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moviefreakedmind said:

He stayed away from Bibi (the figure skater) in For Your Eyes Only. I always took the Skyfall line as a joke just to f#ck with Javier Bardem. A female Bond would most likely be the most poorly received film in history.

The mere fact of a female Bond would not make the film poorly received (that would all depend on its quality), it would only assure the loudest outcry of butthurt fanboys in history (which might be funny but would probably just be sad and annoying if the new Ghostbusters is anything to go off of).

Tyrphanax said:

Maybe I’m weird, but I feel like James Bond should just remain James Bond and people can make other characters that are what they want them to be.

I agree, to an extent.

It’s sort of a conundrum. Make Bond gay or female and he suddenly becomes a different character (unlike most I’d argue this typically isn’t the case with popular fictional characters, for instance I don’t think making Captain America would change a damn thing about him - his sexuality has never informed his characterization), because Bond’s uber “masculinity” is easily his most definitive trait. So since I enjoy Bond movies and want to keep watching more, I kind of have to agree that I’d prefer James to stay James (don’t know why he can’t be black though, no good argument against that).

I will say it might be a fun subversion and still somewhat believably in character for him to hook up with a guy, but yeah at that point we’re starting to stray from Bond as the ultimate male fantasy (though maybe for the better?). Bond as a woman though is a whole other thing. It’d be completely subversive and totally bad ass. The pinnacle of masculinity… a woman? I’d love to see that. And hence, the conundrum. I’d love to see a really outside the box Bond pic. I know everyone loves these movies because of the formula but COME ON. The best films are the ones that don’t follow that formula to a T, that do something a little different. Put simply, I’d LOVE to see what a female James Bond film would look like (done right, of course). I’d be a different thing, sure. Not a true James Bond film. But is that such a bad thing?

Will it ever happen? Probably not. Should it? I think probably yeah.

Tyrphanax said:

But if you’re making a film where you’ve skewed the main character to the point where it’s no longer a “true James Bond film” what’s the point of making the character James Bond?

A character is a character because they have certain traits and motivations (and this includes things like gender and nationality and down to taste in breakfast foods), the same as I am my own person and you are yours. But once you start tweaking big tentpole character traits, the character ceases to be what they were, and you end up with a new character entirely. Ergo making James Bond a female means that the character is not James Bond anymore, and so you cheapen what could be a decent female-driven action spy film by trying to piggyback it onto the established Bond name. It’s like clickbait or some other questionable practise to drive traffic to your product.

This is a fair point and in most cases I’d agree there’s usually not much motivation behind changes like this (I will say though I am someone with very little regard for source material - when I look at a movie and its characters it’s all about THAT movie and THOSE characters, I don’t think what came before is all that relevant).

However, I think specifically in the case of James Bond, because he is such an icon and total embodiment of society’s ideas of masculinity that I think it would be very interesting to see this character in particular made into a woman. It would be so counter to what Bond is that it would be a truly interesting thing to see and have a conversation about. The reaction to the most male-oriented franchise being suddenly headlined by a woman would be a truly fascinating thing. It’s not about cheap gimmicks or anything like that. In this case, I genuinely think it’d make for a very interesting take on the Bond material (and something that would not be done quite as potently with a new female spy character divorced from the Bond ethos - although we should definitely have more original female super spies!).

Plus you lose the chance at cool crossovers in the future.

Honestly I’m getting kind of tired of crossovers. I’d rather Bond not be the nth franchise to try to be the MCU.

(for the record the new Ghostbusters movie is going to suck because it looks like a terrible film, and it would be just as bad if they kept the same movie and swapped the original cast in)

This is a 100% fair point and the obvious rebuttal to nu-Ghostbusters anti-criticism. I really don’t care about it that much but I will say let’s hold final judgements until it comes out.

They could create a fem 005 or a homosexual 0069 and bring in 007 as a supporting character, as Marvel brings other characters to support the individual hero films. A fem 00 might work if done well. Jolie and Johannsen have paved the way. I doubt I’d see a homosexual 00 if it’s primarily a pandering, identity politics gimmick. It would have to have VERY much to recommend it otherwise.
A homosexual Bond or Captain America would be a homo-militant attack on iconic figures of British and American masculinity.
I’m still recovering from being told we MUST believe allowing every pervy bi-sexual cross-dresser to prance into any Girl’s Locker Room is the most glorious idea ever conceived, or else we’re pure evil and deserve to SUFFER AND DIE!!!

moviefreakedmind said:

I would be butthurt if they made Bond a woman. I wouldn’t see it and I would refuse to watch another one until they returned to “James Bond”.

Fair enough. I think it’d be silly not to watch it on principle alone but I get wanting to stick with tradition.

I don’t necessarily have a problem with a black Bond; I actually think Idris Elba would do a great job with the role, although I think any new Bond should start at an earlier age.

In complete agreement.

The argument is just against the changing of a character for no reason other than identity politics.

This is needlessly dismissive. It’s not just identity politics for the sake of the buzz phrase. The Bond films have always been subtextually talking about masculinity and making a woman the center of that would shift that aspect in some potentially very interesting ways.

EDIT: I would definitely say that’s it’s not for the better to take Bond away from the ultimate male fantasy status that he has. There’s nothing wrong with masculinity.

Bond can never be taken away from the ultimate male fantasy status. That’s who he is (which is why keeping that status and making him a woman would be so interesting!). And I’d say there’s nothing inherently wrong with masculinity but there definitely can be things very wrong with it (things often unfortunately exemplified in Bond films).

Tyrphanax said:

DominicCobb said:

However, I think specifically in the case of James Bond, because is such an icon and total embodiment of society’s ideas of masculinity that I think it would be very interesting to see this character in particular made into a woman. It would be so counter to what Bond is that it would be a truly interesting thing to see and have a conversation about.

I get where you’re coming from here, but my argument is that when you alter one of a character’s most defining traits, you automatically create a new character. So by the very act of switching Bond’s sex, you end up with a character that’s Bond-in-name-only. Kinda like Godzilla '98.

Sort of what I just said, but what’s so interesting about it is not altering his most defining (masculine) traits while changing the thing that most commonly associate with those traits (the male gender). I’m not advocating for a female Bond in name only. I’m advocating for more or less the same character who happens to be female (with of course the little bits and changes that come with that).

Besides, like you said, we can just look at Ghostbusters and know what the reaction would be, and they even have the benefit of being all-new characters. A larger franchise with the main focus on one character and his archetype would probably utterly self-destruct in a very ugly way with a change that polarizing.

I’m sure other established franchises (like Bond) are watching what’s going on with Ghostbusters right now and taking notes.

I look at this as simply an unfortunate truth of modern cinema. I’m not suggesting the next Bond film should have a female Bond. There’s no way that’d happen. I’m just thinking out loud about how cool that might actually be.

moviefreakedmind said:

If they made a movie about Tombraider with a male Laura Croft I would imagine that that franchise’s fans would have an equally WTF reaction.

This is pretty much my point exactly. And they basically did make a male Lara Croft game, they just made it a new character and named him Nathan Drake. Just like Lara was kinda a female Indiana Jones (and with her reboot, the parallels are even moreso). Which is perfectly alright with me, nothing wrong with basing a character on an established character, but we can do better than just a gender swap.

Not arguing against this just saying that in the case of Bond specifically his gender and what that entails is central to the character so keeping those defining aspects while flipping the obvious crux of it on its head would be a very interesting thing (again, in this particular case - for example I see no reason for a female Indiana Jones).

thejediknighthusezni said:

They could create a fem 005 or a homosexual 0069 and bring in 007 as a supporting character, as Marvel brings other characters to support the individual hero films. A fem 00 might work if done well. Jolie and Johannsen have paved the way. I doubt I’d see a homosexual 00 if it’s primarily a pandering, identity politics gimmick. It would have to have VERY much to recommend it otherwise.
A homosexual Bond or Captain America would be a homo-militant attack on iconic figures of British and American masculinity.
I’m still recovering from being told we MUST believe allowing every pervy bi-sexual cross-dresser to prance into any Girl’s Locker Room is the most glorious idea ever conceived, or else we’re pure evil and deserve to SUFFER AND DIE!!!

Yay, the prodigal conspiracy theorist returns.

I wish you and Darth Id would just get into it and cancel each other out.

 I would not watch a black Bond on principle. Again, there is JUST NO WAY to divorce this kind of thing from the element of "Yyyyyeeeeeeaaaaaahhhhhh!!! Now we're really sticking it to whitey!!!!". Why should I pay big money for that?
 Again, they could easily create a 009 and bring in 007 to support. Again, it would have to offer VERY much more than an identity politics gimmick before I'd spend my money on it.

DuracellEnergizer said:

thejediknighthusezni said:

They could create a fem 005 or a homosexual 0069 and bring in 007 as a supporting character, as Marvel brings other characters to support the individual hero films. A fem 00 might work if done well. Jolie and Johannsen have paved the way. I doubt I’d see a homosexual 00 if it’s primarily a pandering, identity politics gimmick. It would have to have VERY much to recommend it otherwise.
A homosexual Bond or Captain America would be a homo-militant attack on iconic figures of British and American masculinity.
I’m still recovering from being told we MUST believe allowing every pervy bi-sexual cross-dresser to prance into any Girl’s Locker Room is the most glorious idea ever conceived, or else we’re pure evil and deserve to SUFFER AND DIE!!!

Yay, the prodigal conspiracy theorist returns.

I wish you and Darth Id would just get into it and cancel each other out.

 Conspiracy FACTS, my friend, conspiracy FACTS.

Tyrphanax said:

I’m totally in agreement that it’s an interesting exploration of a character archetype to conduct, just that it just can’t be done on a specific character because by altering the character in order to conduct the experiment, you’ve altered the character past the point that you’re conducting the experiment on the original character.

Sure. I tend to define “original” character about more loosely (again, don’t have much respect for source material). It sort of depends on the character too. I’d say with a character like Bond it’s hard to really say your altering the character beyond his original characterization considering that was done in a book in the 50s and we’ve had so many various portrayals of him since. I’d argue putting the character in the 21st century or making him as funny as say Roger Moore are changes of roughly close to the same magnitude as changing his gender. But that’s just my opinion, of course.

I will say when I first considered the concept of a female Bond I was very much against it for these same reasons - thinking it’d change the character too much. But after much thinking, I’m not sure that’s entirely true (or, if it is, if it really matters as much as I thought it did).

I may also just be really taking this way overboard because it’s late and I’m punchy, haha

That’s fine. I’d suggest we fight each other but I’m team Iron Man too.

moviefreakedmind said:

DominicCobb said:
And I’d say there’s nothing inherently wrong with masculinity but there definitely can be things very wrong with it (things often unfortunately exemplified in Bond films).

You’ll have to go into more detail with this one. I’m sure that one example will be the very outdated and antiquated portrayal of his seduction of Pussy Galore in Goldfinger, but I’m not sure what else you could be pointing out here.

Pussy Galore was not the only one who was “seduced” in a way that might today be considered something harsher (read: RAPE).

Connery’s Bond (and others to a lesser extent - even Craig has the unfortunate portrayal of Severine in the otherwise excellent Skyfall) in general was fairly misogynistic. I could provide examples but honestly I don’t think this is much debated. There’s a reason M called Bond a dinosaur in GoldenEye.

moviefreakedmind said:

Sure but I think that is also part of his character. His seduction of Severine was insensitive sure, but was part of his mission, and I don’t remember it being portrayed as anything other than cold-hearted too. I wouldn’t say that’s misogynistic.

Unless I’m forgetting something, she’s already got him on the boat to Silva’s hideout when he sneaks into her shower to have sex. The fact that he’s assuming that of course she’ll have sex with him is made all the worse by the fact that one of the only things he (and we) know about her is that she used to be a sex slave - basically it feels like he’s abusing her.

Then there’s the matter of “waste of good scotch” which puzzles me every time I watch the film. I want to believe that he’s just saying that as a front, but there’s not much in the film to support that interpretation (why did he wait until after she was killed to attack Silva and his men anyway?).

I wouldn’t want black Bond or female Bond for a simple reason - according to all info we have now, the bond from Spectre and Bond from Dr. No is the same character. That same secret agent has managed to work for her majesty’s secret service for all these 50 years. How? IDK. But that’s the truth.

-Mistake post-