62 replies to this topic

[Simon]

Not sure that the film was designed for this level of questioning and perspicacity.

 

That said, I am here, and I too am questioning.  That Also said, I am not expecting any answers that mean a damn.

 

Irrespective of who touched the ring, can DNA be passed on by touch?  I always thought it was dependent on inner mouth swabs or something with a liquid content.  And for how long can DNA be ID'd?  Thought there was a half-life sort of attribute to such.

 

Anyway, good discussion.  There will never be an answer.  Great film.

[Vauxhall]

Anyway, good discussion.  There will never be an answer.  Great film.

 

Agreed. 

[thecasinoroyale]

On my 4th viewing I remembered this topic so watched for what I could, and noticed on Q's laptop it read "toxicology report", and brought up the autopsy for Le Chiffre, Silva and Greene and DNA from Mr White during his interrogation.

So I guess it's the ring material itself found on each men that matches Sciarra's SPECTRE ring, confirming it's the same metal and same organisation using it.

Tying it to Oberhauser, I guess...I'm not sure how they've done that without any DNA from Oberhauser's body. Still, that's the only bit I don't get. I'll buy the MI6 toxicology link from the rings metal.

[Shrublands]

Post error

[Professor Pi]

As a MacGuffin, it works for me.  It works as a symbolic tie more than any logic (and there are far larger logic loopholes in this and SF.)

 

I always suspected Silva was contracted by Quantum (now SPECTRE) to do some geopolitical dirty work.  But Raoul also did his own "secret missions", probably tired of swapping orders from MI6 to those from SPECTRE.

 

That Q brings a DNA analysis scope with his laptop and does all this "labwork" on a gondola seems far fetched as well.

[RMc2]

I watched out for this again when watching it this weekend, and from what I could tell:

 

- Yep, it's the Zirconium found on Silva, Le Chiffre, Mr White and Greene(?) that ties them together, i.e. they all wore similar rings

 

- somehow Oberhauser's DNA comes up and they're connected.

 

I really couldn't catch the Oberhauser connection. I guess they'd have his DNA from the crime reports on his skiing 'accident' 20 years ago (a stretch, but I'll take it), but he can't have been wearing a Zirconium ring because that was before SPECTRE. My best guess is Oberhauser's DNA is on file from 20 years ago, and it turns up on the ring because he gave it to Sciarra.

[deth]

I watched out for this again when watching it this weekend, and from what I could tell:

 

- Yep, it's the Zirconium found on Silva, Le Chiffre, Mr White and Greene(?) that ties them together, i.e. they all wore similar rings

 

 

 

Except...

Silva didn't wear a ring, Mr. White didn't wear a ring, Le Chiffre didn't wear a ring, and neither did Greene.

[Solex Agitator]

Why did Bond rip the ring from Sciarra's finger in the first place? How did he know to do this? It seemed a bit random and plot convenient. This is one of the very few things that puzzled (read: did not like) in SPECTRE. Please know that I enjoyed the film very much.

 

The analysis of the ring and its DNA ties to past adversaries did not bother me. It did not bother me from a science or plot perspective.

 

Wearing a SPECTRE ring (in light of the obvious detection of doing so in THUNDERBALL) in this day in age might be reserved solely for identification at special meetings. Perhaps his is why we never saw Le Chiffre, Greene, and Silva wearing their rings. Perhaps Sciarra was wearing it for his special stadium meeting in Mexico City.

 

Bond had trouble because "Mickey Mouse" was not the password.  It was "Fidelio." And that, my friends, I state in jest.

Edited by Solex Agitator, 10 November 2015 - 04:53 AM.

[Vauxhall]

It wasn't massively clear, but I think Sciarra showed the ring as a form of greeting when he arrived at the meeting in Mexico - and Bond noticed.

[Jim]

Person who wears it for the longest time is Bond so it suggested to me that he had the DNA of those other folks all over his hands. The dirty monkey.

[bonds_walther]

Why did Bond rip the ring from Sciarra's finger in the first place? How did he know to do this? It seemed a bit random and plot convenient. This is one of the very few things that puzzled (read: did not like) in SPECTRE. Please know that I enjoyed the film very much.

The analysis of the ring and its DNA ties to past adversaries did not bother me. It did not bother me from a science or plot perspective.

Wearing a SPECTRE ring (in light of the obvious detection of doing so in THUNDERBALL) in this day in age might be reserved solely for identification at special meetings. Perhaps his is why we never saw Le Chiffre, Greene, and Silva wearing their rings. Perhaps Sciarra was wearing it for his special stadium meeting in Mexico City.

Bond had trouble because "Mickey Mouse" was not the password. It was "Fidelio." And that, my friends, I state in jest.

Vauxhall is correct. Sciarra holds up his hand to show the ring when he greets the other fellow in the Mexico City hotel room, while Bond observes from outside.

[RMc2]

Another question:

 

Isn't Le Chiffre an independent operator?

 

Mr White tells Obanno that all his "organisation" can guarantee is a meeting with Le Chiffre. Le Chiffre also seems pretty happy to go into U.S. or British custody (although this is said as part of his torturing of Bond). Doesn't seem like a SPECTRE member to me.

[Solex Agitator]

 

Why did Bond rip the ring from Sciarra's finger in the first place? How did he know to do this? It seemed a bit random and plot convenient. This is one of the very few things that puzzled (read: did not like) in SPECTRE. Please know that I enjoyed the film very much.

The analysis of the ring and its DNA ties to past adversaries did not bother me. It did not bother me from a science or plot perspective.

Wearing a SPECTRE ring (in light of the obvious detection of doing so in THUNDERBALL) in this day in age might be reserved solely for identification at special meetings. Perhaps his is why we never saw Le Chiffre, Greene, and Silva wearing their rings. Perhaps Sciarra was wearing it for his special stadium meeting in Mexico City.

Bond had trouble because "Mickey Mouse" was not the password. It was "Fidelio." And that, my friends, I state in jest.

Vauxhall is correct. Sciarra holds up his hand to show the ring when he greets the other fellow in the Mexico City hotel room, while Bond observes from outside.

 

 

Thank you for clearing this up. I missed that subtlety. I will definitely look for this upon viewing the film again.

[S K Y F A L L]

I thought maybe when Q was analyzing the ring that perhaps it was also a digital storage device.

[Simon]

The Sam Mendes interview with Empire magazine clears up the method of sussing the clues from the ring.

 

Not DNA, but a toxicology report finding traces of the ring's ingredients in a Sciarra and a variety of other people Bond has killed.  That is the link.  Makes sense now.

[dtuba]

Maybe SPECTRE is a fight club and they all punched each other with all their ring hands. Ergo, blood and/or sweat transmitted the DNA.

 

What? It could happen!

[DavidSomerset]

This explains the ring and much more...

http://www.empireonl...s-know-spectre/

copy/paste:

"Initially, he’s analysing fingerprints and DNA from fingerprints, but then it’s toxicology reports. He’s analysing post-mortems of various dead bodies, and finding traces of a very rare substance - Ridium, I believe it’s called - in all the corpses of people that Bond has been involved with over the last three. They’ve all worn the rings at some point. That is the thing that makes him convinced they’re all linked. You can’t tell that unless you freeze-frame on those graphics, but it does make sense.

What’s interesting is that one of the things you realise is it’s one of the things the audience already knows is in the movie. The audience knows Oberhauser is still alive so there’s no sense in spending time watching Q discover that Oberhauser is still alive. You just have to believe that he knows how to do that, and that he’s found the solution. I feel you see just enough to believe it."

[RMc2]

Still doesn't explain how they got Oberhauser's DNA... 

 

Hehe, nice one, dtuba!

[Name]

I saw the movie twice, and this particular plot point: Q finds the DNA of every major villain Bond has faced on the SPECTRE ring he took in Mexico City, makes zero sense. How would this ring get passed around so much? How do they have all this information on file? I understand Q needed a reason to trust Bond's judgement at this point in the film, but this seemed like the wrong way to go about it. The scene only serves to repeat exposition we get later on from Blofeld anyway. 

 

The other weird thing is: why haven't they come across this symbol before if the members of the organization are so brazen about it?

Edited by Name, 25 December 2015 - 01:40 PM.

[rubixcub]

After just watching it a 2nd time, it seemed less that he found all their DNA on the ring, but that one thing seemed to lead to another -- DNA, autopsy reports, and other bits of information (perhaps searching intelligence files for that symbol, clarification of which was withheld from us) ended up linking all those parties to Blofeld.

 

I'd probably need to see it a 3rd time, this time on DVD, and pause it at the appropriate part to unpack all the things that Q is doing when analyzing the ring.

 

Dave

[Vauxhall]

Topics merged.

[Professor Pi]

When watching it a third time I paid particular attention to Q's computer screen (anyone else notice he's on gondola #7?!)  It's not the DNA that links them, but traces of some substance called "ridium" or "reitide" (google searches yielded nothing, so maybe it's a fictional element or I misspelled it.)  This would make sense as they'd have done autopsies on Sylva, Greene, and Le Chiffre.  But it doesn't make sense in that they would not have done an autopsy on Sciara (Bond being in Mexico unofficially), unless the Mexican government did it and shared the data.  But Oberhauser?  Even the newspaper article covering the avalanche says Franz' body is missing.  So how Q has this information on his computer is somewhat baffling.  Though I'm still okay with the ring as a plot device linking the villains.  However, I do think Sylva went rogue from even SPECTRE to do his own thing.

[Navy007Fan]

I think the substance everyone is talking about is Iridium, a metal found in high abundance in meteorites.

[ggl]

Zr: Zirconium

 

[Navy007Fan]

Another element found in high quantities in meteorites, good catch!

[sharpshooter]

Another element found in high quantities in meteorites, good catch!

Very interesting. My mind instantly goes to the meteorite sequence at Blofeld's desert lair.

[DaveBond21]

 

Another element found in high quantities in meteorites, good catch!

Very interesting. My mind instantly goes to the meteorite sequence at Blofeld's desert lair.

 

 

All SPECTRE members have to rub the meteorite for luck before their missions.

 

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

[bonds_walther]

Alright. Got the Blu-Ray. Decided I'd pause it during the scenes where Q analysed the ring. Here's what I've got:

Q finds three prints on the ring - Sciarra, White and a partial unknown print.
He analyses the unknown partial print and finds an unknown organic compound in it.
This compound turns out to be reidite (which, after a Google search, is a compound only found in certain impact craters on Earth).
The same compound, reidite, is also found in the toxicology reports of Silva, Le Chiffre, Greene and Sciarra.

Back in the hotel room with Bond and Swann, Q's computer screen reveals the unknown partial print belongs to Franz Oberhauser.

Alas, it's not the case that they all wore the same ring. In fact, we know White touched it in the film so it makes sense that the other two prints would belong to Sciarra and Oberhauser. The leader of SPECTRE handing it out to one of his members.

And if this compound reidite is super-rare, then it's not a massive leap to assume that everyone who has a trace of it is connected. What is a leap though is the fact that we don't know about the crater or the meteorite until much later in the film. Doh!

Edited by bonds_walther, 26 February 2016 - 03:41 PM.

[RMc2]

Alright. Got the Blu-Ray. Decided I'd pause it during the scenes where Q analysed the ring. Here's what I've got:

Q finds three prints on the ring - Sciarra, White and a partial unknown print.
He analyses the unknown partial print and finds an unknown organic compound in it.
This compound turns out to be reidite (which, after a Google search, is a compound only found in certain impact craters on Earth).
The same compound, reidite, is also found in the toxicology reports of Silva, Le Chiffre, Greene and Sciarra.

Back in the hotel room with Bond and Swann, Q's computer screen reveals the unknown partial print belongs to Franz Oberhauser.

 

That's some nice detective work!

 

Doesn't Q's computer also say 'DNA Match' under Oberhauser's picture? Where's that from?

[bonds_walther]

Alright. Got the Blu-Ray. Decided I'd pause it during the scenes where Q analysed the ring. Here's what I've got:

Q finds three prints on the ring - Sciarra, White and a partial unknown print.
He analyses the unknown partial print and finds an unknown organic compound in it.
This compound turns out to be reidite (which, after a Google search, is a compound only found in certain impact craters on Earth).
The same compound, reidite, is also found in the toxicology reports of Silva, Le Chiffre, Greene and Sciarra.

Back in the hotel room with Bond and Swann, Q's computer screen reveals the unknown partial print belongs to Franz Oberhauser.

That's some nice detective work!

Doesn't Q's computer also say 'DNA Match' under Oberhauser's picture? Where's that from?

The fingerprint I presume.