Fuck bond, the character and setting is played out at this point with too many mediocre movies.
no.
If this guy becomes an actor, I'd love to see him in a John Wick spinoff. Yes, let's make him a super spy government spook (he makes that suit look good), but he's trying to unravel the criminal underground and gets to discover just how deep the rabithole goes. His "successful" career up to this point has been taking down scapegoats. Everything turns sideways just before retirement, and the latest criminal mastermind somehow lets slip that the whole thing has been a sham, and he's just a sacrifice to keep the alphabet agencies occupied. Thing is, he's actually good at his job, and now he knows what he's looking for. Retirement is going to have to wait.
Idk Bond is this interesting cultural touchstone that I think is important to keep around. I know for me it was actually a very effective first step in to becoming critical of how women are depicted in cinema, and that message got through to me at actually a pretty early age. Around high school IIRC.
That being said I do think directors should be bolder in their vision and take bigger risks with it. It could be so much more and its history in many ways will make that all the more impactful.
TL;DR: We aren’t beholden to Fleming’s original vision. Bond can be whatever we want them to be.
Edit: yes the “them” was intentional
The different "interpretations" of the character have always interested me. Most of the screen depictions of bond have not aligned with the literary version, to varying degrees. In my opinion, Timothy Dalton came the closest.
But more to your point, the depictions of both women and minorities in Bond films is kind of an interesting timeline. Live and let Die is a good example. It has the first Black bond girl. Not insignificant in 1973. But, it's also peak "blaxploitation" and contains so many racist stereotypes that it sounds like a worn out record.
I remember watching it as a kid and thinking the antagonists, most of whom are black, seemed more like cartoon villains than anything, despite some half-assed attempts to sprinkle in a little sophistication here and there. It's a movie with some strange paradoxes.
Right? There’s nothing quite like it. It has this tendency to combine several tropes and ideas from major films surrounding it. It’s safe in that it’s often familiar but it always has a “bond flavor” that alters it heavily
I think the cool assassin running around in style shooting bad guys and surviving just barely thing is played out.
Give me a quiet guy who is an insurance adjuster. He's got kids in school or college. He was given a a soldier's sidearm (maybe his grandfather's?) as a teen, and his grandad taught him to shoot. His grandpa was always big on accuracy, and told him the horribleness of war. He gets into competitive shooting, but before his first competition, his grandfather is murdered, and the case goes cold. He never competes after his grandfather dies, but takes meticulous care of the gun, and shoots at his grandfather's private range, every day after work.
Then, out of some crazy unrelated event, a story in the local newspaper mentions his grandfather's name, prior to him living in whatever country he lives now. He pushes the local investigators to reopen the case, to no avail. In a series of adjustment investigations, he notices a pattern of accidents, and damage to properties. One particular one alarms him as it's the property of one of his grandfather's close friends. He brings the gun out of fear of the weird coincidences. Drama ensues, and in the fight scene he's hiding under cover, trying not to get hit, hasn't shot back, but at one point the shooting stops. He takes a calming breath. Stands up. Hand in pocket, gun drawn, fires one round. The bullet richochets off one of the assailants guns, causing him to fire a burst killing two more, one who falls down steps to take out a third, the richochet hits a fourth square in the forehead who drops his incandescent flashlight onto the ground which breaks, sparking a gasoline spill that had been there burning up the guy who's gun was hit in the first place.
Our protagonist pockets the pistol, and walks out, calling his boss giving him some information about it being insurance fraud or something. Meanwhile a sixth assailant escapes the property and calls someone. In a foreign language he says in a panic: "Boss, it's the Adjuster." "Impossible, he was buried decades ago, the grave is in the family estate." "No, boss, the insurance adjuster for this property. It must be an offspring." "But none of his children or grandchildren were ever marksman?! How many men did he cost me?" "Five." "And what did it cost him?" "A single bullet." And the bossy guy says something badass like "it's heavens adjuster or some adjuster to avenge the fallen adjuster in his language.
Then the movie ends with him eating dinner with his family, but his grandfathers gun is now at his side.
The Adjuster
John Wick is played out too, and more recently so. I've seen all of them, including the spin-off series and only the first one needs to exist. I'd much rather have a Bond thing.
I think the John Wick franchise, like the Ghostbusters franchise, had one good movie in it. The first one was excellent, partially because it showed some restraint. They went overboard with the second.
The first felt like it took place in the real world, that among the rest of us there's this community of high class criminals, the various mafias and the like, who have their own underground infrastructures. They bother with all the code words like "dinner reservation" because there are regular civilians staying at the Continental, who is in good with them all and provides them ground to go to in exchange for not bringing any heat.
The second movie establishes that 100% of society is secretly underground high class criminals, that the real world above it is all a fake, and that nothing about this is actually cool.
I think JW aged worse over four movies than Bond did over 20.
That falling down the stairs scene was like something from an Austin Powers spoof version.
The first one was great, but I really don't know what they were thinking with the rest of them.
I wonder how he'd look bald. I've always believed that a well-done Hitman series would give James Bond a run for their money. The catch is that it'd have to be self-parodying but presented without a hint of irony or humor.
A good hitman movie/TV show would swing from serious to absurd and back so hard you'd get whiplash
Ditto this but with Metal Gear Solid. I always felt like there was a ton of potential in there for a show or a movie and if we're being honest, half of the MGS games are just movie-length cutscenes anyway. Hideo Kojima wants to make movies but he's trapped in a game development company.
I’ve always believed that a well-done Hitman series would give James Bond a run for their money
Watch Barry. It’s not Hitman, but trust me.
The Turk olympic shoot guy. Showing us how to do the shoot without all the crazy addons the other olympians use.
Nothing wrong with the way other shooters competed. He also didn’t win gold, so the perceived flex isn’t as strong as you’d think.
He and his teammate both did very well and both deserve praise.
