33 replies to this topic

[DJR007]

Everyone wants Moneypenny and Q back in the films so who should be playing these characters?

For Q I would think Johnny Ball would be a great candidate. He's a real scientist / boffin type so would know what he's talking about, plus he can be enthiusiastic without being silly about it.

Moneypenny, not really sure but Samantha Bond returning would be a good start.

Edited by DJR007, 07 November 2009 - 10:38 PM.

[Jim]

Everyone wants Moneypenny and Q back in the films....

Welcome to CBn.

Duck!

[tdalton]

Everyone wants Moneypenny and Q back in the films

Not everyone wants either character back in the films. I think that the films would be much better off if they didn't go back and start adding parts of the formula that they had dropped from Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace. While both of those films followed a lot of the formula, the fact that they didn't hit a great number of the check boxes on the list made the film seem a bit more original.

To answer the question, though, if the characters must return, then I'd say go with Rebecca Hall as Miss Moneypenny and Nathan Fillion as Q.

[sharpshooter]

Not everyone wants either character back in the films. I think that the films would be much better off if they didn't go back and start adding parts of the formula that they had dropped from Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace. While both of those films followed a lot of the formula, the fact that they didn't hit a great number of the check boxes on the list made the film seem a bit more original.

I'm with you. It's time to stop resting on past laurels.

And welcome to the site, DJR007.

[double o ego]

Fillion's too awesome to be Q. I'd rather see him as a henchman type.


Samantha Bond returning as Moneypenny??

[sharpshooter]

Moneypenny, not really sure but Samantha Bond returning would be a good start.

Despite Moneypenny not being written into the last two films, Samantha Bond doesn’t want to return. She always said she would leave when Brosnan did. She’s done with the series. Not that she's going to be asked back, mind you. If the character returns, the obvious decision is to cast a fresh face for the reboot. Something I feel should have been done with M, instead of carrying over Judi Dench - regardless if I think she's good in the role or not.

[Tybre]

Fillion's too awesome to be Q. I'd rather see him as a henchman type.

Henchman? Man's too awesome for that, too. At the very least make him a sort of sub-villain, like Medrano.

[Loomis]

Everyone wants Moneypenny and Q back in the films

A certain Mr Z. Industries, for one, would disagree.

Me, I'd like them back. I think both characters should be considerably younger than Craig's Bond. I'd choose Mackenzie Crook for Q and some little-known British actress in her twenties for Moneypenny.

[Tybre]

You know, it's a shame Burton and Cushing have passed on. Wouldn't mind seeing either one of them as Q or M. Perhaps make one Q and the other M. Although I suppose by now Burton would really be the only one in any shape to keep on acting, even if it is a smaller role like that. Cushing always kept in good health, but he'd be 97 by the time they began filming. Just can't see a man that old still doing it, even in the small parts. Ah well, pointless rambling really I suppose.

[tdalton]

Fillion's too awesome to be Q. I'd rather see him as a henchman type.

I would agree with that, although I would "defend" my choice of Fillion as Q by simply saying that he's one of only three actors that I'd want to see take that role on (and he'd be the only one that I'd want to see take the role on and make it a somewhat comedic part again).

The other two actors that I'd like to see in the part would be either Sam Neill or Jason Isaacs.

[Quantumofsolace007]

Everyone wants Moneypenny and Q back in the films so who should be playing these characters?

For Q I would think Johnny Ball would be a great candidate. He's a real scientist / boffin type so would know what he's talking about, plus he can be enthiusiastic without being silly about it.

Moneypenny, not really sure but Samantha Bond returning would be a good start.

I don;'t want them back.



Alright Q i can see back but moneypenny. The character adds nothing to the films and is best left in the past.

[Jaws0178]

I am of two minds on the subject. While yes, the characters of Q and Moneypenny would be great to have back, ultimately, I do not want to see Q back. Not because I don't like Q, (as I have mentioned in previous posts, the briefings for me were the best part, starting with Goldfinger, and Q's "I never joke about my work, 007" line). The reason I say not to bring him back is because of the actor: as Carly Simon put it, "Nobody does it better". No one could play Q like Desmond Llewelyn. When I first saw The World is not Enough, I thought that John Cleese was trying too hard to be like Desmond. I really disliked Alec McCowen's performance in Never Say Never Again, and slightly disliked Geoffrey Bayldon's in the 67 Casino Royale. Had I not known it was a spoof, I really would not have liked it.

As to Moneypenny, and mind you, this is just all my opinion, I think she was a woman of her time. By that, I mean, she was supposed to be a secretary who had a wild crush on the main character, so that you could see that "Wow, this guy has women practically falling over him." She also was the one woman that actually knew what Bond did for a living, so she was kind of like a mothering type character.

Again, just to wrap, these are all just my opinion. TIOLI

[Gabriel]

I can imagine any organisation having a boss like M, but a borderline-senile old duffer designing gadgets? Sorry, no way!

When you look at Boothroyd, originally played as The Armourer in Dr No and FRWL, he was a guy who worked with weaponry and designed equipment in which he could conceal it.

The whole soap opera of Moneypenny, Q, M, The Minister and so on only developed because there were three different actors (Connery, Lazenby, significantly-older Connery, Moore) in the space of four Bond movies and the producers needed a consistent backing team to support the different lead actor's transition.

The problem is that the backing cast's roles should have been significantly scaled down as soon as Roge was established. Indeed, by FYEO, Q, Moneypenny and M should barely have appeared, if at all. Instead, like the snowball that starts an avalanche, the movies picked up detritus with each film until the Brosnans, where the dialogue spoken by the characters could practically be used in karaoke, it was so familiar.

It's a testament to the skills of Lois Maxwell and Desmond Llewellyn that they made so much of roles where they spoke almost exactly the same dialogue in every film. As has been proven since, no replacements - Caroline Bliss, Samantha Bond, John Cleese - have been able to equal them, so what's the point?

These characters certainly don't belong in the Craig era. If the Craig era is taken as some sort of contemporary prequel series to Dr No, then maybe they could be reintroduced when Daniel Craig's successor arrives in, say 2013-2015. Prior to that, really, what is the point in them?

So no, everyone does not want Moneypenny and Q back in the films, so try to have better manners than to walk on to a forum and tell us what we're supposed to be thinking!

Welcome to the forum.

[Binyamin]

Neither Q or Moneypenny belong in the Craig era.

Now, years down the road, if things go slightly lighter, it would be fun to have them in again. They have to be minor but well-written roles, not fill-in-the-blank faux-humor.

Hugh Laurie would make an excellent Q.

[Wade]

I think adding them back would be fine; after all, both were Fleming characters. But their screen personas did not match with the ones from the books. That's the idea I would advise: Bring them back as INTEGRAL parts, like the anonymous workers at MI6 we saw in CR and QOS. Only a bit higher profile. Maybe give Bond and Moneypenny a backstory in which they HAVE had a night together. And now, there's the kind of tension you get in an office where that kind of thing happens. Nothing outrageous or over the top. Just a plot device that can come in handy now and then. No, I DON'T want the movie Moneypenny and Q back. I want real characters.

Who to play them? Well, in another world where DAD didn't exist, Rosamund Pike as Moneypenny. Or Jaime Winstone. And Q? Brendan Gleeson.

And if there was a male M? Albert Finney.

[john.steed]

Welcome to the group DJR007!

I would very much like to see Moneypenny and/or Q return in the next film. While CR and QoS both happened early Craig/Bond's career, th next film, hopefully, will take place when he has been established in his office. Hence, we would expect that he would have relationship's with the people that he worked with, the Bond in the books certainly did. I suppose you could have a different character, such as Tanner, fill that role. However, given Moneypenny and Q's long, happy, association with the series, why not bring them back, suitably modified to fit the 2010's?

Concerning their history in the series, Moneypenny and Q's roles were well established by the time OHMSS came around so I do not see any "soap opera" concerning them develope from OHMSS through LALD. Also, I, and I believe many others loved them during the Bond era and beyond and am glad that their role, along wwith that of Q did not get scaled down.

[DaveBond21]

If they do return, then they will cast relative unknowns in the roles, meaning that anyone suggesting famous names will be left disappointed.

However, for Q, I think they should being back the "Q-like" guy from Quantum of Solace. The one with the Q glasses, tweed jacket and "Q-like" manner. You know? The one who had all the Q-haters worried it really was him!

[Binyamin]

It would be refreshing if "Q" became more the Quartermaster, the Armorer, and not some high-tech gadget whiz.

He should be more about actual weaponry and field equipment, the way a quartermaster actually is in the service.

Edited by Binyamin, 09 November 2009 - 06:52 AM.

[bond 16.05.72]

Fillion's too awesome to be Q. I'd rather see him as a henchman type.

I would agree with that, although I would "defend" my choice of Fillion as Q by simply saying that he's one of only three actors that I'd want to see take that role on (and he'd be the only one that I'd want to see take the role on and make it a somewhat comedic part again).

The other two actors that I'd like to see in the part would be either Sam Neill or Jason Isaacs.

Does he do a decent English accent? If not forget it, if these parts are recast we at least want them native to the country they work for.

[DJR007]

Well, what a diverse group of responses, all of them make perfect arguments for both sides.

They did bring a new thought to my mind and that was the '00' section secretary, Leolia Ponsonby and later Mary Goodnight. Moneypenny was, of course, 'M's' secretary. It would have been the section secretary that arranged their travel, expenses etc.

Thanks for the responses, lots of food for thought.

[Zorin Industries]

Everyone wants Moneypenny and Q back in the films so who should be playing these characters?

For Q I would think Johnny Ball would be a great candidate. He's a real scientist / boffin type so would know what he's talking about, plus he can be enthiusiastic without being silly about it.

Moneypenny, not really sure but Samantha Bond returning would be a good start.

Nice try.

But I find Zorin Industries needs to believe the intent of the argument before he then argues against it - and something about this thread doesn't feel wholly genuine to me.

[dogmanstar]

I think Eddie Izzard would be cool if he played it serious.

My problem with bringing back Q and Moneypenny is because all the actors that followed Desmond and Lois basically never broke free of their iconic performances. Cleese was terrible, just trying to mimic the Q hatred of Bond's arrogance and cavalier nature. And the post-Lois Moneypenny's just did flirting. Period. If anyone were to come back to those roles, they would have to be re-thought to make them their own. Not just a poor shadow of the past.

[Tybre]

I dunno, I never thought R was that bad. Cleese wasn't wonderful, but he wasn't terrible. Although he did seem to turn in better performances for the video games...

[Trident]

I don't think Cleese's 'R' really was that much a mirror of Q. Cleese simply was too much into the comedy element, with nothing in his part really ever suggesting a serious note. It's true, Q and R could both arrive at slapstick, but while Q was an amiable chap introducing a little fun into giving Bond his gadgets, R came from the other side of slapstick, a fully blown caricature that just had a less outragous moment in which to play a part in a Bond film. Q was from the Ministry of Defense, R from the Ministry of Silly Walks. Much as I'm a fan of Cleese and Monty Python's I see R as a terribly inappropriate part of the later Brosnan films.

[Jaws0178]

Trident brings up a very good point, in that the writers of the last two Brosnan films, Die Another Day especially kind of realized, "Oh my god, we have John Cleese. Lets write funny things for him to do because he is John Cleese." It would almost have been like casting :: shudder:: Rowan Atkinson as Q. They might as well rename Q's character Mr. Bean and make it done that way.

[Trident]

Initially, I even thought Cleese wasn't a bad casting move. But TWINE's R really was a bit embarrassing, wasn't he? Actually quite annoying, considering it turned Llewelin's farewell into a not-so-classic cabaret act.

DAD finally didn't do much to make R a more grounded figure. 'R' is still liason officer to the MosW, on special appointment with DAD's gadget cellar. Even the presentation of the AM 'Vanish' with the absurdly distorted image of the character projected across the supposedly invisible bodywork makes me think of Cleese's gait in that sketch. A treasure of absurdity, but entirely pointless amid the greater scale of absurdity DAD revels in.

[elizabeth]

i know he's a comedy actor, but i think rowan atkinson would be good as Q.

[Double-Oh Agent]

Personally, I liked John Cleese's "R"/Quartermaster character especially in Die Another Day and wouldn't mind his return to the series. I thought Cleese did a great job in DAD. His role in the World Is Not Enough, however, was not as good due to the writing. It was a stupid idea to introduce him with his lab coat caught in the car door. And although I suppose they had to show the potential of the blow-up ski jacket, I feel that part of the scene could have been done much better. As it is, that scene makes him a bit of a buffoon. Fortunately, they fixed that in the next film. As a result, I blame TWINE for Cleese's "mixed popularity" among the fan base. Had he continued in the series and the writers followed the DAD characterization, I think a greater number of people would have more positive feelings towards him and his Quartermaster character.

[Safari Suit]

Eh, he's on screen for, what, a minute? I think Cleese has very little to do with how TWINE is seen, good or bad. Blaming him for the film's low rep around these parts seems a little unfair!

[tdalton]

Fillion's too awesome to be Q. I'd rather see him as a henchman type.

I would agree with that, although I would "defend" my choice of Fillion as Q by simply saying that he's one of only three actors that I'd want to see take that role on (and he'd be the only one that I'd want to see take the role on and make it a somewhat comedic part again).

The other two actors that I'd like to see in the part would be either Sam Neill or Jason Isaacs.

Does he do a decent English accent? If not forget it, if these parts are recast we at least want them native to the country they work for.

I'm sure that he can, as I think that he's certainly talented enough to pull off a good English accent. I don't see it being a problem though, as it wouldn't be the first time that one of these two parts would be occupied by someone from outside of the UK (Lois Maxwell was from Canada, as is Fillion).