101 replies to this topic

[Call Billy Bob]

Yeah, we all have our own ways of looking at it.
 
I think the casual movie viewer thinks of it all being the same, certainly my friends do. 
 
But like I said, all it takes is for Ralph Fiennes' M and Daniel Craig's Bond to have an "interesting time" in Tokyo and we know it's the time Bond mentions to Tatiana in FRWL.
 
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I respect your thoughts and your theory - we can view our media any way we wish after all! I just can't reconcile much of what you are saying into one logical timeline, is all

[RMc2]

I've believed since 2006 that the Daniel Craig films are a new set of Bond movies. They have some rather clever, and not so clever references back to the previous series from 1962 to 2002, a kind of nudge and wink approach, notably with the Aston Martin DB5. But they are not part of the same timeline, I think, as the previous movies - how can they be when we have Bond's first mission as a Double-O agent taking place in the first decade of the twenty first century?

 

The films are not remakes either, though they revisit a number of themes from the 1962-2002 films, notably Bond falling in love and losing his love to the villains and wanting, if not revenge, then closure.

 

What is different though is that the films seem more like sequels. QoS was a direct sequel to CR. We don't know for certain, but SP appears to follow in some ways from SF, and with the presence of Mr White indicates events from the first two Craig films may play a part. Will SP turn out to be an SF sequel? Possibly. Or it may be an attempt to tie up loose ends dating back to 2006.

 

 

 

Yeah, we all have our own ways of looking at it.
 
I think the casual movie viewer thinks of it all being the same, certainly my friends do. 
 
But like I said, all it takes is for Ralph Fiennes' M and Daniel Craig's Bond to have an "interesting time" in Tokyo and we know it's the time Bond mentions to Tatiana in FRWL.
 
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I respect your thoughts and your theory - we can view our media any way we wish after all! I just can't reconcile much of what you are saying into one logical timeline, is all

 

 

I agree with you both very much, Guy Haines and Billy Bob. The Craig films are definitely a new timeline, with 4th-wall winks to the 20 films prior to Craig taking over. Otherwise history would be repeating itself really weirdly (QoS' reference to Goldfinger with Strawberry Fields' death comes to mind), and technology would evolve backwards. But I think Mendes certainly left things open to interpretation by having the GF DB5 appear in SF without any explanation for it!

 

It's interesting that Martin Campbell told Dench she was playing the same character - but I think that was just his guidance for her performance. Or maybe that's just how he interpreted it. If we're going to accept behind-the-scenes tidbits as canon, then we should note GE's script calls her Barbara Mawdsley, but the box at the end of SF says Olivia Mansfield.

 

I've always thought she was a different character: she's generally more acerbic in the Craig films, and swears a lot (I don't think she swears at all in the Brosnan era?).

[seawolfnyy]

1. Dench is playing a different character. Her personality is completely different in the Craig films.
2. The Dr. No-DAD are in a separate universe from the Craig films.
3. The GF car was nothing but fan service.
4. I need a vacation. Barcelona here I come.

[tdalton]

1. Dench is playing a different character. Her personality is completely different in the Craig films.
2. The Dr. No-DAD are in a separate universe from the Craig films.
3. The GF car was nothing but fan service.
4. I need a vacation. Barcelona here I come.

 

Agreed.  

 

I never thought that Dench's M was the same in Casino Royale through Skyfall as she was in GoldenEye through Die Another Day.  She seemed like very much a different character in Craig's films and Brosnan's films.  

[007jamesbond]

it just continue the storyline from SF......like the Flemng novels OHMSS and YOLT was pretty much not that far apart 

[seawolfnyy]

I think It's more of a season 4 than a direct sequel, if that makes any sense.

[Bryce (003)]

Some fine points made by all above.

 

When QoS came about, I stated to many before seeing the finished product myself that re-watching CR would be a must and to think of it as Acts 4 & 5 of CR.

 

With SF, we got a new twist and chapter that has/is seemingly rekindling the events of Craig's first two in our new timeline while also reintroducing some classic elements and characters.

 

I recall the thread discussing the DB5 returning. As it did, it did make for a great nod to the past, yet also set it up for the ultimate swan song as it where.

 

Now that seemingly all the cinematic Bond properties are now in the hands of EON, reintroducing the greatest threat makes sense. It certainly won't be a one shot deal and will carry on into Bond 25. My hope is that Bond 26 will be a stand alone ('ala GF) but then keep SPECTRE as a threat in the shadows as to where the series goes regardless of if they go for another reboot with whoever Bond #7 is or even if Craig goes on. As some have expressed, I'd love it if he matched Roger's seven films before stepping down.  

[dtuba]

 

 

Everything they've done has been very reactionary.  People loved CR, so they decided to build that story out into a sequel and introduce Quantum as "the organization behind Le Chiffre".  People hated QOS, so they dropped all of that story and went all Nolan/Batman with SF.  That proved successful, so they're going the QOS route again with a sequel to SF. 

 

Spot on. Although it's worth noting that Purvis & Wade intended the Aston Martin in SF to be exactly the same one he won in CR - so as well as 'resolving' M and Bond's relationship, it does seem that SF was conceived as a sequel to CR, just not a direct sequel to QoS.

 

I suspect there's more than coincidence in the way Craig's films have vaguely reflected Connery's: FRWL was an explicit sequel to Dr No, then Goldfinger was standalone, then Thunderball reintroduced SPECTRE in a big way, while continuing some elements of Goldfinger.

 

 

What concerns me is, unlike in the Connery era, it seems that EON are jumping the gun on SPECTRE the organization. At least in the 60s, we had the introduction to the organization (through one branch of it in DN), then two films where we are privvy to neither Blofeld's name nor face (FRWL and TB), and then finally the big pay off with YOLT (regardless of one's personal feelings towards the film, at least the scale of it was worth the wait). Now, with the Craig films, it seems that EON are introducing us to SPECTRE the organization, having Bond infiltrate a SPECTRE meeting, and utilizing Blofeld (or so it seems, unclear at this point) as the main villain, all in one film. Too much, too soon. I'd rather have some buildup over a number of films than potentially have a one-and-done with SPECTRE (the film).

 

That is my understanding of the teaser trailer, although I would love to be proven wrong. 

 

Unfortunately, there isn't time. Not with a three-year span between films and the fact that Craig isn't getting any younger. Back when there was one film every year or two years could they afford to thin out the story arc a bit.

 

I'm not sure that "sequel" is the correct term to use here- aren't all Bond films, by their very nature sequels? - but rather tying all the story threads together so that they all exist in the same universe. Unlike the previous five actors' films, which intersect at various points but are devoid of any real continuity. At least that's what I tell myself so I don't go nuts trying to reconcile the various timelines in which each Bond exists.

[seawolfnyy]

Well, if you are of the belief that Quantum is a branch of SPECTRE, then I think we did have the subtle introduction to SPECTRE. Either way, this would more follow the novel SPECTRE in which the organization and ESB were both introduced in Thunderball.

[sharpshooter]

If all of the Quantum members were seen during the Tosca performance - the ones who stand up and leave, then I could entertain the idea these people could be picked off by SPECTRE quite easily.

[007jamesbond]

I treated Quantum like SMESH in the novel where many former SMESH agents join SPECTRE.....I think it the same thing here. 

[Guy Haines]

I wonder if Quantum was a kind of "respectable" cover for SPECTRE - peopled as it was at the top by billionaires, ex-intelligence types, political advisers - which outlived its usefulness when 007 embarrassed its membership in the opera house. These people panicked and neither they nor anyone else associated with Quantum was of any further use to SPECTRE. Dominic Greene set the seal on it, and SPECTRE knew it - motor oil in his stomach certainly, but two bullets in his skull.

 

Quantum seemed based around "financial" activity - the whole Le Chiffre business, and then in QoS the attempt to control, legally, the world's water supplies. It might have been like a hedge fund, with SPECTRE as the main, if very secret, investor. 

 

As for the man charged with winding Quantum up - Mr White, probably SPECTRE's enforcer within Quantum, rather than the leader of it, in my view. Which makes his apparent fall from grace glimpsed in the Spectre teaser trailer interesting - he looks a dishevelled shadow of his former self. I wonder what he's done to deserve this? Perhaps having wound up Quantum White is himself of no further use to SPECTRE? In which case, in the manner of the classic Connery films, surely SPECTRE would have had him eliminated without delay?

 

That's one idea I'd offer about Quantum, but as for Mr White - intriguing stuff, and as ever, we won't know for sure until November.