Why Bond Getting Chipped Stinks!
bigzilcho
Toronto, ONPosts: 245MI6 Agent
Greetings, fellow Bond fans.
Am I the only one in the audience who cringed at the scene where Bond is implanted with a chip?
Make no mistake about it...the chip is on the horizon...and the powers-that-be (SPECTRE perhaps?) will very slyly integrate chip propoganda into the very fabric of popular cuture. Like Bond, for instance.
Paranoia? Of course.
But consider this: I am of the opinion that Bond is the last true individual in popular fiction. The rugged individual is the hero we want...and Bond is IMO the best hero we got.
It goes against EVERYTHING that James Bond stands for to be chipped.
Ian Fleming would break his cigarette holder in two at the prospect.
But then again, we are in the 21st century...times will change...implantable chips will become cool.
One reason? Check out CR...Bond says not a word of protest. Can you imagine Sean or Roger getting chipped? Unthinkable!
007 may be a blunt instrument... but he is not a machine.
So lets not have anymore of this chip nonsense, shall we?
"Yes...considerably."
Am I the only one in the audience who cringed at the scene where Bond is implanted with a chip?
Make no mistake about it...the chip is on the horizon...and the powers-that-be (SPECTRE perhaps?) will very slyly integrate chip propoganda into the very fabric of popular cuture. Like Bond, for instance.
Paranoia? Of course.
But consider this: I am of the opinion that Bond is the last true individual in popular fiction. The rugged individual is the hero we want...and Bond is IMO the best hero we got.
It goes against EVERYTHING that James Bond stands for to be chipped.
Ian Fleming would break his cigarette holder in two at the prospect.
But then again, we are in the 21st century...times will change...implantable chips will become cool.
One reason? Check out CR...Bond says not a word of protest. Can you imagine Sean or Roger getting chipped? Unthinkable!
007 may be a blunt instrument... but he is not a machine.
So lets not have anymore of this chip nonsense, shall we?
"Yes...considerably."
Comments
If the gripe is about degrees of technological intrusion, I guess it's a fair cop---still, as CR represents his first '00' mission, it seems reasonable for MI6 to keep tabs on him, particularly since he's just been a bit...improvisational...in Madagascar...
I guess the difference is that Bond himself decides when to activate the tracer in GF---he's enough of a veteran to know when he's in dutch---in CR, as he's a rookie, M takes this initiative herself...
That said, I hope Eon pointedly shows Bond taking pains to escape such direct, immediate accountability in #22...
:007)
"I am not an entrant in the Shakespeare Stakes." - Ian Fleming
"Screw 'em." - Daniel Craig, The Best James Bond EverTM
"World domination. Same old dream."
Re:finding the chip in Bond's arm
If I'm not mistaken (having only seen CR once), Bond commented on the fact that Mathis might have given away details like the presence, and possibly location of, the chip. This happened in the scene on the beach with Vesper on his chest.
The chip was really just there to facilitate the whole poisoning/bio signs/defibrilator nonsense that the story could easily have done without. There was the business with the fellow at MI6 tracking him but that was really more about his relative postion to his query as the dialogue and action tended to suggest HQ weren't actively following him. Agree it shouldn't have been there; blame Purvis and Wade, seems like something they'd insert (no pun intended).
BTW, despite the elaborate implanting device, I would think putting a chip in a person would be little different than putting them in pets or livestock: Subcutaneous for easy retreival. So Le Chiffre's people probably just looked or felt for a bump ... though why they assumed it was there is another matter; seems unlikely Mathis had any reason to know though Vesper might have ("Not to worry about your money, we know just where 007 is at all times ... ").
The chip was simply pointless IMO. Did it really have anything to do with the defibrillator scene? Not really. They already knew where Bond was (he was at the Casino where you sent him, silly M!) and nobody seemed to be paying attention to his vital statistics until he hooked up to the medical equipment. It wasn't used for anything other than to show a fancy piece of briefcase equipment. If the entire idea of the chip was removed from the script, no one would ever have noticed.
I agree it was completely pointless and with the films move away from ridiculously stupid "gadgets". I thought that was edging back to those sort of unrealistic gadgets.
Gosh, I hope you're wrong.
Anyway, I agree with Bigzilcho, that chipping Bond makes him into too much of a machine and takes away his individuality.
It wasn't as if the chip was controlling him, or they gave him the Terminators arm.
I think the chip could have been used better, there are so many uses they could have encorporated into the story. But it was as if the only reason it was in there was for Le Chiffre to find. The ridiculous machine he had to stick his arm through to check it was there was the most laughable thing.