retiring Q and sacking Miss Moneypenny
Lexi
LondonPosts: 3,000MI6 Agent
This has just appeared on the glory that is the interweb....
http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/entertainment/bond-producers-pension-off-q-miss-moneypenny_10016192.html
What do you think? Are they really going to get rid of these iconic figures? (seems a bit of a shame really, but I guess if they really are going in a new direction, then changes must happen) What do you all think?
http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/entertainment/bond-producers-pension-off-q-miss-moneypenny_10016192.html
What do you think? Are they really going to get rid of these iconic figures? (seems a bit of a shame really, but I guess if they really are going in a new direction, then changes must happen) What do you all think?
She's worth whatever chaos she brings to the table and you know it. ~ Mark Anthony
Comments
Who are these "many people"? ?:)
The characters have their place in the series. That certainly doesn't grant them the 'right' to be in every film, but I don't believe the characters have outlived their usefulness.
Put me down as one of them. Don't get me wrong -- I enjoyed them the first time I saw them, but by Moonraker, they were best seen on videocassette. And once was enough. I just think it's a shame they wasted so many good novels on such lightweight fare.
If by some sick, twisted farce that this is true, I don't know how much longer I will be watching the new 007 films. If the producers really think these iconic Fleming creations are "ghosts of the past", then I am just sad. They are institutions that are timeless and the fact that they can now be re-casted again makes them all the more interesting. I would love to see another actor's take on the role of Q. Desmond is the Sean Connery of Q. Just because he is gone does not mean we can't have more good ones.
I didn't like the crack on Sir Roger either. Had that man not taken in the role of 007, it is likely Babs would still be doing assistant director work for some crappy film production company and Mickey would actually be using his engineering degree making far less money. I'm not even sure if Cubby himself could have kept Bond going so long in the 1970s without someone like Moore. I find it highly unlikely that another actor would have had the intelligence, much less the talent, to create their own style and not rip off Sean's style. Roger made 007 his own. And that worked. Period.
"Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater". I love that quote. If EON understands that, perhaps I can continue to watch new 007 films.
Surely they would have said if they were officially "sacked" by now.
It seems that they are simply not using them for this film.....
Your memeory is fine. Wilson implied they would return at some point, but not in QoS. This article is the usual speculation we get during the filming of a Bond movie. Personally I am looking forward to my favourite made-up story that always appears during filming, that Sean Connery makes a cameo appearance.
You're preaching to the choir here Double H. I am in 100% agreement with you. The 'Cookie Cutter' Bond films were good for their time, but sticking to a closer translation to some of the novels would have made for some truly great films. "Live and Let Die" done with the majority of the novel's bits would have been far more enjoyable story -especially the ending.
After posting I went back to the site and have to agree that the other articles on there are all stories that turned out to be untrue, so I'm hoping like all of you that this is just another "rumour" or misinformation that we see on a daily basis.
I take it Cleese was a mistake in casting for Q? (although I thought he injected some humour into the movies, but sadly perhaps in the wrong place?) As someone who has not read (cowering in the corner with her hands over her head waiting for a right beating) any of the books I take it Q was never meant to be so farsical, and perhaps this is why they are giving Q a rest for a couple of films, so that they can re-introduce him as he was meant? Just a thought.
Thanks for encouraging me, Smoke13. Being an old crank, I periodically agitate for remakes and I'm about due, so here goes: I didn't mean just to pick on Roger Moore. I'm re-reading You Only Live Twice, and it just kills me to think what a terrific film that one would have made ... and I haven't even gotten to the swordfight and Bond's amnesia. Just think what a modern art director and Hollywood magic could do with something as creepy as the castle and the Garden of Death; And of course, you'd have to follow that with the sequel, with Bond's brainwashing and attempt on M's life and last-chance-at-redemption mission against The Man with the Golden Gun. But why torture myself? By the time that happens, if it happens at all, some nursing home orderly will be wiping the drool off my chin as I stare blankly at the screen ...
Having been a Bond Novel Enthusiast since the day I first picked up FRWL, my main gripe with the producers has always been their willingness to toss Fleming's novels into the ash heap, and replace them with something out of the cat box!
Q and Moneypenny were sadly misused as comic relief, and abused in that role as well. I would not object to Moneypenny's return as a desireable, but very professional secretary to M. What they did with Moneypenny in the PB era was offensive - especially her using the "holodeck" ... it was tasteless!
"Q" was never a book charecter, and I don't miss him or his tinkertoys. He should be replaced by nameless fellows like the chap who stuck Bond with the tracking device in CR'06.
But in the long run, both will be back - but only after the producers have gone off the current "formula". I give it two more films max!
Bond’s Beretta
The Handguns of Ian Fleming's James Bond
That's a good point, and a great reason for doing them as period dramas, not something I've been much of an advocate for before, but why not? And definitely go the whole hog and use the titles. Remakes happen all the time in Hollywood, not always to good effect, but I think more faithful remakes of the Bond films would be fun and original enough, while not necessarily supplanting the original versions. The series is 40 years old. It's ripe.
This of course does not excuse Q and Moneypenny accompanying M, Bond, and Tibbet to the horse race to spy on Zorin, nor Q's appearance in a Winnebago outside Stacy Sutton's home, but I think it's a small example of how Q can be used without shoe-horning him into the script. Sometimes supplementary characters are needed, like Fanning in OP because M or Q or the Minister of Defence are not going to be experts in every field, and thus it adds to the 'believability'. I feel that it is perfectly acceptable, however, to think that in MI6, there's a collective group of individuals who are trusted and knowledgeable and are consistently relied upon to discuss mission details.
Boothroyd admittedly evolved from an 'armourer' into a 'gadget man', but I think it would be refreshing to see Bond having a conversation with 'Q' as an expert in Bond's weaponry.
Not to mention how the technology can all of a sudden take a 40-year regression...
Perhaps I'm missing something but I didn't think that these movies took place before the others. It's a reboot which means it's like an entirely different series entirely unrelated to the others. Just like Batman Begins. This is what I've always heard abou the reboot thing but I don't think that the producers have really come out and given a definitive statement about what they are planning to do with the reboot.
I don't expect to see Q or Moneypenny while Craig is Bond, simply because they're not needed to make a Bond film, as EON is currently proving. They would fit much better in a hoped-for but never-gonna-happen period Bond. I can see EON bringing them back at some point, but I expect when they do they'll be broadly reinterpreted, as I don't see EON looking to ride the Bond-cliche bandwagon anytime soon, they're having too much fun and success doing what they're doing.
Where's Lola Personaby? Mary Goodnight had more work in the novels.
And what about Bill Tanner - he made very few movies, but hey - here he is in Quantum of Solace!
As for the characters, if I cant have Desmond or Lois, I dont know if I want them. Seeing Bond flirt with newer Moneypenny's felt disloyal to her memory. And that scene where John Cleese was being Q - whoa, it felt like it was too soon!
More screen time for M.
What a dope!
BTW...I am all for brining back both characters. Tradition!!