“The one where he kills himself protecting you!”
“Your dad or grandad?”
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Does anyone have any particular favourite moments from the film? I remember on my second viewing thinking the bit when the DB5 is surrounded and Madeleine is screaming at Bond to do something as Primo is pump-action shotgunning the window- is just fantastic.
The look on Bond’s face where he is stewing, thinking, perhaps toying with the idea of letting her die? I don’t know. But I think it’s a brilliant moment.
Another favourite bit is Paloma kicking all kinds of ass in Cuba. The music at this part in particular, with the brass blasting away in a delightfully demented dynamic manner is one of my favourite parts of the score.
The staircase sequence.
Bond picking up the toy bunny and tucking it into his braces. Emotional!
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Those, and the death of Felix. Wright and Craig play it beautifully, and it makes the dispatch of Logan so cathartic
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Brilliant indeed. Let’s not forget, if he lets her die here he definitely dies too. There’s a death wish in that scene.
The whole Matera sequence is great, so is the chase in the Norwegian forest. They are bither better action than the final storming of the Villain’s lair, IMHO.
Lashana Lynch is fabulous in her scenes.
The family scenes at the end, from the moment Mathilde appears, are so strange and eerie. I still have not fully processed that yet.
Bond’s death was handled very well, but of course that scene is in a category of its own. At some point I thought Safin was going to kill him in this miserable puddle. Now that would have been bleak.
Also, on a lighter note, I very much liked this much too short scene of Bond showering in a waterfall. I don’t know, must have been the intensity of the acting, my inner botanist appreciating the vegetation, the choice of toothbrush, something like that… 
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Only occurred to me later that Bond did the same thing in Dr No when he’s on Crab Key
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Was it a waterfall? I thought it was an outdoor shower, mirroring the ones the real Goldeneye resort has. And let’s face it, that whole Jamaican sequence was inspired by Fleming’s Jamaican life. I would have loved to see a whole movie about Bond enjoying retirement in that beautiful setting!
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Ah maybe, I suppose I was not focusing enough on the water… 
I agree that those Jamaica scenes are very nice, and among the few escapist and feelgood scenes of an otherwise quite emotionally heavy film.
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The use of the song and phrase is meant to be bittersweet, as per its original use in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Using it at the end of SPECTRE would’ve been a reference without any payoff. I’m glad they got the opportunity to use it so liberally in NTTD with its full power.
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For the members who have seen it - how do you feel about Felix, Blofeld and Bond all dying in the same movie?
Any one of those deaths would’ve been enough to fule discussion and drive controversy for years. All three - huge, historic characters in the one film… does it work or does the death of Bond diminish the impact of the others at all?
Without Bond none of the others are really central, are they? They are characters in Bond’s world and homeless without him anyway.
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Just like in John Pearson’s Biography of 007? Blimey, it’s only just occurred to me how much Craig’s fillms have nicked from that book. I haven’t read it for ages but I distinctly remember Pearson’s Bond describing his childhood home in Glencoe as “big, bleak and ugly”, and there was a chapter where Bond quits and goes off to live as a beach bum like in Skyfall. And of course the overarching idea that Bond might be “real”. Interesting.
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To be honest, I was quite moved when Felix died (even though, like many here, it’s the one thing I was certain would happen since they first announced his return) but not really when Bond died.
I felt nothing when Blofeld died - but I don’t think the film wanted me to. His death moves the plot forward and wraps up that chapter of Craig’s era. I suspect it was deliberate that he dies out of frame; they knew how lukewarmly received Bloferhauser was in SP, so they didn’t aggrandise his death in NTTD.
EDIT: To answer your question(!), I can’t say whether I would have felt more for Bond’s death if Felix hadn’t already died, or if the combination of Felix’s and Blofeld’s deaths lends a sense of crushing inevitability to Bond’s demise, rendering it less moving but more acceptable to the audience at the same time.
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Stealing wouldn’t be the word. They own it.
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I did chuckle at that moment. Judging by Seydoux’s facial expression I expected her to slap him. Bond is so passive aggressive 
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What I like about Bond dying is that EON have now broken all the rules and expectations. The one unbreakable rule throughout the series’ run, and Fleming failed at it twice, was killing Bond. Now EON have done it and it changes everything (just as the trailer said it would). Bond can die now. There will be a tension going forward (though I don’t we’ll see this again) that didn’t exist previously because there is a chance that he won’t make it through. Additionally, Bond accepts his fate and is at peace. He isn’t pleading, he’s sad, but it’s because he can’t be with his family. He’s at peace because he knows Madeleine and Matilde will be safe. It works for me, but I also understand that it won’t for everyone.
Favorite parts:
- PTS (both bits)
- MTS with the doctor no dots
- Bond/Felix playing drinking games and basically ignoring Ash
- Paloma and everything in Cuba
- Felix death
- Bond annoying Q
- the Norway chase and Bond learning he has a daughter (he knows the whole time even though Madeleine lies to him)
- Garden of Death
- Staircase
- Bond death and acceptance
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But does Bond dying actually raise the stakes? Or lower them, knowing that, depending on which way EON decides to go that either:
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Bond’s story can be ended, restarted/reset and done over at any time, basically removing all stakes since Bond and main characters can die infinitely and then return. OR
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That the Bond character lives once, dies once, and since we have now after 25 movies seen his death, know that he cannot die again, and also take less joy in his adventures, knowing that he will not live to retirement.
I feel that moving forward future films will operate under one of these two scenarios, and that in either case, the stakes are now lowered
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Yes.
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It’s hard to imagine Bond’s death being on the table in the debut appearance of the next actor. It just costs to much to promote a new face only to kill him off in one go. Likewise it’s unlikely they’d kill him in the next, or the one after that, as long as he’s popular and the films are making money.
No, the only way a Bond dies again on screen is if everyone knows going in that it’s his last one, and if the filmmakers know it, so will we. So the best they can hope for is that we’ll all be wondering, “Hmm, wonder if he dies this time?”
The shock factor is only good once. (And even at that, there were predictions here that he’d die in NTTD two years ago)
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Third viewing and I’ve enjoyed it more than ever. I can now relax and just really savor the film. A couple of new observations.
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The scene with Bond is in the life raft after the death of Felix and the sinking of the bot is a grim parody of the ending of Thunderball and You Only Live Twice. In those film Bond has successfully defeated the villain, stopped his evil plan and got the girl. Here his best friend is dead and his is alone and defeated.
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Dr. Obruchev extracts Bond’s DNA from his toothbrush he used in his Jamaican shower. I don’t know how I overlooked this the first two times as Dr. Obruchev and Primo discuss it.
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Dali Benssalah is credited as Primo (Cyclops) in the end credits. I do wish his name (and Mr. Hinx) had be spoken in their films. Why give them a cool name if it’s not going to used?
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Project Heracles was quite sinister even before it was hijacked by Safin. M was okay with violating people’s civil rights and their bodies by permanently infecting them with nanobots just so they could kill someone else they might come into contact with. So if a Spectre agents went to a restaurant M would have been okay infecting a completely innocent waiter or the maitre d with nanobots just to get the bad guys. Disturbing.
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My take is this, with this EON can go back to the beginning again or not, 25 films is a good place to start anew or, even, finish their custodianship of 007.
Killing him off as the last Bond movie they produce is beautiful, equally it gives them carte blanche to continue in any direction they wish, should they do so, all the while having given this Bond a truly unique and in my opinion great last film.
It’s the classic each way bet.
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