They do. The Bond Theme is one of the most iconic sounds in human history and any franchise would do anything to have something that golden. Regardless of the era or incarnation it’s the constant, and new ownership should be no different. As much as people rebel against the formula it’s also part of the magic. Ideally they provide enough comfort of familiarity but also do enough to distinguish from the past.
Removing obvious strength like the Bond Theme is out of the question because it’s firmly established and any replacement couldn’t compare. The same goes for the gun barrel in my opinion. You can tell a new story and push harder to try different things, but certain bedrock should be there.
Yeah, you don’t pay $1B for James Bond and abandon the gunbarrel and theme music. Beyond that, what kind of “iconography” is there? It’s a safe bet Bond will end up in a tuxedo at some point, does that count? The PPK was already retired a long time ago. It’d be nice if they had the confidence to give the DB5 the heave-ho, but if the original owners couldn’t muster that much courage, who knows.
At most we may see what we saw with the Craig era: a “bold” abandonment of things like OTT sci-fi-tinged world threats, the MI-6 supporting cast, 90% of the humor, very nearly the gunbarrel…only to gradually work them all back in over time. The temptation is just too great.
As for “continuity,” there really is none outside of the Craig era, and the last chapter in that continuity ended with Bond being atomized, so there’s no choice but to start over, there.
I agree they should ignore every previous filmic episode in Bond’s life as if it never happened. But if “iconography” includes casinos and formal wear, Moneypenny and Q, the “Bond, James Bond” line and, probably, gadgets of one stripe or other, there’s no way we’ve seen the end of those. Otherwise you’re just making a generic action film, and again, Amazon shelled out way too much money for that.
Every post so far has been entirely on the money so I’ll just get on my soapbox and yell at passers-by. I do predict that at least in Amazon 1, it will all be trotted out in case anyone has stepped into the cinema by accident, thinking they were either watching the latest Superman, Tarentino, or Daniel Day-Lewis’ comeback movie.
But beyond that, I’d argue dump everything except the couple of things that are ultimately branding (rather than iconography). The gunbarrel is a wonderful 20 seconds of branding (it’s existence doesn’t hurt anybody though it’s omission seems to cause uncontrollable convulsions in some). Same with the Bond theme (eg David Arnold - TWINE/CR perfect, TND/DAD no, please stop).
Everything else should only appear if necessary to the story - Aston’s, Q, Money-bleeping-Penny, references to the series itself. EON Bond too easily devolved into an assembly line of stuff, like a Generation Game conveyor belt (indeterminate middle-age reference for you there), re-shuffled each time to feel new but ultimately the same.
Amazon have paid for the rights to have creative control so be creative. But if they’ve paid just to own “stuff” - then I hate to say this, the series should become a TV show, with a list of ingredients shuffled around each episode like The A Team or Law & Order.
Like all of Hollywood’s current movie making, they’ll play it safe and rely on “existing IP”. And I don’t mean the Bond franchise itself as this IP, but the “IPs” within the franchise, the recognizable things. They’ll be eager to show the world that they “can do Bond” the proper way, as they promised, so there might be some new elements, but most certainly, there’ll also be enough of the same old same old. That’s their “creative control”. It’ll have to done be in a way that the old world still recognizes the old Bond somehow (otherwise, word of mouth won’t be good), but at the same time in a way that doesn’t alienate possible new and younger fans and offers them enough to build up interest for this NuBond and desire for more.
Droping or adding elements like certain cars, guns or watches etc. won’t be creative decisions. Those depend on the existence of long term contracts (or lack thereof).
It just occurred to me that while I like the “branding” element of the “walk on and fire to the James Bond theme,” I am not 100% wedded to the “gunbarrel” per se. In fact it has never made sense to have blood dripping into a gun barrel (and even less to have a bullet fly into it in DAD) so I would be totally okay with Amazon updating it to a rifle scope or similar element that both makes more sense and makes it immediately apparent which entries are “Eon Bonds” and which are “Amazon Bonds.” (AmaBonds?)
Is that heresy? I know there are people who’ve devoted entire YouTube treatises to the history/ evolution/variations of the gunbarrel, so apparently it’s a huge deal to some. Personally it makes about as much sense to me as obsessing over the fonts used for “James Bond Will Return” but to each his own.
The gun barrel (do I have to say at the beginning? ) is a brief, but important part of the James Bond experience. It lets you know right away that you are watching something special, something different, and it is distinctly 007. Sure, it may not make “sense” in blood flowing down, but neither does the “same” thing happening at the start of each Bond film or during each Bond’s various walk-bys. It doesn’t have to “make sense”. It is simply a special moment or element that can only mean and be James Bond. No other film has it or can come close to matching it. It is simply a super cool element of the 007 series.
And, yes, another one is the James Bond Theme. That is so iconic and cool and so definitively 007 that it has to be kept. The odds of coming up with something even remotely close is way too great. And without the Bond theme, you can have something like Never Say Never Again–and that soundtrack was severely lacking in comparison to other Bond scores in large part by not having the Bond theme.
So if Amazon were only going to keep a handful of iconographic stuff, the gun barrel (at the start) and the James Bond Theme sprinkled throughout would absolutely, positively have to be among them.
And I would even include the “Bond…James Bond” line in there as well. It too is iconic, as it helps introduce each 007 and is another signifier to 007’s coolness factor and further sets him apart from everybody else.
I will always have nostalgia for the PPK, and the DB5 for that matter, but I can stomach those being replaced. They have been in the past. Ultimately those things are tools and Bond can and should use a variety of those.
The tuxedo isn’t going anywhere and it’s probably the most iconic image of the lot. The Bond Theme is on an even higher level because it’s attached to his very being. It follows him everywhere no matter what he’s wearing or using. Retaining the formula but doing something different can be as simple as having the briefing taking place in the back seat of a car, as they did in TND. Which I think is a very good little scene in terms of creating a sense of urgency.
As the man once noted, whilst living twice, it is better to travel hopefully, than to arrive. This might be applicable to the expectation of a Bond film, not least once promotional material starts finding its way out, brimful of promise. One can on occasion come away with those promises unsatisfied.
Something that might have seemed that it was going to be terribly significant in the run up, turns out to be a very much nothingness. Doubtless in many cases some of this is just partnership promotion and product placement, but sometimes those things or characters are impactful to the story being told, once the film is finally unleashed.
And yet, sometimes not. Having featured much in the pre-release stage, some things eventually amounted to absolutely bog all. Accordingly, which proved the least significant and became…:
At least we saw that the BMW Z3 had a usable parachute and it also had radar to warn of potential incoming danger such as when Jack Wade flew low over James Bond and Natalya Simonova as they drove down the road–although admittedly, it was a little slow in announcing the plane’s arrival. The bronze Lotus Turbo on the other hand did absolutely nothing. But it did look good.
The Z3 wasn’t anything but a short commercial break during GOLDENEYE - but instrumental for the later BMW cooperation. German manufacturers back then had no real experience with placing a vehicle in such a prominent production and were hesitant about their cars coming across as offensive and brute (see for example how criminally wasted the Audis in TLD are).
After seeing how successful their product placement was - the Z3 was extremely popular, a Bond car you could actually own and that was fun to drive; I briefly had the ugly coupe version myself - BMW became a lot more open to the trick car idea and they invested massively into later set pieces. Their experience echoed even right until NTTD where the Astons were powered by BMW engines, one of Aston’s publicity stunts to push a limited ‘original’ Aston Martin DB5 on the collector market.
That bronze Lotus was one of the big disappointments of my teenage years. And it led to nothing down the line. Okay, FYEO was already a film with many chases, there was no lack of action. But as Chekhov tells us, if you show the gun in the first act it has to fire before the play is over.
I have a fondness for (a car? What kind of perv am I? Especially since I drive cars until they really get too expensive to repair.) the Lotus, even if it does nothing in FYEO.
Although: it does something very funny and inventively. After the first one exploding against all expectations that it will feature in a riveting chase, this second Lotus again defies all expectations by being just a car. Although it does carry those skis.
And (as I only now found out) it had been supposed to be white as the splendid one in TSWLM, only the blinding white of the Cortina snow made that problematic (already an invisible car? Gee, DAD was indeed another example for „we will use all our ideas at some point“). So the bronzening (hey, no golden paint?) was just a late solution, destroying the gag of „the white underwater Lotus is back, so you can expect… Ski equipment carrying on its roof!“). But that’s filmmaking for you, necessities over ideas.
As for the BMW… well… as the line in „History of the World Part 1“ goes: „Nice. Not thrilling… but nice.“
The z3 I give a slide to because Martin Campbell pointed out that deal came in REALLY late in the day so there was not enough time to actually build a working car with gadgets. Then again, blowing up the Lotus was meant to be a declaration of intent about not relying on gadgets, so it’s hard to say. I have a fondness for both, early Bond film experiences as they both were, but I went Z3.
I am not sure if I am get the question right. Do you have to choose the car you like the most of the two, or the one which dissapointed the most and can go?
I think it is the latter so I chose the BMW Z3. I will never let go of the Lotus and it will never dissapoint me, well, only when I take “her” (I see the car as a beautiful woman) to the garage and get the bill afterwards.
I remember really liking the Z3 at the time and was disappointed it didn’t feature more into the film. All of the BMWs from the Brosnan films were great and it would be nice to see that kind of change up again to give Bond a different vehicle to drive rather than the Goldfinger car.
It wasn’t so much a case of having high expectations for the Z3; quite the reverse in my case. I felt it was totally wrong for the character, and even viewers not steeped in the off-screen mechanics of movie producing could see it for what it was: a product placement for BMW in return for helping fund the film. I could only take solace that Ford hadn’t made a better offer or Bond might’ve pulled up in a Geo Metro. My attitude going in was, “Fine then, do something cool with it. Impress me.” And then…nothing. In fact, based entirely on screen time, I wasn’t sure even BMW could’ve been happy with the deal.
I honestly never gave a thought to the bronze Lotus not doing anything special in FYEO. But if I did, I’d probably have interpreted it as a deliberate “gag,” like the Aston Martin getting those missiles added in OHMSS, only to never be driven: the point of both movies was that they were going “back to basics,” so of course one Lotus in FYEO blows up and the other just sits there. Thinking about it, I guess maybe Roger’s line to Luigi – “Don’t play with any of the switches” – might have led some viewers to expect a pay off, but I figured the comment itself was the whole joke.
I agree with dalton, though: at this stage I’d take the Z3 over a return of the DB5. Or really, any car. Of course, having said that, it’d be my luck if Amazon gave Bond a Tesla Cybertruck.
It’s the BMW for me. It never felt particularly ‘Bondian’ but after the hype of “Bond is back and he’s driving German!! OMG”, it’s an unimpressive car used to next to no impression, the most banal and in-your-face piece of product placement ever.
I suspect that BMW got their money’s worth from all the talk, rather than the appearance of the actual car itself; that they went on to make their own, far superior, “The Hire” series of short films with Clive Owen, showed the limitations of using big motion picture releases to showcase product.
That could be the car he uses at the very beginning of the mission, like the Ford in the Bahamas in CR, while he waits on two day Prime delivery of his actual car out in the field.
) is a brief, but important part of the James Bond experience. It lets you know right away that you are watching something special, something different, and it is distinctly 007. Sure, it may not make “sense” in blood flowing down, but neither does the “same” thing happening at the start of each Bond film or during each Bond’s various walk-bys. It doesn’t have to “make sense”. It is simply a special moment or element that can only mean and be James Bond. No other film has it or can come close to matching it. It is simply a super cool element of the 007 series.