935 replies to this topic

[terminus]

I think your final paragraph has summed the whole situation up very well, coco1997. That said - the idea was not to make Granger so much a secondary villain, but a co-villain, who just happens to be the first of the two villains to die. Perhaps the phrases 'primary villain' and 'secondary villain' are being thrown around (by myself included) in a way that what is meant has got twisted and have gotten this whole situation a bit more wound up than it needed to be.

That said, I think we should draw a line under what's happened, assume that CT's decision is final and move onwards with the treatment - removing and replacing the character of Granger as needed.

I have a few ideas for how the majority of the treatment can be kept intact - which I will fiddle with and post at some point this evening or tomorrow afternoon. We will need a minor villain to replace Granger's position in the proforma - so I am proposing the addition of a character called Quartararo played by Edward James Olmos, whose role in things will be made clear when I post how I envisage a revised outline without Granger will work.

[dinovelvet]

I have a few ideas for how the majority of the treatment can be kept intact - which I will fiddle with and post at some point this evening or tomorrow afternoon. We will need a minor villain to replace Granger's position in the proforma - so I am proposing the addition of a character called Quartararo played by Edward James Olmos, whose role in things will be made clear when I post how I envisage a revised outline without Granger will work.

Sounds good. Ready to move on...

[Mr. Blofeld]

I don't know... I'm loathe to let this character go, after all the work everyone's put into it. It's such a promising premise.

[tdalton]

I don't know... I'm loathe to let this character go, after all the work everyone's put into it. It's such a promising premise.

Agreed.

I'm not even sure my catacombs idea really works all that well without Granger as well. I'm not saying that it should be taken out, but I find it far less effective without Granger.

Sounds good. Ready to move on...

Same here. It'll be nice to get a fresh start on a new project.

[terminus]

I don't know... I'm loathe to let this character go, after all the work everyone's put into it. It's such a promising premise.

Agreed.

I'm not even sure my catacombs idea really works all that well without Granger as well. I'm not saying that it should be taken out, but I find it far less effective without Granger.

If CT has made his decision, it's not something we can argue with. Hopefully the notes that I will post will provide a good groundwork for rebuilding the plot.

tdalton, I think the catacombs idea will work just as well in a revised plot.

[Mr. Blofeld]

I'm not even sure my catacombs idea really works all that well without Granger as well. I'm not saying that it should be taken out, but I find it far less effective without Granger.

Indeed... if CT has decided to disrespect our rights to mould and shape the characters provided, why should we respect his request to remove Granger? If he's pulled out of the games permanently, I see no reason to retract a character with so much development gone into it, already.

[SamuelKevlar]

Honestly, I don't understand any of this. The Granger character hasn't changed at all. As far as I can see all he did in CT's outline he does in mine. Frankly, I'm not happy that he's throwing his toys out of the pram, to use an awesome phrase that I've just learnt, over as simple as thing as his villain not dying last, while discarding my action sequence and most of Chun's background in his outline. Personally, if I was CT I'd be pleased as punch that we as a group managed to quasi-logically get a serial killer into a James Bond movie at all.

All that being said, looking forward to your new secondary villain, Terminus.

Edited by SamuelKevlar, 23 December 2010 - 03:37 AM.

[coco1997]

I'm not even sure my catacombs idea really works all that well without Granger as well. I'm not saying that it should be taken out, but I find it far less effective without Granger.

Indeed... if CT has decided to disrespect our rights to mould and shape the characters provided, why should we respect his request to remove Granger? If he's pulled out of the games permanently, I see no reason to retract a character with so much development gone into it, already.

While there's some logic to that argument, there's no need to fan the fire and potentially make things worse, Matt.

[terminus]

I'm only posting this in bullet point form - I firmly believe that the majority of Samuel's excellent adaptation of CT's treatment can be revised, with only a handful of alterations, to make this new incarnation of the treatment work. I think that tdalton's catacombs sequence will slide in quite neatly.

These aren't quite as cohesive as they would be if I waited to post them, but I wanted to get them out there to show you how I was envisaging the treatment could work sans Granger.

• Falkland Islands: The sequence plays out roughly as described - no real alterations. Bond has recieved his Double-Oh status, but he has been sent to the Falkland Islands training centre as a trainer: it's more of a punishment than simply throwing him out of the service. Bond encounters the female parachuter, Lydia (Rachel Ticotin) and has his fight with the drug baron in the 4x4 before bedding Lydia - discovering that she's an assassin sent to kill her. Bond, naturally, uses his charms to 'disarm' her.
  
• Isthmus City: Bond learned that Lydia had been sent to kill Bond by a rough coalition of drug barons that have come together in order to organise Sanchez' turf. Isthmus City is in political chaos, without the power of Sanchez behind the President, the leadership has no teeth and there are rumours the country may be absorbed into neighbouring Honduras. The drug baron in the 4x4 in the Falklands was not part of this coalition. Bond requests, and is granted permision, to investigate who has tried to have him killed. arrives in Isthmus City in order to track down the person who sent Lydia to kill him - a man called Hector Quartararo (Edward James Olmos) who, to make comparisons, is the 'Mr White' of this coalition of drug barons, with a touch of Dario in there too. As Bond investigates Quartararo, he comes across Chun Qiao and stumbles onto a joint CIA/DEA operation on which his old friend, Felix Leiter is consulting.
  
  As a result of Bond stumbling into the investigation, he looses track of Quartararo but he is pulled out of Isthmus City by the CIA alongside Chun Qiao and transported to Los Angeles.
  
• Los Angeles: Bond and Chun Qiao are to be returned to the United Kingdom on a specially chartered concorde flight.
  
• Monument Valley: Helicopters force the concorde to land - although Bond tries to coax the jet into escaping by trying to push it to its super sonic speeds. This fails when the jet is strafed with gunfire and the pilot (cameo by Michael Jackson perhaps) is forced to land on the highway in a move which very nearly destroys the aircraft. Chun Qiao is pulled out of the wreckage by mysterious masked gunmen - who leave the rest of the passengers alive.
  
• MI6: Bond eventually reaches London, recieves his equipment from Q, flirts with Moneypenny and departs for Rome.
  
• Rome: The sequence plays out, more or less, as in Samuel's treatment - just swap Quartararo for Grangers appearances.
  
• Burma: The sequence in Burma plays out, by and large, exactly as described in Samuel's treatment - just with Quartararo instead of Granger.
  
• New Zealand: Like Burma, the sequence plays out as in Samuel's treatment.

[Captain Tightpants]

I'm not happy that he's throwing his toys out of the pram, to use an awesome phrase that I've just learnt, over as simple as thing as his villain not dying last

That's not even remotely close to the issue here. I steadily built Granger up as the villain instead of Stahl, primarily because Granger had more detail to him. This seems to be a point that nobody here seems to understand - Stahl lacked substance. Because I had no idea what had been intended, I simply ran with what we had. Nobody objected. More elements focusing on Granger started to be put forward, like the chase through the catacombs in Rome. Granted, I may have fuelled the emphasis on Granger, but as I said, nobody raised any issues that the time. Anb yes, I wanted to re-order a few things for the sake of continuity and consistency. But then it got to the point I posted an outline of what I was going to write for the draft stage of the treatment and suddenly there's a "general consensus" that Stahl is the villain and Granger is not despite nobody raising any objections to the direction I was leaning in. It basically undid everything I'd come up with until then. I never would have bothered putting so much detail into Granger if I'd know he was not going to be the main antagonist. And suddenly everyone is accusing me of throwing my toys out of the pram. Well, try and put yourselves in my position: I was asked to build a bridge across a river a hundred metres wide. But first of all, I was only ever given enough building materials to get halfway there. And then just as I'd started building it - I have a few drafts saved on my computer; I'd actually made it all the way to Burma via Rotarua, and I think it worked out quite well - I get told "by the way, we wanted you to build the bridge in the other direction". You could have at least given me some direction earlier on and we wouldn't be in this mess. What really galls is that Granger is one of the best characters I've ever created. And not just here; I'm talking about in all my writings for the past twenty-one years. I'm really proud of what I came up with, and I decided to share it rather than bury it in a short story that will never see the light of day. So now I feel like I've just wasted all that time creating him for this project when my time would have been better spent using him someplace else.

[SamuelKevlar]

I'm only posting this in bullet point form - I firmly believe that the majority of Samuel's excellent adaptation of CT's treatment can be revised, with only a handful of alterations, to make this new incarnation of the treatment work. I think that tdalton's catacombs sequence will slide in quite neatly.

These aren't quite as cohesive as they would be if I waited to post them, but I wanted to get them out there to show you how I was envisaging the treatment could work sans Granger.

• Falkland Islands: The sequence plays out roughly as described - no real alterations. Bond has recieved his Double-Oh status, but he has been sent to the Falkland Islands training centre as a trainer: it's more of a punishment than simply throwing him out of the service. Bond encounters the female parachuter, Lydia (Rachel Ticotin) and has his fight with the drug baron in the 4x4 before bedding Lydia - discovering that she's an assassin sent to kill her. Bond, naturally, uses his charms to 'disarm' her.
  
• Isthmus City: Bond learned that Lydia had been sent to kill Bond by a rough coalition of drug barons that have come together in order to organise Sanchez' turf. Isthmus City is in political chaos, without the power of Sanchez behind the President, the leadership has no teeth and there are rumours the country may be absorbed into neighbouring Honduras. The drug baron in the 4x4 in the Falklands was not part of this coalition. Bond requests, and is granted permision, to investigate who has tried to have him killed. arrives in Isthmus City in order to track down the person who sent Lydia to kill him - a man called Hector Quartararo (Edward James Olmos) who, to make comparisons, is the 'Mr White' of this coalition of drug barons, with a touch of Dario in there too. As Bond investigates Quartararo, he comes across Chun Qiao and stumbles onto a joint CIA/DEA operation on which his old friend, Felix Leiter is consulting.
  
  As a result of Bond stumbling into the investigation, he looses track of Quartararo but he is pulled out of Isthmus City by the CIA alongside Chun Qiao and transported to Los Angeles.
  
• Los Angeles: Bond and Chun Qiao are to be returned to the United Kingdom on a specially chartered concorde flight.
  
• Monument Valley: Helicopters force the concorde to land - although Bond tries to coax the jet into escaping by trying to push it to its super sonic speeds. This fails when the jet is strafed with gunfire and the pilot (cameo by Michael Jackson perhaps) is forced to land on the highway in a move which very nearly destroys the aircraft. Chun Qiao is pulled out of the wreckage by mysterious masked gunmen - who leave the rest of the passengers alive.
  
• MI6: Bond eventually reaches London, recieves his equipment from Q, flirts with Moneypenny and departs for Rome.
  
• Rome: The sequence plays out, more or less, as in Samuel's treatment - just swap Quartararo for Grangers appearances.
  
• Burma: The sequence in Burma plays out, by and large, exactly as described in Samuel's treatment - just with Quartararo instead of Granger.
  
• New Zealand: Like Burma, the sequence plays out as in Samuel's treatment.

Good stuff. Just two notes. One is short: Chun doesn't get kidnapped out of the plane. She manages to escape from both parties and ends up coming to Stahl's place under her own steam. At this point she still trusts him - or as far as she trusts anyone.

The other note's a little more involved. Chun Qiao needs to be in Isthmus City for a reason. I propose an altered version of what I have in the outline, only with her making the Corinthian/Sienna deal not with Granger (his replacement Quartararo would have no pull in the US) but with Agent Dean Soma (or whatever new name we give him - I propose Howard Mason). I actually considered this when I initially wrote it (as I wasn't sure as to Granger's nationality) but didn't want to offend CT by turning a character he'd created into a bad guy. That's not an issue now - Mason can be working together with Leiter to make sense of the new situation in Isthmus, only he's got dirty deals going on at the side. Perhaps he's being paid by Quartaroro and/or Stahl to get Corinthian, perhaps the three of them are equal partners. Either way he can be dispatched with after Isthmus - maybe one of the two kills him in a rage after learning he's let her get arrested while they still need her to make Corinthian work.

Incidentally, Dean Soma was never on the proforma. Just an observation.

[terminus]

Sounds like it would work. I'm going to make a pass of the PTS at some point this afternoon and will post it - and then we can work on the Isthmus City section, which I expect you still have a clearer idea of about than I do.

[Captain Tightpants]

Incidentally, Dean Soma was never on the proforma. Just an observation.

Yeah, I needed somebody in Isthmus City who could bring Bond in. He was created because I needed a reason for Bond to be in a Concorde over Utah. SO I hit upon the idea of having Bond arrested for his crimes in Isthmus and extradited to London via Los Angeles. But to do that, I needed somebody who could arrest him in Isthmus, and there wasn't a character in the proforma who could do that. Felix Leiter was the only one who came close, and I couldn't see Leiter arresting Bond for what happened in LICENCE TO KILL. So, I just put in a filler character who would serve a function of the story for that part of the story and named him "Dean Soma", an anagram of "Asmodean" (aka "Jasin Natael"), one of the Forsaken in Robert Jordan's WHEEL OF TIME series. I'd just finished THE FIRES OF HEAVEN and he was on my mind because he was an interesting character. I needed a name, so I made up Soma because I couldn't see Chun, Stahl, Savatier, Granger, Leiter or Sierra arresting him.

[terminus]

Here we go -



GUN BARREL OPENS ON -

MI6 Headquarters, London

M hears about some potentially catastrophic event that requires the attention of one his best men - he presses the button on the intercome to speak to Moneypenny. "Moneypenny, where the hell is Bon -" He catches himself before he says the name, correct himself: "Moneypenny, get me 008 -" The secretary acknowledges the order, her expression betrays the fact that she is missing Double-Oh Seven.

MI6 Training Centre, Falkland Islands

Double-Oh Seven is overseeing the training of potential future members of the Double-Oh Section. The first scene that we see is like something out of Basic Instinct, with a handsome tuxedoed trainee (Clive Owen, fresh from filming the first season of Chancer) trying to get information out of a stunning blonde woman (a cameo appearance by supermodel Christie Brinkley) and failing abysmally - the scene playing out in front of a bearded Bond who watches it from behind a two-way mirror whilst smoking a cigarette. He stubs the cigarette out in an ash tray when the trainee crashes and burns, walking into the training room and absolutely berating the trainee - who leaves, suitably cowed.

Bond flirts with the blonde woman (revealed to be a low level MI6 operative named Suzie) but this is more out of obligation than actual want and she politely passes over the overtures that Bond has made. Bond leaves the training centre, which is on West Falkland, and climbs into his Range Rover and heads to the cottage he currently calls home - it's a far cry from his apartment in London and there's something of the semi-vagrant about it, M casting him into a proverbial 'no man's land' for the past eighteen months since the events of 'License to Kill' has had a real effect on Bond.

He is welcomed at his cottage by a golden retriever, it's obvious the Double-Oh and the dog have become each others lone companions. Bond takes the dog out for a walk, smoking a cigarette as he does so - when he spots a parachutist coming into land on the islands. Bond approaches the parachutist once they touch down - revealing that it is a beautiful Puerto Rican woman, who identifies herself as Lydia. She claims that she was aiming for Argentina, but missed when she was blown off course - this impresses Bond, she is clearly no amateur to have made a jump from the height where she could concievably be blown that far off-course.

Such skill would also make being blown off-course highly unlikely. Bond suspects that the girl is lying and is exactly where she wants to be. The conversation between the pair - a curious mix between interrogation and outright mutual flirtation - is interrupted by the arrival of another 4x4 that drives to run the two down. Bond throws Lydia and himself out of the way - which allows the girl to make an escape - whilst he stays and takes on the driver of the 4x4.

The driver is one of the drug lords who entered into a business transaction with Franz Sanchez and he fights Bond with a knife. During the fight, Bond manages to toss the knife away from the drug lord. This gives Bond the upper hand, but only momentarily - and soon it looks like the drug lord is going to throttle the life out of the secret agent.

Just as Bond seems to have lost - the golden retriever drops the knife into Bonds hand, having chased after it and returned it to Bond like the stick we saw the Double-Oh throwing for it minutes earlier. Bonds hand clamps round the knife, swings it round and plunges it into the drug lords chest - the mans eyes go wide and his body goes limp. Bond pushes the corpse of him, rubs his dogs ears in thanks - and heads back to his cottage where he finds that Lydia has let herself in. "I hopeyou don't mind."

She's run a bath for the two of them. Bond strips and joins the sexy parachuter in the bath as his dog curls up under the dining table. In the bath, Lydia reaches for the gun she has hidden underneath a towel - but Bond easily disarms her, sending the gun skidding across the bathroom floor. He pushes her head under the water -

Lydia gasps as he releases his grip and she surfaces - she admits that she was sent to kill him by a loose coalition of drug lords in Isthmus City, upset that he killed Sanchez and lost them millions. Bond makes a comment about this, then swings the situation into a romantic interlude when he suggests that: "I ought to check you for any other hidden weapons -"

With that, we transition into another TITLE SEQUENCE designed by Maurice Binder (which, unfortunately, will end up being his last) accompanied by a rhythmic themetune sung by Michael Jackson. The title sequence is much the same as those of 'The Living Daylights' and 'License To Kill' but with a running motif of computer components and electronic circuitry, coupled with Bond walking along the edge of a knife.

CB.n PRESENTS

TIMOTHY DALTON
as Ian Fleming's James Bond 007

in

CBN MEMBERS'
FOR TOMORROW WE DIE


Joan Chen
Iman Abdulmajid

Wilhelm von Homburg
Edward J. Olmos
Christopher Greener

Rachel Ticotin
Christie Brinkley

Clive Owen
Bill Paxton
John Rhys Davies

Geoffrey Keen
Lois Maxwell
Desmond Llewelyn

with

Robert Brown as M

"For Tomorrow We Die" sung by Michael Jackson
"For Tomorrow We Die" written Michael Jackson, with Tangerine Dream

Soundtrack by Tangerine Dream

Directed by John McTiernan

Titles Designed by Maurice Binder

[coco1997]

Awesome! That was by far the most well developed of any of the Anthology pre-title sequences so far.

[terminus]

It was fun to write, fleshing out details from the two treatments. Next up will be Isthmus City - but that will require a fair bit of work as it will be the one that varies most with the removal of Granger. Rome will then need a bit of elaboration and alteration for the same reasons, but I suspect the Burma and New Zealand are almost already set.

[Mr. Blofeld]

Considering the first half of the film focuses on Bond tracking Chun and this leading him to Granger Quertoquerto, perhaps the thing that M nearly needs Bond for could involve Chun? A lengthy sequence, perhaps, showing her breaking into something, showing how professional she is -- and a brief hint of the Corinthian virus?

[terminus]

It's a possibility - but it would suggest we'd need to meet 008 at some point, even if he's killed off soon after we meet him. I imagined it would be something we'd hear about but never see - something unconnected to the main mission - and with the training sequence, knife fight and the rendezvous at Bond's cottage, I suspect the PTS will be quite lengthy as it is.

It's Quartararo. Although I may change that to Morales - it's simpler to type.

[Mr. Blofeld]

It's a possibility - but it would suggest we'd need to meet 008 at some point, even if he's killed off soon after we meet him. I imagined it would be something we'd hear about but never see - something unconnected to the main mission - and with the training sequence, knife fight and the rendezvous at Bond's cottage, I suspect the PTS will be quite lengthy as it is.

I don't think it should be unconnected; remember, the Gilbert PTSes were always relevant to the main plot of the film -- that's where we should be taking our cues from.

It's Quartararo. Although I may change that to Morales - it's simpler to type.

Here's an idea: Why not just keep Granger? It's too late in the game to go changing things around, and, besides, so much work has been put into the character that it's a shame to lose him simply because the user who created him, as you put it, "threw his toys out of the pram".

[terminus]

It's a possibility - but it would suggest we'd need to meet 008 at some point, even if he's killed off soon after we meet him. I imagined it would be something we'd hear about but never see - something unconnected to the main mission - and with the training sequence, knife fight and the rendezvous at Bond's cottage, I suspect the PTS will be quite lengthy as it is.

I don't think it should be unconnected; remember, the Gilbert PTSes were always relevant to the main plot of the film -- that's where we should be taking our cues from.

You seem to have misunderstood. The PTS _is_ connected to the rest of the movie by virtue of Lydia being sent to kill Bond on behalf of the coalition of drug barons. So we ARE taking our cues from the Gilbert Era - but I think you mean the Glenn Era anyway.

It's just the 'potentially catastrophic event' that I've got occuring off-screen that is unconnected.

It's Quartararo. Although I may change that to Morales - it's simpler to type.

Here's an idea: Why not just keep Granger? It's too late in the game to go changing things around, and, besides, so much work has been put into the character that it's a shame to lose him simply because the user who created him, as you put it, "threw his toys out of the pram".

I will repeat this statement one final time - we are jetissoning the character of Granger out of respect for CaptainTightpants' wishes. This is the final word on the subject.

It's no issue swapping Granger out and installing the character of Morales - it requires a little shake-up to Isthmus City and to Rome, but the set pieces in Burma and New Zealand survive almost intact from the treatments that CT and Samuel did.

[Mr. Blofeld]

It's a possibility - but it would suggest we'd need to meet 008 at some point, even if he's killed off soon after we meet him. I imagined it would be something we'd hear about but never see - something unconnected to the main mission - and with the training sequence, knife fight and the rendezvous at Bond's cottage, I suspect the PTS will be quite lengthy as it is.

I don't think it should be unconnected; remember, the Gilbert PTSes were always relevant to the main plot of the film -- that's where we should be taking our cues from.

You seem to have misunderstood. The PTS _is_ connected to the rest of the movie by virtue of Lydia being sent to kill Bond on behalf of the coalition of drug barons. So we ARE taking our cues from the Gilbert Era - but I think you mean the Glenn Era anyway. It's just the 'potentially catastrophic event' that I've got occuring off-screen that is unconnected.

That "catastrophic event" -- what is it? What I meant was the tripartate or tetrapartate structure the Gilbert PTSes had, and, usually, that meant having a part of the villainous plan being enacted as the first scene of the movie, after the gunbarrel. This is what I meant by having it be connected, with the audience seeing Chun do something major to inadvertently jeopardize security; cut to MI6, M nearly calls for Bond, cut to Falkland Islands.

[terminus]

I really don't think the unseen 'catastrophic event' needs to be witnessed by the audience.

This isn't a Lewis Gilbert movie - it's not even a John Glenn movie, but they're the pretitles we should be looking at using as a template. This is probably closer to the TLD titles which open with a scene with M - and then transition into an action sequence, ending with Bond in the arms of a sultry beauty.

What do other people think?

Another random idea that I had was making the woman at the training centre in the Falklands (whom I have called Suzie here) Loelia Ponsonbury - and leave it open for her to return in a minor capacity in further UB-Dalton's (should we do more).

[tdalton]

I think that tdalton's catacombs sequence will slide in quite neatly.

The more that I think about it, the more I don't think the sequence works without Granger in the story. The catacombs sequence was thought up specifically for the Granger character, and I feel like using it now without the character not only takes away a lot from the scene, but it also prevents the use of such a scene later on if we ever end up with a villain similar to Granger (i.e. a very, very creepy villain, not necessarily a copy of Granger), where the scene would work much better.

I'll leave it to group consensus (I'm not going to demand that it be pulled from the story or anything like that), as usual, but I have reservations about how effective the scene can be without the villain it's been written for. I'll wait to see what comes of it, but I felt like I should raise this point about the scene, especially since my entire input into this project has been towards that one scene and has entirely revolved around the Granger character.

Maybe I could come up with something that would fit more in line with dinovelvet's concept of this being Dalton's YOLT or TSWLM? I feel like if anyone has any legitimate reason to be upset with how their idea was implemented, it's him, as his plot idea went in a completely different direction and tone than originally intended (and I would step up and be the first to admit I had a part in that as well).

Edited by tdalton, 23 December 2010 - 09:14 PM.

[terminus]

I would be happy for you to submit a new action sequence as an alternative, if you want to do that

[terminus]

Here is a redraft of the Isthmus City sequence:



Isthmus City, South America

In the eighteen months since the death of Franz Sanchez, Isthmus City was become a political time bomb: President Hector Lopez has been shown to be a weak and ineffective leader, his political rivals are pushing for the country to be assimilated into neighbouring Honduras, several drug barons have tried to stake their claim in the power vacuum that exists because of Sanchez' death and the likelihood of a military coup increases with every day that passes.

A handful of the drug barons have formed a rough coalition in the belief that together they will be able to prop up the ineffective Lopez, prevent a military coup and stop the assimilation of the country into neighbouring Honduras. It is this coalition that sent Lydia to attempt to kill Bond in the Falkland Islands - and, upon his arrival in Isthmus City, slipping into the country from neighbouring Nicaragua, it is them who Bond tries to track down in the seedier bars of the country.

During his attempt to track down the leadership, Bond meets and has sex with Chun Qiao in a rundown motel. He suspects she has some connection with the coalition because of how she acted in the bar in which they met - but when he leaves the room to use the shower, she escapes the room and then vanishes into the foot traffic outside.

Instead of using his new friend to contact the coalition, Bond plans to allow himself to be captured by the coalition of drug lords - but stumbles upon, and threatens to derail, a joint CIA/DEA operation that his friend Felix Leiter, now using a walking cane to support himself, has been brought in to consult on. Because his pursuit of the coalition threatens to derail the operation, Felix has Bond handcuffed to a chair in the safehouse that the CIA have set-up.

The operation is this:

A rogue Hong Kong born (and therefore British citizen) computer hacker Chun Qiao is in Isthmus City to make contact with Everett, her contact in the CIA, with whom she has made a deal: she will exchange Corinthian, a computer virus designed to remotely access and deploy automatic weapons systems like missile bases, for the freedom of Sienna Lauder, a human rights activist who the US dumped in a Burmese prison through the process known as rendition. But Everett betrays Chun and she is captured by the joint CIA/DEA team.

Los Angeles, California, USA

Bond and Chun are taken to Los Angeles where Bond awaits repatriation and Chun extradition to London via a chartered Concorde jet. Bond meets Chun shortly before they board the jet, recognising her as the woman he met in Isthmus City.

Monument Valley, Utah, USA

The flight back to London takes the concorde across the USA - but because of the law, the concorde may not go supersonic whilst it is over American soil. As the jet passes through Monument Valley in Utah, it becomes harried by helicopters: this sequence involves the jet weaving around the actual monuments. Bond tries to help the pilot (played by Michael Jackson) take the jet up to supersonic speeds, but the gunners in the helicopters strafe the jet with gunfire - smashing the windshield and forcing the aircraft to put down on one of those famously-long highways.

Before the concorde is harried by the helicopters, Bond makes his way down the aisle of the jet and sits next to Chun. He discovers that she is a computer hacker - he confronts her about his suspicions that she is dealing with the coalition of drug barons, she admits that they helped get her into Isthmus City.

When the jet lands on the highway, the passengers must evacuate - in the confusion, Chun Qiao is able to slip into the background and vanish into the wasteland. Thugs wearing desert camouflage emerge from the helicopters that have landed nearby and begin searching through the passngers, looking for someone - these thugs have the air of ex-professional soldiers and Bond quickly realises that they are not after any of the crew or the government contingent onboard, they are looking for Chun Qiao.

This realisation comes too late to save the life of a member of the concordes crew who is shot by one of the thugs. The thugs are led by the mute Savatier, a tall man with a scarred throat. When they realise that Chun has vanished, they decide that everyone else is a liability - but the deaths of the passengers and crew is prevented by a flyby from a pair of USAF jets.

Savatier and his thugs scramble to escape before rescue arrives. As the passengers and crew are loaded into a Chinook, Chun Qiao watches from the shade of a rock formation before turning on her heel and vanishing into the wasteland.

MI6 Headquarters, London

M greets Bond when he arrives back at MI6 Headquarters. He hopes that Bond has now learned his lesson - that (to use a now cliche phrase) with great power comes great responsibility. Bond reports on his experiences in Isthmus, the way that the concorde was attacked and the reason Bond believes the concorde was attacked.

Using Bonds description of Savatier, Q uses identification software to learn that he is associated with a radical luddite organisation. This worries M: he orders Bond to investigate what the luddite organisation is up to. The trail of Savatier picks up in Rome.

Q equips Bond with the red cigarette flares, the rosary beads and a stunning Aston Martin Visage - with all the usual refinements that one would want on the continent. Bond visits the locker room where he bumps into the recruit that he trained in the Falkland Islands, then shaves to remove the beard that he grew whilst on assignment there -

As he climbs into the Visage, Bond is back to the secret agent we know and love. He revs the engine of the Aston Martin - it's a long drive to Rome.

[dinovelvet]

Maybe I could come up with something that would fit more in line with dinovelvet's concept of this being Dalton's YOLT or TSWLM? I feel like if anyone has any legitimate reason to be upset with how their idea was implemented, it's him, as his plot idea went in a completely different direction and tone than originally intended (and I would step up and be the first to admit I had a part in that as well).

I'm not really that bothered by it, I just sort of assumed it would take on a YOLT-ish form, but it didn't. I did specify that the virus-affected countries would be forced to do the villain's bidding or he'd use their weapons to attack each other, and that didn't seem to end up in the storyline, but terminus found a way to make the virus plot work anyway, so I'm not proposing that we go back and alter it just to suit me.

Are we ready for Ultimate Broz yet?

[coco1997]

Yeah, I'm pretty anxious to do UB Brosnan as well. But it sounds like UB Dalton should be finished within a day or so, if all goes well.

[terminus]

I replaced my accidental double-post with a proposed draft of the Isthmus City/Los Angeles/Monument Valley sequences.

Morales will be glimpsed in Isthmus City but we will have our first proper encounter with him in Rome.

Everett is the operative who betrayed the transfer of Chun Qiao to Stahl and Savatier and he gets killed in the aftermath of the concorde landing in Monument Valley by Savatier.

Morales pursues Bond to Rome to continue the vendetta of the coalition against Bond - but Savatier kills him (it would occur in the catacombs if they're retained) to get him out of the way because he's getting in the way (in this redraft the coalition and the luddites aren't interconnected).

This means it's Savatier who gets killed in Burma.

[coco1997]

Good work adapting all the elements CT and SamKevlar laid out, terminus.

One quick point: the Aston Martin is called the Virage, not the Visage.

[terminus]

Glad you enjoyed it - might do another pass today and hopefully get the XMas Special Event up tonight (even if UB-Dalton is put temporarily on hold whilst we do it or it's run simultaneously).