Very well said.
If one has witnessed this show for a time one can’t fail to note how ‘we fans’ keep coming up with ideas - some of them way out no doubt - and when they are finally picked up, as happens every decade or so, we’re cross with the powers that were how they dare veering off the beaten path.
It’s indeed difficult to produce anything with James Bond on it and not fall out with at least part of the fanbase.
Lost in all of this is that we can now actually begin speculating about who Amazon might get to play Q…, er, I mean Bond.
Amazon recently announced their new cinema distribution arm, and it’s quite certain that the next Bond will first be used to maximize that endeavour.
But the spin-offs will be exclusive Amazon Prime content.
The way a Bond film can be seen is not what bothers me, since the cinema experience is no priority for me anymore.
The quality, however, is. And for every great Amazon show there are tons of rubbish with a high end gloss.
And it’s no joke: they really bow down to their algorithms.
So if Amazon recently doubted that James Bond is a hero they will turn him into one (the way they think a hero has to look and act like).
And who passes the Oligarch Smell Test.
Mi6 is sold to a billionaire who has everyone tested for efficiency, so Bond gets high marks and then accepts his new job as a bodyguard for a benevolent group of oligarchs who just want to ensure democracy while radical left lunatics led by a transgender villain try to force a suspicious green new energy source on poor taxpayers‘ lives.
If they use Reacher as something of a template, we stand a good chance of things being fine for the franchise moving forward.
Sounds like they might have known it too, given the film we got.
That’s a good example. That series has been improving on the source material, giving it more texture, humour and human depth, something the books mostly fail to do.
They’ve also done pretty well with casting the show as well, which gives me some hope.
Hadn’t seen this yet. So it begins.
I saw the Bezos thing earlier. I very seriously doubt that this is how they’ll go about picking the next Bond. Just seems like him trying to drum up some engagement for the news story rather than him actually asking people for real suggestions on who should play the part.
That is the series where they are spinning off one of the recurring characters into her own series–“Neagley”–right? Amazon stocks its series with characters just to be able to spin some of them off into other series.
Following that template, we will get: “Q: Outside the Lab”; “M: The Early Years”; “Moneypenny: Homelife”; “Tanner at Large”; “Jim and Felix’s Excellent Adventures”.
Jeff Bezos Crowdsourcing Next James Bond? Amazon Chief Asks Fans Who Should Be 007
His DMs are open. What could go wrong?
Doing the Musk thing here - knowing that he won’t take up any suggestion because he is now calling the shots.
So, Washington Post - turned into a joke.
Bond…
I‘m sure the Orange overlord will chime in with a „suggestion“, and that one Bezos will follow, too.
Had the same thought.
Reacher is well done.
Regarding Bond, that Stuart Martin fella is my choice.
Regardless of who they pick, if they pick well, there’s hope.
Having reflected on this for a little while, I have 2 thoughts:
1 - If you are a level of Bond fan to be here, you don’t just watch the movies, but you are well acquainted with the behind the scenes business dealings going back 60+ years. We have spent decades reading books, listening to commentaries, watching behind the scenes specials, etc. We know the minute of everything James Bond.
We are experiencing today the biggest story in the franchise’s history.
2 - What changes the most for us today is the introduction of the unknown. We have never felt that before. Sure there is always the possibility the next movie won’t be good or we might not like the next actor, etc. Those unknowns are a given for any creative enterprise.
This is different. We always had a steady hand keeping the ship successfully navigating calm or storm. There were certain givens in the franchise and a level of quality that was guarded.
That’s gone now. All possibilities are on the table. The guardrails that existed to keep things going forward don’t exist anymore.
I’ve always liked your pick Dalton. He has something of a Timothy Dalton vibe, me thinks. Age though, leaves him out of the field.
Ooh, new sport.
Lovely, lovely upsetting change; how one may wonder at it.
To paraphrase Wodehouse (I think), even when the Bond series pats one on the head, it does so with its knuckles.
Marvellous. Probably Marvel-ish, but let’s worry about that later.
