I'll agree to that because it doesn't really matter if he's 007 or not in his fith and last film in this series. If he's retired he's retired, it's still a film about James Bond so I don't get why people would be upset outside of messed up reasons.
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Bond's number is up: black female actor 'is the new 007'
- Thread starter Geoff
- Start date
I'll agree to that because it doesn't really matter if he's 007 or not in his fith and last film in this series. If he's retired he's retired, it's still a film about James Bond so I don't get why people would be upset outside of messed up reasons.
I don't think it is a nice setup if Craig retires at the beginning of the movie, a black woman steps in as the new 007 that replaces him and Craig HAD to come back for something/helping her. Somehow it sounds like men are necessary in some jobs. She should just replaced him, period.
This would make 3 wouldn't it? QoS and Spectre both did it, and I feel like CR and Skyfall played with it to various degrees as well. On top of Die Another Day doing it. And next to that you've got the MI films which do it every movie as well...
Exactly. How much can you change before it ceases to be a Bond film? Certainly you can bring a lot of his more dubious qualities up for examination but the fact is that he's not really a likeable character when you actually look at it. He's a drinking, womanising, chain-smoker with a disdain for most people and a love of the good life. He can and possibly should be held accountable for some of the things he's done but there are better ways than simply replacing the character full stop.
Cool. I just realised is the name James Bond meant to be a designation too? Are all the James Bonds different people or are they all meant to be the same man? (Suspending disbelief in appearance/age/time)
I think the first two are a given. He pretty much quit at the end of Spectre when he went off with Swann. I expect her to be offed pretty sharpish to get him back into the fray. However I don't think he'll quit at the end of the movie. To me it'd be crazy to have had him left the service at the end of two successive movies, moreso when you consider he kind of retired at the beginning of Skyfall.
EDIT: He also briefly quit in Casino Royale too!
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James Bond is a man with the designation 007. Before Craig they tried to gently pretend that the different actors were playing the same James Bond in a timeless, Simpsons-style continuity but Craig's Bond exists in his own closed-off world separate from the others.
Killing him makes perfect sense, we've already had enough reheated ideas in recent films and that's the one ending they haven't done before. Then depending on the reaction they can either make a Craigverse movie with this new 007 or do the standard Bond recast and start over again.
It's one of those stories that comes up from time to time where people suggest that it is actually a different person each time. I think that's just people trying to explain in their own head why the character and era change rather than just accepting that as a series they can't keep setting it in 1962 and have Sean Connery still in the role!
I'm not worried about this, the last few movies had a couple glaring issues (I still enjoyed them a lot, and Casino Royale is GOAT) that are not really depending on this change. Way I see it, it doesn't really change the franchise, it just means that (probably during the movie itself, not even at the end) Craig's Bond stops working for MI6, with the agency needing to fill his shoes in with somebody. But I totally expect Bond to be a rogue agent if this happens, so it's not like he's being written off just like that. In fact it sounds almost too obvious: Craig has to go on a mission that is too fucking out there for MI6 so he retires or gets fired, he goes in as a rogue agent, then the new 007 takes his place, likely immediately assigned to stop Bond from doing bad shit. By the end of the movie Bond will either be dead or morally pardoned (as he stopped a nuke exploding in London or some shit), but likely not involved with the MI6 anyhow. The next movie is probably not gonna be set in this universe anyway so who becomes the next 007 here is irrelevant most likely, because in a couple years' time we'll likely get a new Bond that has to take cues from how the action and spy movies evolved: so expect the new stuff to be inspired by Mission Impossible 4 and onwards and John Wick.
Huh... did not know that about the Craig Bond movies (never seen any Craig or Brosnan ones). I always assumed it was meant to be the same person. I suppose making him a separate person this time is an in-world explanation for why he's been around decades and changes appearance and varies in age. It makes sense otherwise he's like Doctor Who or something. I know you have to suspend your disbelief.
That's kinda like getting excited because the sun comes up, they are already angry about everything anyway.
Doesn't matter what makes sense in terms of story. The fact is that it's a massive franchise and the producers won't do anything to risk that. Plus I imagine that the Fleming Estate will be very protective over the rights to the character and won't allow another character to 'be' James Bond.
I can't remember it ever being referenced in the Craig films that a "Bond" existed previously. It's just a simple reboot. I'll be surprised if they don't go that route again after Craig is finished.
This is the kind of thing that will end up making no one happy.
This is almost certainly just a this-movie-only character/arc. The character isn't actually a James Bond replacement, just a vehicle for James Bond to play out his story and reclaim his place in whatever way he's going to.
The fact he is on the outs with MI6 again already has be rolling my eyes though, they need to stop going to that well.
If they actually ever replaced James Bond with a female actor, as in the character we will be following in movies going forward, people would be livid -- but that is not what appears to be going on here.
Ultimately this means it makes for this sort of attention grabbing headline but actually amounts to close to nothing... which means the people who want James Bond to be a non-white-man are going to be upset... and the people who want James Bond to stay a white man are going to be upset.
It feels so transparently like a social media conversation generator.
This is almost certainly just a this-movie-only character/arc. The character isn't actually a James Bond replacement, just a vehicle for James Bond to play out his story and reclaim his place in whatever way he's going to.
The fact he is on the outs with MI6 again already has be rolling my eyes though, they need to stop going to that well.
If they actually ever replaced James Bond with a female actor, as in the character we will be following in movies going forward, people would be livid -- but that is not what appears to be going on here.
Ultimately this means it makes for this sort of attention grabbing headline but actually amounts to close to nothing... which means the people who want James Bond to be a non-white-man are going to be upset... and the people who want James Bond to stay a white man are going to be upset.
It feels so transparently like a social media conversation generator.
It is the same character. Both Roger Moore and Timothy Dalton's versions reference the fact that his wife was murdered, which was done in Lazonby's film.
Craig's films are set just before he becomes a 00 agent so can't reference anything that's happened in previous films.
Hopefully the movie ends with this, instead of having her killed as a plot device at the beginning of the movie to bring Bond back.
I'd also say that in Skyfall Bond goes to his childhood home where he meets his old groundskeeper who knew him as a boy and calls him James Bond. It's pretty safe to assume then that that's where he grew up. On top of this his parents graves are shown and are both called Bond. Therefore if it is a different person taking on the code name James Bond each time then they would literally have had to have trained someone called James Bond to be a spy also called James Bond!
Someone didn't re-read their work.
Well, if Bond quit/retired it stands to reason that they'd have a new "007", but there's little chance they'd replace Bond completely with a female character.
Right oh. Confusing! I knew the first Craig Daniel movie was the first book.
...until she is tragically killed in a single movie's runtime and forces Bond out of retirement to avenge her.
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This is a weird thing to pick up on, but I guess it's because 'Daniel' isn't very iconic (and neither is 'Craig', really), but when you say 'Idris' everybody knows exactly who you bloody well mean. It's just an automatic mental tick, I guess.
I'm A-OK with them killing off Bond at the end of this if they really want to, but what I hope for is that they don't indulge the silly arse "James Bond is a codename" thing, which is something really far removed from Fleming's intentions and also, frankly, pretty stupid. I don't need that continuity. Just kill Craig's bond off and then have a new guy and just don't address it. Don't 'reboot' it. People will understand; they did four times before.
What I'd like from Bond once Craig leaves the role is for the series to drop most of the pretense of being a GREATER STORY, because it hasn't been very successful and largely feels hamfistedly crowbared into things. None of this is helped by the fact that they just busk it, they never had a grand plan for these stories, which is why Quantum is so uneven, Spectre completely disconnected and then retconned back to be part of the overall plot in Spectre. It's a mess.
I understand this is a hard ask in a post-MCU world where everybody wants a universe (which I why I think a female-led Bond spin-off to run concurrently is likely again after falling at one of the later hurdles towards production in the 90s), but, god, just make Bond a villain-of-the-week deal again, where each film he can tackle a silly villain that is connected to something contemporary in the world at the time.
English is not my first language so I ask questions about its usage whenever I see something I don't understand.
That theory, if a black female is to take the role?
Or maybe they literally just call them James Bond, subverting gender assumptions altogether?
Clearly you wouldn't echo any inappropriate title put up by the Guardian.
Ah! Granted the information is limited but the 007 number is just given to an agent. Bond seemingly left the service at the end of Spectre so they've likely just given the number to another agent. I don't believe that it'll mean that this new character will be Bond.
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It would be a bit strange if Bond retired and MI6 replaced him with a black woman also called James Bond.
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These were my thoughts immediately. The studio will score some social cred, some people will get upset, plenty of free PR for everyone involved, then back to status quo.