Shockingly I quite like the idea of Josh O’Connor as Bond
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FYEO’s helicopter PTS is better than SPECTRE’s
Barry’s DAF tension theme was good enough to be retained long term
LTK has the best Q sequences
I appreciate Sean’s era but enjoy Roger’s more
Blood Stone and GE Reloaded are legitimate Craig era canon
Casino sequences enhance Bond media
TND and QoS have the most relevant modern plots
QoS shouldn’t have a gunbarrel sequence, especially where it was placed
We Share The Same Passions’ best captures Bond’s psychological existence
Bond should be capable of commandeering any vehicle
Bond will return to being an active and popular brand
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Here’s a new controversial opinion: I’m somewhat surprised that Broccoli didn’t team up with McClory for TSWLM, especially after Saltzman left. They wanted Blofeld as the villain (with Maibaum in particular wanting him to have a part of the story), why not team up so that both can get a Bond movie? Plus, he probably would have helped give another boost to the budget. Saltzman wasn’t going to be around anymore, particularly from a financial standpoint. And he couldn’t have made another Bond movie away from EON, for legal reasons. He loved the ocean as well. A good portion of TSWLM is set by water. It could have been a win for both parties, and probably the audiences.
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Interesting idea; on the surface of it probably a good move to get McClory inside the tent…
However, my impression from reading Sellers’ The Battle for Bond is that McClory was really only ever a one-trick pony. A huckster who had the incredible luck to run into a group of rich uperclass twits who tried to cut him off after their own project went in circles - and one was stupid enough to use the resulting material for his own book.
McClory’s entire career pretty much consists of the THUNDERBALL rights and little else. His actual work on other films seems to have been at most of varying success and after the windfall of the court decision he seems to have been solely concerned with milking that title to the last drop.
Meanwhile, the THUNDERBALL production will have taught Eon a lesson as to the relative merits of any involvement with McClory and the finished product wasn’t probably worth the trouble. Had they taken him on board for THE SPY WHO LOVED ME they would just have opened again that can of worms, while the continuing trouble of WARHEAD/JAMES BOND OF THE SECRET SERVICE repeatedly proved McClory could only ever remake THUNDERBALL, nothing else. I think it was the right decision not to go there for Eon, not even for the use of Blofeld and Spectre.
NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN would very likely have tanked badly without Connery. This was the only real draw of that project - and when your main attraction isn’t your script but the fact you’ve got a former Bond then that’s simply not enough. McClory tried to play the similar trick a few times, with Brosnan and probably also with Dalton and Moore, but that’s just my private suspicion.
Can’t fault McClory for making the most out of his little scrap of Bond history. But a creative force to enrich a project he probably never was.
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And to keep things simple: after all the troubles they had with McClory they probable also didn’t realy like the guy enough to work with him again.
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And then there is McClory’s involvement with the project itself: Fleming, Cuneo and Bryce had some flimsy napkin idea about a hijacked nuclear weapon that Fleming spun a little further and all three had the vague hope to make a killing by turning it into a film (and get plenty of subsidies and tax deductions from it). They had no actual hands-on experience with the film business, they just had heard McClory (then working on THE BOY AND THE BRIDGE, financed by Bryce) was supposedly a successful player somehow involved with rounding up many stars for bit parts in IN 80 DAYS AROUND THE WORLD.
McClory was certainly the closest to actual film business out of the group - but his main talent seems to have been talking the talk and hiring others to do the walk. He spotted immediately they needed a professional script writer and hired Whittingham. The treatments and scripts at the heart of the court case were based on input by Fleming, Bryce and McClory - but practically all written by Whittingham, as commissioned by McClory. McClory’s own intellectual input in the work was fairly limited.
The settlement reflects this to a point: the main attraction were the film rights to Thunderball; that McClory also got the film rights to Blofeld and Spectre he didn’t value very high at the time, lest he wouldn’t have agreed to let Eon use them for a decade. He was solely after getting his claws into the THUNDERBALL production. It must have earned him a pretty penny. But he was far from having invented any of it himself.
In fact McClory’s professional judgment has been rather useless: Fleming initially offered him Live and Let Die and From Russia, with Love as candidates to film but McClory thought none of Fleming’s books up to then - Dr No - would make a good film adaptation.
Humhum…
I rest my case.
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A McClory TB remake around 2003/4 with Brosnan could have made some money because of the unkind way Barbara ditched Brosnan…
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Nice write ups, @Dustin great story details I didn’t know or realize. I can see why Blofeld and SPECTRE as true recurring threats can be a mixed bag for some people. It can get truly repetitive, in a series that often DOES repeat itself. That’s why Superman and even the DCEU had a hard time at bringing in audiences and mixed box office success for the last twenty years (minus the Dark Knight sequels). People are tired of Lex Luthor’s real estate plans, or crazy science experiment creations. Same with General Zod taking over Earth or making a new Krypton. While I do like Blofeld and SPECTRE being a threat that could strike anytime, it was good that EON (and IFP to a degree) was willing to make other villains and company threats.
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Here’s another controversial opinion from me about the future of Bond and Amazon. Recently it was announced that David Heyman and his Heyday Films production company have signed a first-look deal with Amazon Studios. This could mean that Amazon and his crew and company are possibly planning a second Bond movie. Historically, Bond actor’s 2nd movies have come out within two years of their first. Other reasons for my reasoning. With Amazon having the money ready. The main producers know how to work back to back productions. they could be looking somewhat ahead at the future.
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That’s a point I hadn‘t thought of - Both Pascal and Heyman have had proven success doing back to back films in a series which makes me wonder if that was a contributing factor in those two producing.
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Say what?
This only means Heyman wants to branch out and do other films.
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Very in the eye of the beholder. Strictly speaking he wasn’t ditched so much as he simply didn’t get a new contract. But true, another THUNDERBALL remake would probably have created some buzz, especially if they’d have timed it in concert with the British yellow rag frenzy about Craig.
Brosnan can thank his gods he didn’t fall into that trap.
That’s a good point, haven’t looked at it this way.
On the whole it’s possible they aim for a modus operandi like Broccoli/Saltzman in the latter days of their partnership. But would they need this odd first-look deal for it? What would be the point if those were not Heyman’s very own projects he wants to develop?
Don’t know. 
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Exactly.
A first look deal for Heyman with Amazon MGM doesn’t really have any impact on Bond.
Amazon MGM holds the rights to Bond. Their ability to move forward with any Bond film does not require a first-look deal with Heyman. He has this deal with Amazon MGM because, I would assume, they have faith in him as a producer and want to have the first opportunity to deal with him in any upcoming projects that he may want to make.
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Amazon-os is definitely planning a second and third and fourth Bond, but one should not think for a second that someone like Amy Pascal would allow another producer to continue without her in his own production entity.
And really, they will focus on getting this first one ready and mega successful.
Imagine if it plays well but not well enough.
Sure, they will do a second one but heavily course correct through even more intensive market research than this first one.
And if that one does not turn out to be an at least „Odyssey“-like money machine, I would not be surprised if Bezozu would put Bond in his personal vault, waiting for someone to buy it for a price which would make Jeffrey even richer. If that took years or decades he would not care. He would certainly be amused that in the end he would be the one who ended James Bond.
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Also, these first look deals are routinely given to shut people up if they have become unwanted.
First look does not mean anything has to be produced, just that the studio wants to see the projects first.
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Would have prefered the TB remake instead of Brosnans Laws of Attraction but thats just me…(and probably the producers of Laws because of the meager box office)
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The Bourne franchise (the franchise Craig fans tend to love basing their Bond films on) losing to the Mission: Impossible franchise in the box office means by Craig fans’ own logic Daniel Craig does not deserve to be James Bond.
Even then, box office profits should not matter in the quality of the films.
Sean Connery is at best the fourth-best Bond.
Dalton Bond is better than Connery Bond.
People who complain about the scripts in the Brosnan Bond films don’t understand how mid-to-late 90’s and early 2000’s culture works.
Johnny English would be a more reliable Bond than Craig Bond.
The underwater submarine scene involving Bond and Wei Lin in TND and the Golden Gun duel in TMWTGG are the best examples of horror in Bond films (even better than actual horror films like Halloween and ANOES).
Jeremy Irons or Daniel Day-Lewis would’ve made a great Bond (or in Irons’ case a good Bond villain as well). However I’m afraid my propensity for inserting Irons into everything ever might turn him into the British Dwayne Johnson.
J.W. Pepper wasn’t that bad, but maybe it’s my southern roots talking. Jack Wade is awesome for the same reason.
I like the addition of Charles Robinson to the franchise in TND and he needs to come back.
John Cleese should have never been replaced by Ben Whishaw. Whishaw is boring.
Renard has one of the most underrated character arcs in the franchise.
I really liked Die Another Day and its main villain Gustav Graves. Zhao is also cool.
I really liked TMWTGG. Good horror scenes involving the Golden Gun.
I really liked Moonraker, though it has less to do with the premise and more to do with the main villain being an evil eugenicist type that was handled well. Most other Bond films that tackle these issues come off as tasteless and too much in favor of the racist.
A View To A Kill is not that bad. Christopher Walken did well in his role of a psychopath and Grace Jones of course is an excellent Bond henchwoman/Bond girlboss.
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Lots of shocking opinions. You fit in very well.
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First–welcome Agent0086.
Second:
This is interesting. Could you expand? I am a 1970’s aficionado myself, so this period is not well known to me.
But it was so lovely to have a queer Q. Also, we queers are often (usually?) boring.
Agreed. I like it better than OCTOPUSSY (shocking!). John Glen gives a masterclass in compensatory direction.
Seconded.
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1990’s period had already had its groundwork laid down with the grunge scene and while there was a lot of fighting between neoliberals and libertarians, it was a far more progressive time than in the 1970’s. It was also a time of mass opulence as capitalism peaked during this time with the low prices still continuing from the 1980’s although it was slightly higher than in the 80’s. It was an economic accident, but a beautiful one nonetheless. Most people in that decade clamored for a good-looking guy with a sophistication and a body count that could match and Brosnan fit right in to that niche. This so-called ‘management middle man’ persona people complain about was a result of a decade marked by progressive politics before Brosnan took over and neoliberal superstructure. It was normalized.
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