179 replies to this topic

[Moore Baby Moore]

The idea that MI6 is brainwashing agents takes rather a lot of backstory.

It would also require explaining why MI6 is brainwashing secretaries (the three Moneypennys) and why the CIA is brainwashing a ton of different people into being Felix Leiter. In essence, to justify the theory, the entire mythos would have to be skinned alive and completely robbed of its core.

It doesn't work, can't work, and will never work. It's best to just look at it as a live-action comic book, taking on new interpretations of the classic characters over time.

I subscribe to the Loomis-is-just-stirring- theory.

In other words, trolling. Especially when he keeps insisting that he can't understand why people think his pet theory is a bad idea after the objections have been spelled out multiple times.

Edited by Moore Baby Moore, 11 October 2006 - 07:15 PM.

[Loomis]

Moore Baby Moore,

Firstly, welcome to CBn. Secondly, if you stick around here, you'll find that there will be plenty of opinions on and theories concerning James Bond that you will disagree with. This is true of all of us; personally, I find it makes for an interesting site and lively discussions, as long as personal insults, etc. are avoided. Such is the nature of fandom.

[Bon-san]

Oh, come on. Let's be honest. Loomis is a known troll. We only put up with him here because some few years ago he was knighted by Her Majesty, and we're all still wowed by that.


But seriously, Moore Baby Moore, Loomis is one of the really good guys. He is a passionate, informed fan of Bond-dom, literature, cinema, the fine arts, cultural affairs, human rights...shall I go on?

Fact: Loomis ≠ internet troll.

Unproven notion: Loomis may = devil's advocate. On occasion, of course.


And, Sir Loomis, you can send my check to the usual address.

[Thunderfinger]

The Phantom is a codename.
Even God could be a codename.
James Bond obviously isn

[Loomis]

[quote name='Thunderfinger' post='624551' date='11 October 2006 - 20:42']
The Phantom is a codename.
Even God could be a codename.
James Bond obviously isn

[Santa]

Indeed. Weird DAD-fan he may be, but Loomis isn't a troll.

[Skudor]

What's a troll?

[Santa]

Short, ugly thing. Mind you, I've never actually seen Loomis...

[Loomis]

Short, ugly thing? Won't go there, but just to say that I most certainly do not look like Daniel Craig.

"What a pity," I can hear santajosep replying.

[Skudor]

Really? From what I though, I thought they were big, tall, hairy, ugly things. I didn't realise Loomis was any of those things.

[Santa]

You should know all about them, I believe they come from your part of the world. Maybe they're not short, but I believe they hide in places so my childhood mind may have assumed.

Short, ugly thing? Won't go there, but just to say that I most certainly do not look like Daniel Craig.

"What a pity," I can hear santajosep replying.

Oh I'm sure you're good enough.

[spynovelfan]

Guys.... you're getting worked up about something written on a GERMAN website. The guys who work on the website didn't work on the movie. They're hired to make German Internet users interested in James Bond.

One page one of this thread Vodka Martino linked to Sony's main international site, where it lists Bond's birthplace as West Berlin. Here's the site:

http://www.sonypictu...ssier/index.php

Loomis isn't trolling. He's pointing out something I also find bizarre; I don't agree or like the codename theory, but I can see *some* merits to it, and why it has come up. For instance, Judi Dench's M apparently met James Bond for the first time in GOLDENEYE. Now it appears from the trailer that she met him on another occasion, which takes place after that in terms of technology and geo-politics, but before Bond was made a double-0 agent. The obvious answer is the one that Barbara Broccoli has already given: 'We know it doesn't make sense...' But I do share Loomis' puzzlement that this idea gets fans *so* riled up. Ditto the very mention of a non-Caucasian playing Bond, which we've had a right old ring-a-ding about.

I think you can disagree with the theory and still get something out of discussing why it might work. It can open your mind a bit. For example, the fact that Fleming also played these sorts of games is quite interesting, and discussing it might lead us into some interesting areas.

After all, there's only so many times we can discuss the fact that Craig's a blond midget who looks like the ghost of the corpse of the Milky Bar Kid's great-grandfather.

[marktmurphy]

Agreed. But Bond fans' extraordinarily hostile reaction to it does baffle me - I mean, it has the largest number of votes against it in the "What would be the least welcome development?" thread, among 18 scenarios, even outranking "Homosexual Bond"! Is it really worse than, say, "Bond on other planets, a la Green Lantern", or "The XXX cross over" (that's XXX as in Vin Diesel, one presumes, rather than the resurrection of Anya Amasova that I suspect many of us would greatly welcome).

Well, yes, apparently it is. It seems to be the ultimate heresy as far as Bond fans are concerned, the ultimate line that must never, ever be crossed or else all is ruined. And, while I'd never expect it to be universally welcomed (heck, I don't even really buy it myself, despite possible appearances), I do rather wonder why it's hated so much.

Because it would undermine the main character of the series. He turns out to be something we never knew he was; something much less than he ever was. And it would be the biggest aspect of his personal history and we never knew anything about it. It's pretty much the textbook way of creating an unsatisfying drama- it's a like a crappy soap opera where a main character's dead brother we never knew about appears at the door. It's cheating and it's rubbish.

Ah, but I've got a theory about that. The man who turns up at the start of TMWTGG is actually the real James Bond. The chap going by that name in the previous novels was a SMERSH agent who had been brainwashed into thinking he was Bond.

Cheeky! That's very nearly my Bond story idea...

[Publius]

it's a like a crappy soap opera where a main character's dead brother we never knew about appears at the door. It's cheating and it's rubbish.

Or the classic "it was all a dream" retcon, as seen most notably in Dallas and Newhart. Although I forgave it in the latter case, because Bob's just funny like that.

[Santa]

Could I retcon my life? Would that be possible? I'd make many improvements.

[Thunderfinger]

When do you wish to have been born then ,Santa?
And where? Just post it here, and consider it retconned.

[Loomis]

Agreed. But Bond fans' extraordinarily hostile reaction to it does baffle me - I mean, it has the largest number of votes against it in the "What would be the least welcome development?" thread, among 18 scenarios, even outranking "Homosexual Bond"! Is it really worse than, say, "Bond on other planets, a la Green Lantern", or "The XXX cross over" (that's XXX as in Vin Diesel, one presumes, rather than the resurrection of Anya Amasova that I suspect many of us would greatly welcome).

Well, yes, apparently it is. It seems to be the ultimate heresy as far as Bond fans are concerned, the ultimate line that must never, ever be crossed or else all is ruined. And, while I'd never expect it to be universally welcomed (heck, I don't even really buy it myself, despite possible appearances), I do rather wonder why it's hated so much.

Because it would undermine the main character of the series. He turns out to be something we never knew he was; something much less than he ever was.

Surely he'd be something much more - about five people more.

And it would be the biggest aspect of his personal history and we never knew anything about it.

Erm, until we knew about it.

It's cheating and it's rubbish.

Rubbish, perhaps, but cheating? Was it cheating for Fleming, several books into the series and apparently purely in tribute to Connery, to all of a sudden make Bond a Scot, when readers would up till then have assumed the character to be an Englishman? Was it cheating for Darth Vader to be revealed as the father of Luke and Leia in THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK, when there was absolutely nothing in STAR WARS to suggest such a relationship or any necessity for it?

If - and this is a colossal "if", 'cause it's almost certainly never going to happen, and let me again remind people that this is just a harmless fan theory - Eon ever did decide to incorporate the codename idea into the series, it would hardly be cheating; it would simply be a case of *cough* artists exercising their rights to add to the work that was theirs.

[Thunderfinger]

Just watch CR 67 will you, Loomis?
Stop messing with our heads!

[Skudor]

Personally, I detest the CN theory purely because it's such utter fanwankery. It's trying to create a logical explanation for something we know very well has no suc explanation (in terms of the character). It's trying to fill a logical void, when the simple answer is that there is a void.

And, secretly, because it makes so much sense.

[Thunderfinger]

Filling that void with CN theory, will do you worse than filling it with nicotine.

[Jericho_One]

I still don't understand why people make such a fuss about this.
The man's not real, that's why he's being played by the sixth actor in its history and that's also why it's just impossible to establish a coherent timeline, it's a dead issue. Living actors do age, James Bond simply doesn't, so there's no need for outlandish theories to explain something that doesn't need explanation in the first place.
It's not the CN theory that is idiotic, it's the apparent need of it.

In the end, James Bond lives, and I don't give a damn about what year he was born in - he's timeless.

[stromberg]

Codename theory discussion again.
How time flies, is it that time of the month again?

codenametheorynotbond.com

[kneelbeforezod]

there's no need for outlandish theories to explain something that doesn't need explanation in the first place.
It's not the CN theory that is idiotic, it's the apparent need of it.

Exactly Thankfully, people who need such "theories" are few and far between. Our man Loomis implies that if you don't accept the codename theory, then you must be subscribing to another theory in order to rationalise the series... when in reality no theory is needed; we just don't think about it

And I don't get worked up or angry when people bring up the codename theory, it doesn't bother me at all. I just, quite cheerfully, call it what it is: solid gold horse .

[Dr. Noah]

NOTE:

James Bond isn't real. When an actor plays James Bond... he's playing James Bond!!! Is that hard to understand?

[Santa]

He's real.

[Dr. Noah]

Well, Ian Fleming was real. And id he was still writing at age 100, I bet Bond would still be in his thirties/forties in the new stories.

[marktmurphy]

And it would be the biggest aspect of his personal history and we never knew anything about it.

Erm, until we knew about it.

That just doesn't work- imagine if you suddenly found out at the end of Eastenders it's all been a dream some idiot child has been having for twenty years. Satisfying? Or irritating to find out you're supposed to be happy that all the characters you've been investing all your interest in aren't even supposed to be real in their own reality?
We know Bond was never intended to be a codename; thus the story taking an uncovincing twist like this would only be irritating. In the last Sherlock Holmes book we find out Watson was actually solving the crimes all along and Holmes is an actor (like 'Without a Clue', yes). Satisfying? To find out your hero is a sham?

[DOUBLE-O-JOE]

Even Pearson's bio of 007 mentions he was born in Germany on Armistice Day, 1920, or something. So I find this latest revelation to be quite consistent with Bond's published history. West Berlin in 1968 sounds very cool to me.

[Loomis]

And it would be the biggest aspect of his personal history and we never knew anything about it.

Erm, until we knew about it.

That just doesn't work- imagine if you suddenly found out at the end of Eastenders it's all been a dream some idiot child has been having for twenty years. Satisfying? Or irritating to find out you're supposed to be happy that all the characters you've been investing all your interest in aren't even supposed to be real in their own reality?
We know Bond was never intended to be a codename; thus the story taking an uncovincing twist like this would only be irritating. In the last Sherlock Holmes book we find out Watson was actually solving the crimes all along and Holmes is an actor (like 'Without a Clue', yes). Satisfying? To find out your hero is a sham?

I find the codename theory satisfying from the point of view of tying together "universes" that are already separate (the Connery era, the Moore era, the Craig era, etc.) and cannot be tied together in any other way (apart from the "Bond is a HIGHLANDER-style immortal" theory, which is lunacy). EASTENDERS is all one timeline anyway.

[Vodka Martino]

Relax, it's just a theory. If people are happy to accept "alternate universes" in which Higson's Bond and Benson's Bond and Daniel Craig can happily co-exist with Fleming's FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE and Fleming's YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE (YOLT being a novel that slyly suggests that - oh, the horror of it! - none of the other Fleming adventures Really Happened™) and, oh, I don't know, NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN.... why won't they tolerate at least the theoretical possibility of yet another alternate universe in which MI6 is a less-than-angelic organisation that brainwashes its agents and makes them go about under codenames?

I mean, the whole Bond universe's just a load of bollocks anyway, so why not?

My main problem with the code name theory (apart from the fact that it's dragged this thread out over six pages) is the fact that MI6 is portrayed as "a less-than-angelic organisation that brainwashes its agents etc.."
That may well be the case in the real world, but I go to the movies to escape the real world. Whatever the Bond films may be, you could always count on them to be clear-cut in terms of the whole good guy versus evil villain scenario. Even though CR may no doubt play around with this convention.
Besides, that whole "brainwashing our own agents" shtick was done back in 1962 with "The Manchurian Candidate" and then again in spy fiction by David Morell with "The Brotherhood of the Rose". Dreadfully written book, that was. I'm sure it's been done countless times in some variation or other. Like they say, 'there's one bourne every minute'!

Otherwise, Fleming's Bond could actually have gone to the cinema to see Sean Connery playing him... which makes this thread even more taxing on the brain and twisted....

Oh, DS, don't even go there. That will really do your head in. That's like the time it dawned on me that in the world of "The Rock" , where Sean Connery plays the SAS guy jailed at Alcatraz, there are no Bond films starring Sean Connery in existence.

I don't even think Tamahori really supports it at this point, because the very interviewer he was talking to essentially rebuked his theory by asking him, "Then why does Roger Moore visit Tracy's grave?" And he just said, "Oh. I didn't know that."

I bet he didn't know he was gonna get busted by the cops while wearing a dress, either.

I still don't understand why people make such a fuss about this.
The man's not real, that's why he's being played by the sixth actor in its history and that's also why it's just impossible to establish a coherent timeline, it's a dead issue. Living actors do age, James Bond simply doesn't, so there's no need for outlandish theories to explain something that doesn't need explanation in the first place.
It's not the CN theory that is idiotic, it's the apparent need of it.

In the end, James Bond lives, and I don't give a damn about what year he was born in - he's timeless.

I like your style J_One. 'Nuff said.

VM