I really never know how to start these posts; I don’t even what to call them. Whether reviews, or articles, or essays, I really have no idea but I’m glad I write them. They help me think, help me talk, help me concentrate, and help me feel some small comfort in one or two people’s validation. Alright now that that heartfelt monologue is out of the way, let’s get straight into the meat and potatoes of today’s movie article. This is something I always wanted to talk about for a long ass time and I am so glad I’m finally getting the opportunity to put it out on the hive platform for millions of you to go through and tear me down to pieces. Hurray the internet.
There will be cursing in this post so please bear with me and also 
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Today we (and when I say “we” I am referring to my body soul and spirit and you reading this in deep space) are going to talking about the James bond franchise, looking at it from a bird’s eye view, a critical view, a fan boy view, basically what I’m trying to say is we are going to be looking at these movies quite thoroughly and we will be looking at all of the changes and iterations of the pop icon, why it is one of the most memorable movie franchises in the world and why his character is one of the most iconic in pop culture.
The James bond franchise is the fourth highest-grossing movie franchise in the world bested only by the big three, the marvel cinematic universe, the star wars franchise and wizardry world the people responsible for adapting J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and Fantastic beasts (which reminds me I am supposed to write an article on that soon). The movies were based off of Ian Flemings’ James Bond spy novels which were published in the 1950s and the 1960s. The adaptation rights for the novels were sold to Eon productions who remain the sole distributors of all James Bond movies till date. The series has spanned across twenty five movies all about the adventures of British secret agent, James Bond alias as 007 (double-O-seven) whose character has been played by the likes of the late Sir Sean Connery, the late David Niven, Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan and most recently by Daniel Craig.
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See the first ever James Bond film I ever saw a was Die another day released in 2002 starring Pierce Brosnan in the lead role as well as the likes of other stand out actors and actresses Judi Dench who played the titular M, Rosamond Pike as Miranda Frost and of course the stunning Halle Berry as the bond girl Giacinta “Jinx” Johnson (now mind you 2002 Halle Berry was already most beautiful woman on the palnet gorgeous so yeah, you couldn’t be more afro latina than that name “Giacinta”). I remember seeing this film and being stunned and in awe of the action, drama, thrills and the razzmatazz of it all. I loved every single part of it and mind you I saw this film sometime in 2006/07 I believe. I was only about 9 or 10 years old at the time and I was in complete awe of what I believed was this cinematic masterpiece. Finally here was a body of work that was not boring poorly scripted over dramatized Nigerian home drama and, or an international drama tragedy I couldn’t necessarily understand or relate with. This ohh this, well this was action, thrills, effects, guns and explosion and most importantly, this was a story with a simple objective with “a well written competent hero” who could get us the audience from point A to point B, little drama, crazy vfx, no stress. This was magical, this was perfection. And thus began my long obsession with the James Bond franchise and the titular 007 movies. I finally had the opportunity to see some of the rest of the other James Bond movies preceding this one and they all left this lasting satisfying impression in me. I would end them, feeling absolutely hyped up and ready to go save the world, imagining myself as the renowned spy beating up bad guys and saving the damsels. That was until 2009. When everything changed and I meet the new guy on the block, the one whom I considered “The imposter”
So the year is 2006, it’s been four years since we last James Bond in the big screen. Where has our on screen hero gone, where is our last action hero, our symbol of epic awesomeness and utter sexiness, Where is my James Bond? (Yep I’m going to make that the title of this article).
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Of course at the time little boy me failed to realize that Pierce Brosnan had stepped down from being the character and Daniel Craig was chosen as his replacement. Of course I had no idea about these things I had no internet or mobile phone then all I had was local TV stations and if you’re Nigerian and you’ve ever watched the NTA, you would quickly realize that your country’s affairs are more important than who plays the new bond. Fast forward to 2010 me seeing Casino Royale for the first time. I had a lot of expectation, a lot of hype going into that film. Here I was expecting the biggest, best, most cinematic, most enthralling James Bond film I had ever seen, mind you this was me seeing the newest iteration of the character at the time after I had being able to catch up with most of the other films in the franchise all thanks to my dad having for me and this collection of pirated Bond movies back in the day. Then the credits rolled and I had no fucking clue what I just watched. I did not know what to feel about what I had just watched. What, Who, WHHYYY? Those were all I felt after seeing the film. This was my first time seeing Daniel Craig’s first outing as James Bond and it was in my opinion then, “the worst James Bond movie I had ever seen”. Where was it, where did it all go? The razzmatazz and the glamour, the exploding cars and the cool gadgets, the over the top villain and his world ending device of doom which we are supposed to see wipe off an island from the face of the earth, the beautiful, fierce bond girl who fights by his side with her impressive karate skills to bedazzle us. Where is the glamour, where is the pizazz, who the fuck is this guy? Where is my James Bond? Three and a half films later and I still find myself asking these same questions. Where did my beloved boyhood hero James Bond go and who is this “imposter” I see trying hard to impress me. Why can’t I just like Daniel Craig’s iteration of this character no matter how hard I try? After thinking long and hard for over 11 years, watching YouTube videos, going through Mission Impossible 4, 5 & 6 again as well as Skyfall and Spectre all for the purpose of “research”, I think I found some answers. So now let’s talk about what I found while looking for my beloved Mr. Bond
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1.James Bond VS Nerfed Bond
Honestly I had an issue coming up with this title for this first heading so depending what I finally choose to stick with, tell me please bear with me. Where was I? Right Old Bond vs New Bond. Like I said earlier, certain features about Pierce Brosnan portrayal of James Bond caught my boyhood eyes when I first saw him on screen. Three minutes into the film, I had a good idea of who this guy was and why I was to root for him, he was charming, handsome, efficient, pragmatic, eloquent, virile, everything thing the perfect man could be. He was who all the men wanted to be, and who all the women wanted to be with. There wasn’t a sticky situation Bond couldn’t get himself out of, and even when by common sense he couldn’t possibly be able to get out of them, he had plot amour by his side. Now this didn’t mean he didn’t have his flaws, he was built with some of them in mind. He was over confident, brash, he had serious problem with women, some people even consider him a misogynist (I do not), he was “a shoot first ask questions later” kind of guy and all this did get him into trouble several times but like I said he had plot amour to save him every single time. He was the British Chuck Norris; he was spy Bruce Lee, the “real life” version of batman and guess what? we loved him that way. Those were the qualities that drew us to him the things that made us fan boys adore him. He was our symbol of peak manhood; he was our icon of “truth”. He represented the fantasy that one could be responsible when he wanted too and irresponsible when he wanted too and still get what he wanted, the perfect representation of the work hard play hard mentality and we liked him that way, because He was our perfect fantasy, our escape from reality. Then along came Daniel Craig and the new set of producers who took all that James bond represented and they tried to change him into something else, something we couldn’t recognize, and something we didn’t know him as, like I call him, an “Imposter”. All of a sudden James didn’t have all the answers to the questions, James wasn’t one step ahead of the villain he was one step behind, he could still fight and do karate chops but he would get beat up several times before he would final manage to get back up. All of a sudden James bond didn’t have a lot of plot amour on his side, He was losing what made him special to me. The most annoying part watching James get nerfed wasn’t seeing James lose or get beat up; it was seeing James lose to people who he would previously easily wipe the floor with. All of a sudden James Bond started getting old and that didn’t make sense to me because the James Bond was never a continuity project from all previous movies I saw. He was a never aging, ever glamorous agent who always got the job done; remember this is “real life” batman we are talking about here. However I discovered later on YouTube (big thanks to Cine Fix – IGN movies and TV) that new iteration of Bond films played the character having continuity in mind and it didn’t just make sense because to do that effectively, you would need one face, one name and one chronological story centered on this character and most importantly no legal battles for the rights of characters (yes apparently they had legal issues with getting the rights to some characters) you already had introduced bond as a symbol, rather than a story there is no need to make him into something more or something he isn’t just stick to it. The new writers of 2006’s Casino Royale had other plans in mind. They wanted to have Bond’s character in continuity while trying to incorporate the previous Bond iterations into the continuity but of course this didn’t go well as the previous Bond films were not released in chronological order So that just ended really badly for them. Craig’s iteration of the character tried to be Bond and tried not to be Bond; in the end he just ended being an “Imposter”
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2.New Tone? Same Bond? Why? Just, Why?
Another thing that really changed in the new iteration of the films was the tone. Previous James Bond films had a certain comical tone to them. They weren’t meant to be taken too seriously I mean, car submarines and space vessels swallowing up other space vessels, that’s so comic sci fi shit right there. It was comical, it was whimsical, and it was great. It was the 1970s but it was clear what Bond films were supposed to be. Like we said previously he was a symbol, for the perfect “guy dude” and using comedy as a medium, he was portrayed this way. The bond films were never a serious dramatic affair. They had over ambitious villainous characters with plans to still all the money from the world-bank. They had villains stealing space ships from space (that space vessel eating up other space vessels kind of shit), rays that could shrink people to the size of molecules and other ridiculous stuff and people loved it that way. It was what we came for; it was what we were promised and it was what we got. We were given scenes that were out of the ordinary, larger than life, in order for us to forget about our own real life issues. The James Bond Franchise was a FANTASY and we all knew this, as well as loved it. It was our fantasy. It was this way until 2006 casino royale and from there on we could tell something was wrong. The over ambition larger than life villains were no were to be found, James was so serious and focused and yet he was getting his ass kicked by low level guys. It all seemed so weird his seriousness. This change in tone didn’t just happen in 2006s Casino Royale alone but in the other Bond films that followed as well and like I said, it was a strange to see because to be frank, it didn’t make it all the more enjoyable to watch. All of a sudden the new writers thought it would be a great idea to tone down the comic relief moments and tone up the drama and the tension, without really increasing the stakes and dread and that just creates problems for your story. Your story becomes inconsistent missing some key things the audience wouldn’t be able to place their hands on. Which bring me to my third and final problem (technically there are more but it would be a long read)
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3.An Inconsistent story aka what the f**k is even going? Who are these Sons of…. and why should I care?
The last problem I discovered when looking through the new iterations of the franchise, ironically, it was the first on my list, is the problem of an inconsistent story as I mentioned in the last sub heading. This problem I believe is heavily tied to the first two problems earlier stated. When you try to change the core attributes of a character, try to make him what he traditionally wasn’t. When you change the general tone and pace of a film to try to create a different kind of story, one you think would resonate more with modern day audiences, when you ride the wave of a previously established character and you fail to deliver that same character you promised to an audience, you end up this. An inconsistent character and an inconsistent character, creates an inconsistent story. To explain this, let’s talk about another popular spy pop icon superstar, Ethan Hunt aka American Hollywood Spy Bruce Lee, Chris Shrma (a lot of you aren’t going to get that last reference but search google and find out who he is, it’ll will make more sense to you) guy from Mission Impossible. The movie franchise was established to be one thing, American Hollywood spy guy kicking some bad guy’s butts, looking cool at it, while trying to save the world from burning to ashes due to some psycho villains’ plans with a bit of vfx, razzmatazz and pizzazz. All through-out Mission Impossible Ethan Hunt remains true to his character and because of this he stays true to the story. The story doesn’t change it stays the same because Ethan Hunt doesn’t change. The characters around Ethan Hunt don’t change because the story doesn’t change and if Ethan Hunt were to ever change, then we would see the events which lead to a change in Ethan and we would say that he has experienced a full character arc. Because of this we know what we are going to get every time we go to see a Mission Impossible movie, we know what we are going to get and we like it, we have accepted it. Ethan Hunt doesn’t just start doing things he wouldn’t normally do, he doesn’t just start making decisions that are unlike him, he doesn’t start changing the story due to something that happened of screen or because some writer wanted him to represent something else because his actions are what directly move to story to its final destination (no logs intended). In short, an orange is supposed to taste like an orange. If an orange starts tasting like something else, it’s would no longer be an orange, it would be called something else maybe a mango, or a chocolate, or a mango chocolaty orange glazed in vanilla (that would be delicious). Look my point is creating a main character that’s consistent gives a story that’s consistent because the main characters actions are driven by his consistency and his actions drive the story as well as the story’s consistency. If something is to make the main character change, it must be so something we see and experience happen to him, not happening of screen, like James Bond getting recruited in one film and seeing him being called out from retirement in the next, when he is the main character, that shit don’t make no sense. Nuff said
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There’s a lot more things I would have loved to talk about but here’s three thousand words and it’s a long read so I will end it here. Please give an upvote and comment your thoughts on the topic down below and as the late King would always say, Excelsior.
