If u love it let it go

This is the great dying of beloved franchises. And while I can sit back and laugh at Star Wars and LotR fans for their respective enshitifications, I too have witnessed the sad decline of the much loved series Star Trek, which had as much of an impact on me as James Bond. Luckily for me, I had Redlettermedia guide me through the mourning process and now I hardly think about Star Trek at all. In fact, in my head canon, Star Trek effectively ended with Enterprise in 2002. Fans can gloat on about how under appreciated Discovery was, or how good Lower Decks and Strange New Worlds is, etc, etc. But it’s over for me.

This is the way it should be. For something to be truly appreciated, its very existence has to be jeopardized. But this also allows us to pave way for the future.

I could have bitched and moaned about Denis Villeneuve and Amazon’s decision to focus the next Bond movie on 007’s early adventures in a 3+hour action romp, but whatever. That’s out of my control. I’m an old Bond head and the next film is not being made with me in mind. I turn 109 next summer. It’s time for some new blood. But unlike with Star Trek, there will be no one to help me through the mourning. James Bond doesn’t have that kind of fan base. I have to sit alone in a garage with a bottle of Taaka and a loaded .38 and weep alone. At least that’s the way James Bond would have wanted.

But in the words of megalomaniac Paul of Tarsus, it’s time to put childish things away and accept that James Bond died by a brutal missile barrage in No Time To Die. That’s the way he would have wanted it.

The sum of all fears

If you ask me what my greatest fear is I’d tell you that it’s being caught by the Colombian cartel, lit on fire and getting tossed from a helicopter into alligator infested waters. If you ask me what my second greatest fear is, I’d tell you that it’s Jeff Bezos and Denis Villeneuve fuckin up the James Bond franchise in the grandest way possible.

You know that they will. And there’s nothing we can do about it. Not one goddamn thing.

I’ve made several pitches on this blog about how to revive the franchise. And all of my calls have gone unanswered. So I’ll make my final stand here.

To Jeff Bezos. To Steven Wright. To Denis Villeneuve: all of you better listen and you better listen damn good. My advice to you is to not overthink it. Just send James Bond on a regular ol mission like they used to do in the olden days.

But you and I both know that’s not happening. A two hour runtime just isn’t how tentpole movies are made anymore. Additionally, no one wants a James Bond backstory. He is an inexplicably broken man between the ages 35 to 55 and there’s no need to go deeper than that. But you will.

So you want to fuck up the franchise? Fine. It’s your money. But here’s how you do it:

Cold open. A young 20 something James Bond 007 is on a mission. We don’t need to go into the backstory. We need to go back to the days of Goldfinger. The cold open should be a beautiful piece of nonsense: Bond infiltrates a compound, blows it the fuck up, and then beds a woman. Show the audience what this movie is capable of. So Do what they did in Goldeneye. You wow the audience with not ONE incredible stunt. You do TWO. And you do it all in seven minutes or LESS. The days of 20 minute cold opens are over. And once the final stunt is complete, it rolls over into the title sequence. And I cannot stress this enough, DO NOT fuck this up. The title song needs to be Goldfinger, Nobody Does It Better, and A View to a Kill all in ONE. You need to get to work on this yesterday!

With the title sequence over, it’s time to roll over into the plot. It’s 10 years later. M is played by Idris Elba. He’s sitting behind his desk and he is bored AS FUCK. Everyone keeps coming into his office telling him that the latest drone strikes have been successful and he waves them off. Tanner comes in with yet another boring ass report and M loses his shit. “Remember when this job used to be fun?” he moans to his chief of staff.

“No sir,” says Tanner.

Meanwhile, who exactly the bad guys are has become less clear and the world is mired in rising tensions between the US, Russia, and China. But a strange eccentric billionaire has come on the scene (we’ll call him Beff Jezos) and he’s doing some weird shit while world leaders are looking the other way. M keeps his eye on him and he keeps warning the Minister of Defense but the Minister waves him off. Then M gets a call from his counterpart in US intelligence. He tells him that Jezos is stepping up his weird shit and that he wishes they can go back to the olden days. “Remember James Bond? That guy was cool as shit. He could get to the bottom of this,” the US intelligence chief tells M.

“That was a different time,” M says.

He hangs up the phone and pours a scotch. He takes his glass to the reception area to discuss matters with Moneypenny. She briefs him on the day’s usual bullshit and he nods and takes a drink. “What ever happened to Bond?” he asks her.

“James Bond? Last I heard he was back in the Navy,” she says.

“You haven’t spoken to him since?”

“As far as I know he still plays baccarat at the casino.”

“Do you mind paying him a visit? Ask him if he’d like to come visit me. I just want to catch up on old times.”

Moneypenny raises an eyebrow but agrees. That night she goes to the London casino. She enters and in the faraway corner she sees James Bond, not in a tux but dressed casually, throwing down some cards. He’s playing across the table from Sylvia Trench. Moneypenny is stopped at the door and she asks to speak with Bond. The receptionist retrieves him and he steps out into the lobby to talk to his old colleague. He’s clearly three sheets to the wind.

“M would like to speak to you,” she says.

“About what?”

“He wants to catch up on old times.”

Bond laughs and lights up a cigarette. “Tell M I’m now a commander in the Royal Navy. They’re about to give me my own ship. Tell him I’m never coming back.”

“You know he won’t take no for an answer.”

“Yeah? Well if he wants to talk to me, I’m sure he can find me.”

A few days later, we see Bond in his sharp Naval uniform as he’s reporting for duty as an XO on a battleship. He shows up, gives out a few orders, and then he gets ripped out by his captain for showing up late. In the middle of this asschewing, an admiral steps in. The Admiral is M, now wearing his naval uniform. The captain jumps to attention and salutes. “Sir, had I of know you’d be here…,” he pleads.

“This is an unscheduled visit. Now if you’ll excuse us, I’d like to speak with Commander Bond alone.”

The captain nods and departs. It is revealed that James Bond’s last mission as a 00 agent went sideways and he lost his confidence. M then proceeds to give him a Colonel Troutman like speech about him being the best and that the world, and England, needs him. M hands him a Universal Exports business card. “If you need me, you know where to find me,” he says.

Bond takes the card and spends the next several days in agonizing pain as he considers his career options.

Meanwhile, shit gets real with Jezos. He steals nuclear weapons or some stupid McGuffin and threatens the world with it. The Minister of Defense calls M. “Activate the 00s,” he orders.

“About bloody time!” M beams.

James Bond shows up at the nick of time and is given the rundown. He goes to Q to pick up his gadgets and quips “just like the olden days,” and then he’s sent on his mission. Early on, Bond stumbles a bit while he tries to shake the dust off. But while he’s tracking down a henchman, he dons his signature tuxedo and he does some badass shit with his gadgets, and the audience cheers just like when they saw Batman again in the Dark Knight Rises because James Bond is BACK!

And that’s just the first hour and half of the movie!

James Bond 2049

You know what, good for Amazon. Everyone rightfully shit on them for wrestling away the James Bond franchise from the Broccolis and they immediately turned the narrative around by landing the hottest director on the market right now. All that Denis Villeneuve does is hit balls out of the park, from Prisoners to Sicario to Blade Runner 2049 to Dune. If you want to shut your critics right the fuck up then you get this guy on your team.

With this announcement, the countdown is on. We’re only months, possibly weeks, away from the casting of a new James Bond actor and with Villeneuve on board and an infinite amount of money at his disposal, James Bond has entered A-list territory. Not that James Bond wasn’t A-list before. Academy Award winning director Sam Mendes already helmed two 007 pictures. But this time something feels different and I’m not sure what to think about it.

Villeneuve has a distinct style; a certain way his pictures move: visually rich, slow paced, big ideas, etc. In some ways, he’s not all that different from Christopher Nolan. But unlike Nolan, there’s nothing about Villeneuve’s filmography that screams James Bond 007. And given how big studios have fucked up big named properties in the last decade, I still think Amazon has to prove itself. Villeneuve doesn’t change that.

No one bats 1.000.

Maybe a part of me doesn’t want Bond to be “elevated” material. Mind you, even before Amazon, the Broccolis began this elevated process during the Daniel Craig era. But I think old school fans like myself are screaming for simpler times. Bond doesn’t need an emotional arc. Just make the movies episodic, ya know?

But the Villeneuve announcement has received an overwhelmingly positive reception on the internet and the only one who’s not excited is me. And I think I know why: for the first time, the next James Bond that will be cast will be younger than me. That’s not a big deal, it’s just an unusual experience. I’m beginning to feel my age. And that’s when you realize that they are no longer making movies with YOU in mind.

So this is very much a ME problem. I’ve told y’all time and time again: if I ever become one of those old guys who can’t roll with the changes then you have my expressed permission to find me in a dark alleyway and shoot me dead. But that doesn’t make things any easier so bear with me.

With all this said, the silver lining is that at least the James Bond franchise is in better hands than Star Trek 🤷‍♂️

Strange New Worlds. it’s pretty good 😔

So I guess I owe Alex Kurtzman an apology.

I was reading an article somewhere by someone that ranked all the Star Trek TV series. They placed placed SNW at #3.

Already.

Only four episodes have aired.

But here’s the sad part: I’d rank it there too 😔

Yes, SNW is pretty damn good. I’m ashamed to admit it. The nerds may nitpick the series to death. They may question its science or its adherence to canon. They may bitch about nuTrek being too “woke” (Star Trek’s always been woke). They, like me, may never want to admit Alex Kurtzman finally did something right. But they know in their hearts: SNW is quality Star Trek.

I knew Star Trek had a JJ Abrams/Alex Kurtzman problem when Into Darkness went into production a little late because, it seemed, they just straight up forgot about it. And the final product was predictably shit.

That’s when I came to the conclusion that Star Trek should have died with the ending of Enterprise. OR they should have waited longer than 5 years to reboot the franchise.

ST just wasn’t out of the public consciousness long enough to make much of an impact, I felt. And to be honest, I still kinda feel that way.

Can you imagine if Paramount waited until NOW to reboot Star Trek?

We probably would have been given an “R-rated” treatment directed by Denis Villanueva, where the 24th Century would have been presented as completely alien to the 21st Century audiences. Probably graphic violence and nudity galore as Starfleet officers take it all in stride due to Vulcan, stoic ideals permeating the Federation.

It was a missed opportunity tbh because Paramount wanted to continue exploiting the pockets of Trek fans.

But, finally, 13 years after ST09, we finally get quality Star Trek. 👍