4 replies to this topic

[Colossus]

Because it's basically a celebration of the most earthliest of human habits to put it short, drinking, fornicating, indulging, things which we humans are brought into this world which has it. Even if this movie or that movie isn't that good or this or that era, it's just all to an end of doing these things which… unlike OTHER movie franchises which try to escape into wondrous worlds of fantasy as if to escape our own world, there are franchises like this which CELEBRATE things like this. 

[Dustin]

I suspect the Bond films are not that much less escapist or fantasy compared to Star Wars or Game of Thrones. The stage is different, looks more familiar and is peopled by characters we think we recognise from the telly or the headlines. But Bond is out to slay dragons, he employs 'magic' in the form of his toys, he saves the country and gets the reward in the person of a beautiful woman.

The main difference is that all available surfaces are awash in brand logos so we can buy all the stuff we see in Bond films for Christmas. Bit difficult with chain mail and cloaks...

As for outlast, I feel sure the Bond series will outlast a great many other competitors, simply because it's already proved for over five decades it can. Superheroes may come and go, dystopian fantasy series may appear, vampires and werewolves and astronauts and space cowboys. But there doesn't seem to be a rationale that would prevent Bond from slaying dragons in fifty years from today. Or a hundred.

[Colossus]

Just seeing your post now. Well said Dustin. Also he's "in the now" which is always more relatable. 

[mattjoes]

I agree with the original point and share the sentiment. To put it in other words, Bond is fantasy, but turned inward, rather than outward. It's about the exaltation of the way we human beings live and  are today, rather than the way we'll live and be a thousand years from now.

[Professor Pi]

To a certain degree, all these franchises are fantasy.  But we don't always have access to lightsabers, transporter beams, invisibility cloaks, rings of power or sometimes even leather whips of history professors.  But a fancy car, a beautiful woman are not beyond the realm of possibility.  Each day brings a new tech gadget.  And failing those, a martini shaken, not stirred, is only a walk to the kitchen away.  Long live Bond!