The Hot Button Topics For James Bond Fans Right Now

Just thought I'd do a quick match report here, had some interesting Bondian chats around the bonfire over the weekend at Licence to Grill 2. And some of them even spiraled into the early hours, especially as it got a little, heated pardon the pun. 

There was some very passionate chat around the subject of Should James Bond Be Black, Should James be a Woman? As the discussion unfolded, I realised even some of the logic I was holding onto was being probed, and maybe even had some cracks in it. I'll get onto that in a second.

Now the biggest question I was asked, the most common question. Who will be the next James Bond?

When I said, when I repeated many times, nothing official has been announced, but Aaron Taylor Johnson has been heavily linked. And I believe he will be the next James Bond. He has the right kind of profile, he's a good age, he is not a household name yet.

When people asked what had he been in, I said Kick Ass, Nowhere Boy, Bullet Train, but outside of that, even I was struggling to come up with anything from his filmography. So what I found interesting was many people had not heard of him, nor had seen him in any films. I guess that's partly because it was a slightly older crowd. 

What about James Norton 

One friend said to me, you know I saw a play the other day, called A Little Life, and it had James Norton in it. He was on stage for 2.5 hours and he was amazing.

We got some photos out of James Norton, and we passed those around. Then we pulled up some photos of Aaron Taylor Johnson and passed those around. And the reaction was quite surprising. I would say most people found James Norton to be better looking. Some even said Aaron Taylor Johnson was almost too good looking for the role.

Now is it problematic if the actor is too good looking to play Bond? Well it wasn't a problem for Pierce, wasn't a problem for Roger.

Two interesting points

Barbara Broccoli loves the theatre. I know because I once met her and spoke to her at a performance of Man de Manche in the west end which starred Nicholas Lyndhurst and Kelsey Grammar. Which I'm guessing was the genesis of why Nicolas Lyndhurst found his way into the new Frasier series.

Now Connery, Craig, and of course Dalton all did theatre. Johnson has done some theatre, but not in a long time.

Interestingly, someone who is not being talked about right now is Matt Smith who most of you might know from The Crown and Dr Who. Although I've long thought he's not handsome enough to play Bond, but he does a Bond cruel look to him. Maybe almost a period look to him, if they were to go back and do period Bond, not a bad shout. He's not a million miles of a Hoagie Carmichael who Vesper describes Bond as in the novel Casino Royale.

HAS BOND GONE TOO WOKE

Boy did we go round the houses on this one. Until the early morning.

My position is, that I just want the best man for the job. I don't think we need to go out and find a black actor to play Bond, just because we've had a white Bond for 60 years. But I do think it has to be a man.

Now when I got pressed on why should Bond be a man, my reflex answer is because I want to see my Bond womanise. Use his power of seduction, to infiltrate whatever, the scheme, the villains lair, and the response I got back was;

"Can a woman not use her powers of seduction?"

Which of course is true, we already see that with a lot of Bond girls, Xenia Onatopp, I'll see you in Miami girl, and of course the ultimate, Rosika Miklos in The Living Daylights. 

Now should Bond be Black when Fleming wrote him white? That to me is too fundamentalist. If you're taking everything that Fleming wrote as gospel, then you'll never move Bond into the modern day. And plus who the hell cares really what colour Bond is, so long as he can kick ass.

Now I've had a further thought on why Bond shouldn't be a woman. And its purely based on nothing more than my own personal selfishness. When I watch Bond, I get to live vicariously through Bond as a man. I get to see him get the girl, get all the girls, I get to supplant myself into that body and do all the amazing Bond things. I don't see myself being able to aspire to that, if a female is playing the role of James Bond.

Also, we all got a soft launch shall we say, as we saw Nomi be 007 in No Time To Die. Now I think Lashana Lynch was very good in doing what she had to do. I feel like she kicked sufficient ass. I actually really liked her competitive streak. But would I be interested in seeing a spin off with her as 007 ? I'd watch it of course, but then I watched Road to a Million. Well at least one episode.

Overall

Overall. I don't think Bond has gone woke. I do think Bond 26 should just concentrate on having a better plot and being more creative in their set pieces. No Time to Die suffered from a real lack of creativity when it came to the set pieces. Whatever happened to Bond driving off a car ramp, on top of a moving bus, through a barrier, getting the car smashed in half. I miss that style of Bond, the creativity part.

Anyway, these are just some of the hot button topics that were spoken around the firepit. And believe me, it got quite hot at times. But that’s what a whole day of drinking can do. And people are passionate about their Bond, I know I am.

Photo by Sviatoslav Ilin on UUnsplash