everyone else in the theatre. And after killing him off so decisively leaving no doubt about it then they’re going to have to pull the Dallas script writers out of retirement to come up with some ridiculous and implausible plan to resurrect him.

some ridiculous and implausible plan

I know, he’ll start to go backwards in time and we’ll realise that he’s actually some of the baddies that he’s bumped into in earlier films.

I had to pee 🙁

The nanobots made no sense at all

Why didn’t his EMP watch disable the nonobots?

How come it blew up the bad guys eyeball but did nothing to the earpiece?

Speaking of earpieces, come come they could scan for the bad guys frequency, listen in, but then transmit without being heard on that frequency?

Did enjoy it though.

As for what comes next, Skyfall introduced us to Bond’s parents so we know Bond isn’t a cover ID. But after killing him off, surely playing the “Bond is just a cover ID” would have been the best option.

So all seemed to enjoy it then ?. Worth the wait for it to appear on BBC one next Xmas ?. I cant see the point in getting a dvd when it is more often released for tv viewing.

That said, dvd allows for pee/coffee/dinner making breaks.

For us, going was an event, just like the good old days, and a return to normality. Meal before hand, a full cinema (not packed, we went to a posh one) kids talking about it to their friends. Last film we saw was 1917 just before lockdown in an empty theater, so it was a joy to be back – not that we go frequently, but next stop will be Top Gun: Maverick on IMAX!

Saw it last night. Didn’t find it particularly gripping and not a patch on Skyfall for instance. Too gimmicky for me.

The ending is a bit weird: The bit where he goes thru the transition to ladyboy and back to get access to the dodgy club was pushing it a bit.😲

Nice to be back in the cinema tho.

How come onye he’d killed the bad guy Bond didn’t just say “divert the missiles” or self-destruct them or something. Once Freddie Mercury was out the picture, there was no urgency to destroy the stock pile?

How come onye he’d killed the bad guy Bond didn’t just say “divert the missiles” or self-destruct them or something. Once Freddie Mercury was out the picture, there was no urgency to destroy the stock pile?

You missed the bit with other nation states rushing to the island to get the nanobot technology?

Ah yeah, the silo doors stuff was fun as well, fully functional for some reason, and not sure what missiles HMS Dragon used to cause the mass damage that occurred, the destroyers aren’t exactly there for land targets

You missed the bit with other nation states rushing to the island to get the nanobot technology?

Yep, thought they were just on their way to see what was going on, not that they actually knew what it was.

Bond still could’ve said cancel that first lot, gimme 5 mins and have another crack. There were a few extra launch bays on that boat they didn’t use.

Yes, it’s not real and I am over thinking it

Bond still could’ve said cancel that first lot, gimme 5 mins and have another crack.

I thought the whole point was that he’d never have been able to see Madeleine and Mathilde again due to being infected with the nanobots that would kill them so he effectively chose his own death.

To people saying you can’t just reboot from the start with another actor:

superman, spiderman and batman all disagree. Give it a few years, a new actor and some hype and you can go back to the start with a slightly different take.