Forget GoT and the MCU—the fantasy epic of our time is set in Hawkins, Indiana

By Rick Ferguson

SPOILER ALERT: If you have yet to start or finish Stranger Things 4, then come no further! For death awaits you all with nasty big pointy teeth.
 
I just finished binging Stranger Things 4 and that was some of the most epic fucking shit I have ever seen. Yes, you can make the usual bitchy arguments against it. The episodes are too long and overstuffed. The Duffer Brothers are too sentimental and have cloaked the main characters in impervious plot armor. Eleven seems to possess whatever powers she needs at the time, up to and including the power of resurrection. There are plenty of nits to pick.

But really, shut the hell up. Thanks to the deadly toxicity of today’s online commentariat, we can’t have nice things. No matter how objectively great is a piece of pop culture, some extremely online asshole will shit all over it: for being too woke, for not being woke enough, for not being as good as X, for being too frivolous, for being too serious, for upsetting beloved tropes, for adhering too strictly to those same tropes. Those of us of a certain age remember when you could only talk about the latest movie or television show with your friends. Believe me, we were all the better for it. If you need any more proof that social media is a net disaster for humanity, forget about what it has done to our politics. Look no further than the harm it has inflicted upon the Star Wars franchise. Or consider that the most powerful force online is alternately Elon Musk or Zack Snyder’s army of Snyder-bots.
 
So, fuck all that; let’s focus instead on the epic awesomeness of Stranger Things 4. After such a long Covid-imposed layoff--three years passed between the ST3 and ST4 release dates—I was primed for a letdown. Aren’t those kids all like 35 years old now? Would I even still care whether or not Eleven’s powers return? Whether Hopper is alive or dead? Whether Will is gay or straight? The show was a great diversion, but I wasn’t exactly pining for its return.
 
What ST4 reveals, however, is that the Brothers Duffer have been playing the long game. Taking their cues from two of the 20th Century’s greatest storytellers—the two Steves, Stephen King and Steven Spielberg—the Duffers have set their sights on epic storytelling that can stand alongside the giants of fantasy fiction. Think The Stand, or The Dark Tower. Think ET. Think the original Star Wars trilogy. Hell, think Lord of the Rings. That’s the field upon which the Duffers have chosen to play. During the first three seasons, the brothers stood on the shoulders of those giants. With ST4, they have taken their place alongside them.
 
Take in microcosm Chapter 7, “The Massacre at Hawkins Lab.” In that episode, crucial backstory ties the events of ST4 with the events of ST1: Namely, that the Upside-Down version of Hawkins is frozen in time on the date November 6, 1983. That’s the same date that One, AKA Henry Creel, massacres all the other “specials” at Hawkins Lab, and the date that young Eleven opens the first gate to the Upside-Down and exiles One into it, where he becomes Vecna. The Eleven we meet scared in the woods in the series debut has just fled Hawkins Lab after those events.
 
We learn also that the Demigorgon and the Mind Flayer were never the series’ big bads—it was Vecna all along (cue “Agatha All Along”-like theme song). We now have a unifying series story arc, into which the show’s first three seasons fit snugly. And we have a new layer of guilt for which Eleven must contend: She may not have massacred her fellow specials, but she did inadvertently create Vecna. Whether the Duffers planned the Vecna reveal from the beginning or effectively retconned it into the rest of the show, it’s an astounding piece of storytelling.
 
Intercut with this epic reveal is Hopper’s escape from his Russian prison. Going into the season, I was skeptical of this subplot. Hopper’s narrow escape from death at the end of ST3 seemed the worst kind of plot armor, and Hopper’s meandering arc during the first few episodes of ST4 only deepened my suspicions. But Hopper’s escape from the prison’s monster pit was so brilliantly staged, choreographed, and edited for maximum suspense that I laughed out loud with sheer delight. And his long-delayed reunion with Joyce gave me all the feels.
 
In one episode, then, we get kickass worldbuilding, deep character development, and precision action filmmaking. Note also how effectively the brothers have deepened and leveraged the psychology of its main characters to drive this season’s plot. In addition to Eleven’s longstanding trauma and guilt, ST4 hinges on Max’s trauma over her relationship with her abusive brother, Billy. Throw in Nancy’s lingering guilt over Barb’s death in ST1, Lucas’s growing pains and desire to fit in, plus Dustin’s hero-worship of the awesomeness that is Eddie Munson, and you have a show firing on every cylinder. If any character is given short shrift in ST4, it's Mike, who is mostly sidelined until his big “Love—True Love!” speech in the season finale.
 
Really, what other current or recent fantasy IP can stand against Stranger Things? Not Game of Thrones, which collapsed under the weight of George Martin’s dithering and its show-runners inability to write their way out of their own box. Not Star Wars, which not only wrecked its movie game with a disappointing sequel trilogy, but also squandered its Mandalorian goodwill with the unwatchable Book of Boba Fett and the listless nostalgia of Obi-Wan Kenobi. Not the Harry Potterverse, which now consists solely of several pointless Fantastic Beasts films and JK Rowling’s anti-trans tweets. Not even the mighty Marvel Cinematic Universe, which has mostly spun its wheels since the glory of Avengers: Endgame, can compare.
 
ST4’s closing image of Hawkins itself invaded by the Upside-Down sets the stage for a final season that rivals Tolkien himself. I can imagine an ST5 propelled by its own epic quest into its own upside-down Mordor, with Eleven, Mike, and company undertaking an arduous journey for a final confrontation with Vecna. Maybe the show will screw the pooch. But the Duffers have earned our trust by delivering a fourth season that blew away all expectations. From this fantasy fan’s perspective, Stranger Things now stands alone.

By Rick Ferguson

Author and business consultant Simon Sinek says the most important question any business must ask—and continually revisit—is, “Why?”

It’s a harder question to answer than most marketers think it is.

Why does your company exist? And why should anyone care?

For indie publishers, that question is often forgotten. Once upon a time, a writer seeking to publish fiction had a binary choice: Get an agent and seek a traditional publishing deal or continue to dream about it.

Today, authors can get their books into the hands of potential readers without any gatekeepers holding them back. The rise of self-publishing has presented tremendous opportunity for authors—but it has also flooded the marketplace with inferior product. So many self-published authors are vying for intention that getting traction and visibility for your work has become a herculean task.

So, when I decided to self-publish my own fiction rather than begin the hard slog of rejection and futility that constitutes the traditional publishing journey, I became one of the many tens of thousands of indie authors out there doing the same thing. I’m running ads, sending out reader magnets, and building my email list. I launched Phabulousity Press as a vehicle to showcase my work.

But the question begs: “Why?” Why should you care? If you’re one of the few folks engaging in this tiny corner of the Facebook Empire, then what's in it for you?
As we relaunch Phabulousity Press after a hiatus, that’s the question on which we’re focused. We want to build a platform for indie fantasy and science fiction not for us, but for you—a platform that you’ll return to again and again as THE best source for indie genre fiction on the planet.

To that end, expect the following content every time you engage with Phabulousity:

• Offers for free and discounted indie books
• Interviews and showcases for other indie authors
• Sweepstakes and contest entries
• Fantasy and sci-fi book, movie, and TV news
• And more!

We hope you like the new Phabulousity Press newsletter. Thanks for sticking around!
​

The most fun you can have without being eaten by a real shark!

Recently the Phabulousity crew took a break from flogging the writers in our writers' dungeon for a rare board game night. Our fave from the evening was Ravensburger's Jaws, a board game recreation of Steven Spielberg's 1975 classic film.  It's good clean fun in which you may get eaten by Bruce the shark!

Designed four two to four players, the game is designed around two "acts." In Act One, players playing as movie characters Brody, Hooper, and Quint race around Amity Island trying to spot the titular shark  before he eats all the swimmers on the island beaches (another player plays as the shark). In Act II,  the action shifts to the Orca, Quint's boat, and the three human players try to kill Bruce before he either eats them all and/or destroys the boat.

The action is fast-paced, there's a good mixture of strategy and luck, and you can finish a game in about an hour. What's not to love? Get it at Amazon today-- it's Phabulousity approved!

*Phabulousity is an Amazon affiliate and we may earn a commission on purchases.

The 25th James Bond film is a bittersweet farewell to Daniel Craig’s 007
 
By Rick Ferguson
 
During the latter half of the Great Lockdown of 2020, I was getting desperate for something new to watch. Movies, indoor dining, social gatherings, concerts, and sporting events were all out of the question, so I joined the rest of the developed world in watching a shit-ton of television. To stave off boredom and madness, my wife and I had already blazed through Mad Men, The Sopranos, The Crown, Mrs. Maisel, Lupin, and even fucking American Idol; now, things were getting desperate. Reading the news that the release date of the 25th James Bond film, No Time to Die, had been delayed yet again, I was struck with what passed in those days for inspiration: I would rewatch every James Bond film and rank them for this blog.
 
Mission accomplished. If you’re interested, you can read my complete Bond reviews and ranking here. Now that the latest Bond film has finally been released—I even saw it in the theater with my son, who has become a reluctant Bond fan himself—where does it fit in my overall ranking, which is the only one that matters?
 
The answer is forthcoming. But first, the setup. No Time to Die marks Daniel Craig’s announced final appearance as James Bond, and the film is often weighted down by the foreknowledge. No Time is structured as Craig’s valedictory lap, with callbacks to his previous adventures, intimations of mortality throughout, and plenty of grist for the mill if you’re a critic or Twitter scold who questions whether the entire Bond conceit of a hyperviolent, womanizing white male hero has any place in today’s world. Like all Bond films, it’s sometimes exhilarating, sometimes a mess, and all the time a Bond movie. Which is to say, James Bond films are a known quantity—and, as with any Bond film, your enjoyment of No Time will depend entirely on your level of enthusiasm for a film franchise that began during the Kennedy administration.
 
The plot is typical Bondian nonsense. There’s Rami Malek as scarred and oily villain Lyutsifer Safin (surely among the more ridiculous Bond-villain names), who has a beef with international crime syndicate SPECTRE, a history with Bond’s longtime love interest Madeleine Swann (Léa Seydoux), and a diabolical plan involving nanobots weaponized into DNA-linked contact poison. Bond, meanwhile, has retired to Jamaica to shack up with Swann and gaze wistfully into the sunset; his former position as MI6 assassin 007 has been filled by Nomi (Lashana Lynch), a woman. Returning players include Ben Wishaw’s gadget-master Q, Ralph Fienne’s MI6 head M, Naomie Harris’s Moneypenny, Jeffrey Wright’s CIA agent Felix Leiter, and Christoph Waltz’s SPECTRE head Blofeld. The plot kicks into motion when Leiter recruits Bond out of retirement to help locate a missing Russian scientist connected to the nanobot tech. If that last sentence had you rolling your eyes, note that, like all Bond films, your comprehension of the film’s plot in no way relates to your enjoyment of it.
 
For 007 fans, there’s much to recommend. All Bond films are required to genuflect at various stations of the cross; No Time includes an appearance by the beloved and gadget-filled Aston Martin, a nod to Bond’s various gadget-filled wristwatches, and most importantly, the welcome return of the villain’s hidden fortress fully stocked with a small army of anonymous and easily dispatched goons. The film is a bit light on action set-pieces, but it includes a decent chase in the first act and a prolonged running battle in a fogbound forest. A pretty terrific bar fight set in Havana includes an awesome cameo by Ana de Armas as “Bond girl” and CIA agent Paloma; in a nod to “the-times-they-are-a’changin” crowd, Bond does not bed her first, an oversight that Sean Connery would never have tolerated. Although her character disappears for the rest of the film, De Armas is so good that I’d be the first in line to see a Paloma-centric spinoff movie.
 
Those of you who watched season one of True Detective will be unsurprised to learn that first-time Bond director Cary Fukunaga delivers on the action scenes, which are zippy if structurally uninspired. More surprising is the amount of humor present in a film that might otherwise have been a dour exercise in rote nostalgia. Through four films, Craig’s Bond has largely registered as a taciturn brute; here, he delivers several Roger Moore-worthy quips, and at times he’s downright chatty. Fukunaga and his screenwriters remembered that Bond films are supposed to be fun, a critical save for what is by far the longest entry.
 
On the downside: while Rami Malik tries to dial up the creep factor, his performance is too somnambulant for a film otherwise light on its feet. And, as capable an actor as is Léa Seydoux, she and Craig have precious little chemistry considering Swann is supposed to be the love of Bond’s life. In Casino Royale, Craig and Eva Green set the screen ablaze, but Craig and Seydoux can manage nary a spark.
 
But these are quibbles. If you like Bond films—and, in particular, if you like Craig’s take on 007—then you’ll enjoy No Time to Die. Considering that, historically, each new Bond film Etch-a-Sketches the previous film, it’s surprising to note that the five Daniel Craig entries have collectively provided a complete story arc for James Bond—much as Christopher Nolan’s three Batman films provided a complete arc for the Caped Crusader. The Craig films have varied in quality, but even the worst of them is better than a middling Roger Moore or Pierce Brosnan entry.
 
In fact, I will go so far as to officially anoint Daniel Craig as the all-time best James Bond. To Sean Connery fans, those will be fighting words, but I will brook no counterargument. Connery gave the world James Bond—but Daniel Craig gave him a soul. I’m sad to see him go. As the film credits end on the promise that “JAMES BOND WILL RETURN,” I’m also excited to see who comes next.
 
The Ultimate Bond Ranking:
 
1. Casino Royale (Craig, 2006)
2. From Russia With Love (Connery, 1963)
3. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (Lazenby, 1969)
4. Goldfinger (Connery, 1964)
5. Thunderball (Connery, 1965)
6. Skyfall (Craig, 2012)
7. Dr. No (Connery, 1962)
8. For Your Eyes Only (Moore, 1981)
9. License to Kill (Dalton, 1989)
10. The Man with the Golden Gun (Moore, 1974)
11. No Time to Die (Craig, 2021)
12. Never Say Never Again (Connery, 1983)
13. You Only Live Twice (Connery, 1967)
14. A View to a Kill (Moore, 1985)
15. Tomorrow Never Dies (Brosnan, 1997)
16. Spectre (Craig, 2015)
17. Quantum of Solace (Craig, 2008)
18. Die Another Day (Brosnan, 2002)
19. Moonraker (Moore, 1979)
20. Goldeneye (Brosnan, 1995)
21. The Spy Who Loved Me (Moore, 1977)
22. The World is Not Enough (Brosnan, 1999)
23. The Living Daylights (Dalton, 1987)
24. Live and Let Die (Moore, 1973)
25. Diamonds are Forever (Connery, 1971)
26. Octopussy (Moore, 1983)

By Rick Ferguson

Well, that’s a relief. After the ho-hum storytelling of Black Widow—a film that served largely to introduce new Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) characters rather than deliver a deep dive into Scarlett Johannsen’s Natasha Romanov—I worried that Marvel Studios had finally jumped the shark. The decade-long Infinity Wars saga was such a monumental feat of studio-driven filmmaking that it’s likely Marvel will never come close to matching it again, let alone topping it. Too many variables—casting, scripts, direction, kismet—would have to go right for Marvel to keep its winning streak alive. Plus, with all the ancillary Disney+ shows, the forays into animation, and Kevin Feige’s promotion to overall Disney creative mastermind, the likelihood of brand dilution is high.
 
But I’m here to report that Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is a welcome return to form for Marvel. Does the film suffer from some of the same tropes and third-act problems from which many Marvel entries have suffered? Indeed, it does. At this point, however, you’re either on board the Marvel bus or you have no intention of riding. And if you’re on the bus, Shang-Chi provides a reasonably bitchin’ trip.
 
Shang-Chi is Marvel’s first superhero origin story since 2019’s Captain Marvel, a joyless entry that turned Carol Danvers into the most bloodless hero in the MCU. In Shang-Chi, the joy is back. From the charisma of stars Simu Liu, Tony Leung, and Awkwafina to the fast-moving script by Destin Daniel Cretton, Dave Callaham and Andrew Lanham to Cretton’s sure hand in the director’s chair, the film slaps. It may not reach the top tier of MCU films in our overall ranking, but it’s a respectable showing for the MCU’s first all-Asian adventure.
 
Like most superheroes, Shang-Chi (Liu)—or Shaun, as he’s introduced to us in an opening that sees him working as a valet for a San Francisco hotel—has daddy issues. Shaun’s father is legendary Asian warlord and gangster Xu Wenwu (Leung), who centuries ago unearthed the mysterious artifacts known as the Ten Rings, and who now wields them to enjoy relative immortality and to drive his chariot wheels over the bones of his enemies. By the present day, Wenwu is a smartly dressed villain who leads his Ten Rings Army of spies and assassins to amass a global empire. When Wenwu sends his assassins to retrieve a pair of amulets from Shaun and his estranged sister Xialing (Meng’er Zhang) given to them by their deceased mother, Shaun must reckon with his own past as a super-assassin. Can Shaun prevent Wenwu from opening a mysterious portal behind which may hide soul-devouring beasties? Can he escape his father’s murderous legacy to become the hero he was always meant to be? To ask these questions is to answer them.
 
The film indeed relies heavily on tropes now de rigueur to the MCU. There’s the obligatory first combat scene in which we see the hero in action—in this case, a repeat of Carol Danvers’ bus fight in Captain Marvel. There’s the obligatory midpoint link to the larger MCU—in this case, an appearance by Dr. Strange sidekick Wong (Benedict Wong) and a few other surprises. There’s the obligatory scene in which the hero receives his official superhero costume and agonizes over whether or not to don it. Most egregiously, the finale detonates into the obligatory orgy of prolonged and confusing CGI. These third-act episodes of explosive pixelated diarrhea have become so ubiquitous that Marvel runs a real risk of fans tuning them out. We may at least be thankful that superhero films have finally stopped leveling major cities.
 
What can you say? That’s Marvel. Seeing a Marvel movie now is comfort food, like eating at Waffle House: You can order the hash browns smothered instead of scattered and substitute the country ham for bacon, but you’re still eating the same yellow food. The good news is that, within the constraints of the Marvel formula, Shang-Chi mostly works. The film’s most direct MCU antecedent is not Captain Marvel but rather Black Panther: Instead of T’Challa you get Shang-Chi; instead of Killmonger you get WenWu; instead of Shuri you get Xianling; instead of Wakanda you get the mystical hidden village of Ta Lo; instead of vibranium you get dragon scales; instead of armored rhinos you get giant Asian lions. It’s all executed so well, and the joy of its cast and makers is so evident on the screen, that it’s easy to just surrender to the flow. Plus, you have legends like Tony Leung and Michele Yeoh kicking ass, which is nice.
 
So much has been made of the film’s importance to Asian representation in Hollywood that it would be redundant to dwell on it here. Let the culture warriors dictate the terms of that debate; Marvel fans are more interested in good stories told well, stories that weave snugly into the increasingly expansive tapestry that is the MCU. Shang-Chi delivers. That’s good news for the future of Asian-themed movies in Hollywood, good news for Disney shareholders, and good news for MCU fans. Given the film’s theatrical-only release and impressive Labor Day box office, it’s also good news for the beleaguered exhibition industry. As we enter the Fall of our second year of pandemic horrors, political turmoil, and extreme weather, that in itself is a cause for celebration.
 
Ranking: As always, we place each new MCU entry into our overall ranking, which is true and inviolate. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings enters at number 13, the highest ranking for a new MCU entry since 2019’s Avengers: Endgame.
 
1. Captain America: The Winter Soldier
2. Guardians of the Galaxy
3. Avengers: Infinity War
4. Thor: Ragnarök
5. Captain America: Civil War
6. The Avengers
7. Iron Man
8. Captain America: The First Avenger
9. Black Panther
10. Avengers: Endgame
11. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
12. Spider Man: Homecoming
13. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
14. Ant Man
15. Doctor Strange
16. Spider Man: Far from Home
17. Black Widow
18. Ant Man and the Wasp
19. Avengers: Age of Ultron
20. Captain Marvel
21. Thor
22. Iron Man 2
23. Iron Man 3
24. The Incredible Hulk
25. Thor: The Dark World

By the late 1980s, the James Bond franchise had reached another crossroads. After 1985’s pretty-good A View to a Kill cracked the Top Ten in US box office returns, the venerable Roger Moore finally hung up his fitted tuxedo for good. There was never any doubt that the franchise would continue post-Moore; the films still made money, after all. Creatively, however, the franchise had become moribund. A quarter-century in, Bond films no longer captured the public imagination, which had moved on to new breeds of action star: Swashbucklers like Harrison Ford, supermen like Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger, or comedic action stars like Eddie Murphy or Michael J. Fox. Bond films were now what Dad dragged the family to see.
 
To reinvigorate the franchise, Eon Productions turned to Welsh stage star Timothy Dalton. Dalton wasn’t the producers’ first choice; that honor went to Bond-in-waiting Pierce Brosnan, who was forced to turn down the role after NBC renewed his contract for his detective series, Remington Steel. A conflicted Dalton eventually signed on, because money. Gone with Moore was Louis Maxwell as Ms. Moneypenny (she had played the role since 1962’s Dr. No), while Desmond Llewelyn carried on as gadget-maker Q, providing some continuity.
 
Here’s how I rank Dalton’s two entries (the Ultimate Bond Ranking will appear at the end of this article):

1. License to Kill (1989): As both Connery and Moore proved, it can take more than one film for a new Bond to feel comfortable in the role. For Dalton, the second time was the charm. For all that the The Living Daylights ill-served the Welsh actor with a tired plot and faceless villains, LtK features one of the tighter scripts in the franchise, long on action and short on implausible plots. The stakes are also uncharacteristically personal for Bond, who embarks on a roaring rampage of revenge against Robert Davi’s drug lord after the latter kills his old CIA pal Felix Leiter’s wife. Carey Lowell’s Pam Bouvier is a top-five Bond girl, spending much of her screen time fighting alongside Bond rather than swooning over him. The climax, featuring numerous runaway and/or exploding tanker trucks, is also a top-five Bond climax. A fitting end to Dalton’s short tenure as Bond.
 
2. The Living Daylights (1987): A reluctant Bond Timothy Dalton opted to play against Roger Moore’s wisecracking playboy 007 with a grimmer, more stoic take on the character, one that takes some getting used to. Dalton is perfectly serviceable as Bond, certainly a step up from the wooden George Lazenby. But Dalton’s stoicism is here taken to extremes—he arguably speaks less in Daylights than any Bond has spoken in any other entry. The film’s plot does Dalton no favors; it’s a tired Cold War thriller with yet another mountain ski chase and three different villains, none of whom register as interesting. Maryam d'Abo’s Russian cellist Kara Milovy likewise fails to make a mark. On the positive side, Bond’s Aston Martin makes a welcome comeback, and the climactic fight on a dynamite-laden cargo plane holds up. Mostly forgettable.

 ***

After just two Dalton entries—1987’s mostly forgettable The Living Daylights and 1989’s mostly terrific License to Kill--the Bond franchise entered a prolonged legal purgatory that left the series dormant for six years. When 007 finally returned in 1995’s Goldeneye, Dalton had bequeathed his Walther PPK to Irish actor Pierce Brosnan, the longtime Bond-in-waiting. Unlike Moore and Dalton, Brosnan needed no one-film tryout to step into 007’s fitted tuxedo; in Goldeneye, his debut, Brosnan’s Bond appears in medias res, fully formed and assaying the role as if he had already been playing it for a decade.
 
Brosnan’s four entries are mostly competent, even if none crack the top ten in the overall ranking. Brosnan’s Bond is easily the most murderous, taking his license to kill literally—he shoots bad guys in the head, mows them down with machine-gun fire, runs them over with cars and tanks. Compared to Brosnan, the four previous Bonds were models of restraint. The films also take product placement to new heights, with BMW cars and motorcycles featured so prominently that the German automaker should have received a producer credit.
 
Here’s my ranking of the Brosnan entries:
 
1. Tomorrow Never Dies (1997): Brosnan’s sophomore effort features Jonathan Pryce as a hammy Rupert Murdoch-style media tycoon who attempts to jumpstart World War III to secure broadcasting rights in China. This plot rivals Roger Moore’s A View to a Kill in sheer implausibility. The action, in contrast, is often innovative—the film’s central car chase features Bond piloting a remote-control BMW against the bad guys. The true standout here is Michelle Yeoh as Chinese spy Wai Lin; in a first for the franchise, Yeoh is fully as deadly an asskicker as Brosnan. Yeoh was already an established star in China, and it’s to Brosnan’s and the filmmakers’ credit that she’s given plenty of opportunities to show off her action chops. Yeoh is an electric presence, second only to Diana Rigg as the best “Bond girl;” that she wasn’t given her own spinoff film is a missed opportunity. Yeoh’s performance alone makes TND Brosnan’s best series entry.
 
2. Die Another Day (2002): Brosnan’s swan-song franchise entry is very nearly his best—and, just as Michelle Yeoh elevated Tomorrow Never Dies above its cockamamie plot, so too does DAD benefit from the presence of his female lead.  As NSA agent Jinx Johnson, Halle Berry shines as a rare person of color to lead a Bond film while also kicking ass alongside 007. Yes, she’s forced into a gratuitous bikini shot, but what’s a Bond film without a little light sexism? The plot, in which a rogue North Korean operative seizes control of the “Icarus satellite” to start a war between North and South Korea, is serviceable enough. The stakes are also once again personal for Bond, who is captured and imprisoned by the North Koreans in the pre-credits opener and tortured for 18 months before emerging bearded and longhaired, as if Brosnan was starring in a Broadway revival of Jesus Christ Superstar. The film is marred by truly terrible CGI effects that were bad even for their time, and which prevent it from earning the top spot in the Brosnan rankings. Features the only appearance of John Cleese as Q, which is a shame, because Cleese rocks the role. Of a piece with the other Brosnan films: Enjoyable but immediately forgettable, like a bag of off-brand potato chips.
 
3. Goldeneye (1995): Brosnan’s first Bond film set the template for his four entries: relentlessly middlebrow, surprisingly violent, unspectacular but uniformly competent. Bond squares off against Sean Bean’s agent 006, an MI6 traitor who fakes his own death to head Janus, a SPECTRE-like crime syndicate attempting to gain control of a Russian satellite weapon code-named Goldeneye (named in homage to Ian Fleming’s Jamaican vacation home). This first entry features several franchise debuts: Dame Judi Dench as the new M, Samantha Bond as the new Moneypenny, and Joe Don Baker as CIA Jack Wade (Felix Leiter apparently still recovering from his shark mauling in License to Kill). Desmond Llewellyn’s Q, meanwhile, provides a modicum of continuity. The centerpiece chase featuring Brosnan driving a tank through the streets of St. Petersburg is fun, but the climax features yet another battle set in secret fortress/laboratory filled with minions. Izabella Scorupco’s Russian computer programmer Natalya Simonova is, like the film, competent but forgettable. The standout is Famke Jannsen’s femme fatale Xenia Onnatop, who can crush men with her thighs, and who seems imported from a wilder and more interesting film. Fun but unmemorable.
 
4. The World is Not Enough (1999): The high point of Brosnan’s third franchise entry is the opening—a bitchin’ action setpiece featuring a speedboat chase along the Thames. From there, the picture is mostly a letdown. Kudos to the screenwriters for featuring the first female Bond villain: Sophie Marceau as oil heiress Elektra King, who plans to destroy Istanbul in order to corner the global oil market. Trainspotting’s Robert Carlyle features as Renard, Elektra’s henchman, who is introduced with a terrific setup: A bullet lodged in his brain has rendered him impervious to pain. Unfortunately, the script gives Carlyle precious little do to. The film also features the sixth (!) Bond ski chase, which, come on. Denise Richards earned a Razzie award for her taking on nuclear physicist Christmas Jones, but the fault is less hers than the producers who cast her in such a ridiculous role. Film also features the final appearance of Desmon Llewellyn’s Q; the plan was to replace him with John Cleese as “R,” but the conceit did not outlive the Brosnan entries.

***
 
After 2002’s Die Another Day, Pierce Brosnan completed his four-film deal and declined to re-enlist for another tour of duty as 007. Faced with recasting the role yet again, Eon Productions opted for another franchise first—a full series reboot. Instead of continuing with fitful nods to continuity, as previous films had done, the next Bond film would function as sort of a Batman Begins for the series by showing 007 at the beginning of his career. Moneypenny and Q were both recast, while Dame Judi Dench returned as M simply because she was so good in the role. Rebooting Bond was an inspired move, one that gave the producers the opportunity to wash the series clean of tired tropes and bring 007 into the 21st Century.
 
As for the casting: The choice of Craig was controversial amongst the Bond faithful, who felt that he was too thuggish and plain to play the suave 007. Fortunately, the faithful were wrong. Craig’s Bond is thuggish; instead of appearing as if born in a fitted tuxedo, he carries himself as a man from a working-class background who has willed himself into existence as a globetrotting secret agent. He also convincingly plays a stone killer—unlike Brosnan, who never quite pulled off the coldhearted assassin role, even as he sprayed bad guys with machine-gun fire. Craig’s Bond suffers from a classic internal struggle: He doesn’t want to be a killer, but it’s the one thing he does well.
 
With Eon Productions’ 25th Bond film, No Time to Die, languishing in Limbo due to pandemic-related delays, we’ll have to wait to determine where Daniel Craig’s last turn as Bond falls in the overall franchise ranking. Whether the Bond franchise will continue beyond Craig is an open question—but, as long as there’s money to be made, you can bet 007 will return.
 
And yet, we must acknowledge that James Bond the character has reached yet another crossroads. Should Bond remain a cisgender, straight white man shooting and snogging his way around the globe? Should Bond be recast as a Black man, or should James Bond become Jane Bond? Or, has pop culture finally moved beyond “shaken, not stirred?” We’ll see. In the meantime, we can continue to revisit Bond as an exercise in history and nostalgia, and as a means to study the evolving definition of the masculine ideal. During a pandemic, there are worse ways to pass the time.
 
Here’s my overall ranking of the Craig entries:
 
1. Casino Royale (2006): By rebooting the franchise, the producers gave their screenwriters, director Martin Campbell, and star Daniel Craig the freedom to craft the best Bond film. Produced over forty years after the debut of Dr. No, Casino Royale stands as the platonic ideal of a James Bond movie. The plot, which hews close to Fleming’s original novel, is gripping and mostly realistic, eschewing gadgetry and effects for old-school violence. Craig’s Bond is modeled closely after Fleming’s original character, a merciless killer with a heart. Mads Mikkelsen is terrifically slimy as arms dealer Le Chiffre, while Jeffrey Wright is a welcome addition as returning CIA agent Felix Leiter. To the role of Vesper Lind, Bond’s money handler and love interest, Eva Green brings both glamor and intelligence, placing her in the top five of Bond girls. The chemistry between Craig and Green is both palpable and rare for a Bond film; when Lind suffers the same fate as Tracy Bond in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, you feel Craig’s heartbreak. With Casino Royale, Eon Productions pulled off the impossible—they made the best film in the series, eclipsing even the glory days of Sean Connery.
 
2. Skyfall (2012): Director Sam Mendes takes over the helm for Craig’s third go at 007, and the results give Craig his second entry in the Bond Top Ten. Whereas Quantum of Solace traded spectacle for story, Skyfall gives Bond his most personal story since On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. The film focuses on Bond’s most long-lasting relationship: With M, played once again by the inimitable Dame Judi Dench. The central love affair between these two characters is maternal rather than romantic; M’s (SPOILER ALERT!) death at the hands of Javier Bardem’s rogue MI6 agent Raoul Silva robs 007 of his only familial relationship. As Silva, Bardem serves as a Joker-like inversion of Bond—the secret agent as psychopath, obsessed with M as the mother figure who abandoned him. Continuing the series reboot begun in Casino Royale, Skyfall also reintroduces two iconic supporting characters: Moneypenny (Naomi Harris), now a field agent, and a young Q (Ben Whishaw). The film’s action set pieces are relatively scant for latter-day Bond, but the cinematography, by Mendes collaborator Roger Deakins, renders the film the most flat-out beautiful of all the Bond entries. With a billion-dollar box-office haul, Skyfall remains the highest-grossing Bond film—and rightfully so.
 
3. Spectre (2015): Sam Mendes returns in Craig’s most recent turn as 007, making him the first returning series director since the days of John Glen. Spectre tries mightily to maintain the quality established by Casino Royale and Skyfall, but to middling effect. After a long legal battle, Eon Productions regained the rights to use the criminal organization SPECTRE, first established in the Connery films, along with the organization’s Number One, Blofeld—played in this entry by Christoph Waltz. The film also tries to retcon the previous Craig films by making Quantum and the previous films’ villains all part of SPECTRE. This plot twist is clumsily handled, as is the film’s climax, an homage to the deadly-maze finale of The Man With the Golden Gun. As Dr. Madeleine Swan, French actress Léa Seydoux hasn’t much to do but brood; on the positive side, Ralph Fiennes lands as the new M, and Dave Bautista is the best Bond antagonist since the days of Jaws. Bond’s brutal clash on a train with Bautista—another homage, this one to Connery’s battle with Robert Shaw in From Russia With Love—is the film’s high point.
 
4. Quantum of Solace (2008): Named after an Ian Fleming short-story title, Quantum of Solace is a direct sequel to Casino Royale, beginning literally where the last film ended—with Bond capturing the elusive Mr. White, an operative in a mysterious SPECTRE-like organization called Quantum. In many respects, the film lives up to the high standards of CR. Whereas Craig’s first film dialed down the action set pieces, Quantum dials them back up—with car chases, speedboat chases, aerial dog fights, and brutal Bourne Supremacy-style hand-to-hand combat filling most of the screen time. Olga Kurylenko is appealingly tough and vulnerable as Bolivian agent Camille Montes, while Mathieu Amalric is fittingly suave and slimy as eco-terrorist Dominic Greene. Unfortunately, the film’s short running time leaves the climax rushed, with Green morphing from omnipotent mastermind to axe-wielding lunatic in short order. Film also features an homage to Goldfinger, with MI6 agent Strawberry Fields found dead and coated head-to-toe in black oil instead of gold paint. A worthy sequel, but a step down from the perfection of its predecessor.

***
 And, to wrap up our look at the Bond filmography, here's my Ultimate Ranking of Bond films. 

The Ultimate Bond Ranking:

1. Casino Royale (Craig, 2006)
2. From Russia With Love (Connery, 1963)
3. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (Lazenby, 1969)
4. Goldfinger (Connery, 1964)
5. Thunderball (Connery, 1965)
6. Skyfall (Craig, 2012)
7. Dr. No (Connery, 1962)
8. For Your Eyes Only (Moore, 1981)
9. License to Kill (Dalton, 1989)
10. The Man with the Golden Gun (Moore, 1974)
11. Never Say Never Again (Connery, 1983)
12. You Only Live Twice (Connery, 1967)
13. A View to a Kill (Moore, 1985)
14. Tomorrow Never Dies (Brosnan, 1997)
15. Spectre (Craig, 2015)
16. Quantum of Solace (Craig, 2008)
17. Die Another Day (Brosnan, 2002)
18. Moonraker (Moore, 1979)
19. Goldeneye (Brosnan, 1995)
20. The Spy Who Loved Me (Moore, 1977)
21. The World is Not Enough (Brosnan, 1999)
22. The Living Daylights (Dalton, 1987)
23. Live and Let Die (Moore, 1973)
24. Diamonds are Forever (Connery, 1971)
25. Octopussy (Moore, 1983)
 
And, as a bonus, some random Bond stats:

• 597 bad guys killed
• 55 Bond girls
• 20 shaken-not-stirred Martinis
• 12 Aston Martins
• 7 ski chases
  
• 5 Baccarat games
  
• 3 shark-filled pools

Read Ranking Bond  Part I

Read Ranking Bond part II

1983 may have been the year of Peak Bond. That year, not one, but two Bond films duked it out at the box office—Roger Moore’s Octopussy, his sixth outing as 007, versus Sean Connery’s Never Say Never Again, an “unofficial” entry that nonetheless marked Connery’s seventh turn in the role. After the underwhelming coda of 1971’s Diamonds are Forever, Connery had said goodbye to Bond until producer Kevin McLory, who owned the film rights to the Ian Fleming novel Thunderball, backed up the money truck and coaxed Connery back into Bond’s fitted tuxedo. Hence the film’s title, which winked at Connery’s vow to never again play the role.

Octopussy beat Never at the box office, which secured Moore’s status as the decade’s alpha Bond; for Gen-X kids who grew up in the 1970s, Moore was Bond. George Lazenby had already assayed his one-and-done entry in 1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service when Eon Productions heads Harry Saltzman and Albert Broccoli offered Moore the role; fresh off his stint as Simon Templar in television series The Saint, the debonair actor had long been seen as a Bond in waiting. Over Moore’s seven entries, his 007 would morph from ruffian to playboy, and the series from serious adventure to overt camp. Few fans consider Moore the best Bond—but he certainly had the most fun with the role.

Here’s how I rank the Moore/Lazenby entries, with Never thrown in for good measure. 

1. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969): Former male model George Lazenby was a competent if forgettable Bond, but On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is a terrific entry in the canon. The third act alone has enough action for three Bond movies, let alone one: Bond finds himself in a downhill ski chase, a car chase, a mountain avalanche, and a climactic bobsled chase against Telly Savalas, no less! The “Angels of Death” conceit of twelve beautiful but dim women brainwashed by Savalas’s Blofeld hasn’t aged well. On the other hand, Diana Riggs’ Tracy di Vincenzo is among the best Bond girls—she gets to drive point in a car chase and beat up some bad guys during the climax. The film’s tragic ending was echoed decades later in Daniel Craig’s first entry, Casino Royale.
 
2. For Your Eyes Only (1981): FYEO is, for my money, peak Moore-era Bond, the one film in Moore’s oeuvre that stands with the best films in the canon. After the campy excess of Moonraker, Eon opted for a leaner, old-school approach to the follow up, eschewing hidden fortresses and jump-suited minions in favor of simple Cold War espionage. The result is a film that hits nearly all the right notes: genuinely exhilarating action, real tension, clever homages to earlier Bond films, and a plot that mostly avoids insulting your intelligence. The film winks at Moore’s age (he was 53 at the time of release) by having a jailbait figure skater throw herself him, then having Bond offer to buy her ice cream instead of bedding her. Carole Bouquet’s Melina Havelock is a top-five Bond girl—deadly with a crossbow and able to pilot a clunky Citroën 2CV through a bitchin’ car chase. We even get Topol (Tevye from Fiddler on the Roof) as a Greek smuggler and Bond ally. Still, the franchise had, by this point, become a bit long in the tooth. Released the same year, Raiders of the Lost Ark transformed action filmmaking and left Bond in the dust.
 
3. The Man with the Golden Gun (1974): TMWTGG is generally regarded as one of the weakest franchise entries—but for my money, it’s still better than most of Moore’s entries. Its ranking here is due primarily to the presence of Christopher Lee as Bond’s arch-nemesis Francisco Scaramanga, an assassin attempting to steal a “solex agitator,” a MacGuffin that can “harness the sun’s power.” Lee was a British Special Forces officer during World War II, a true baddass, and you can sense his bemusement throughout at having to lose a fight with a dandyish actor whose neck he could most likely snap with little trouble. Set mostly in Asian locales, the film features a pointless kung-fu scene designed to capitalize on the popularity of Bruce Lee, a big star at the time. Maude Adams makes the most of her first franchise appearance (she would return in 1983’s Octopussy), but Britt Ekland’s Mary Goodnight was the most insipid Bond girl since Daniela Bianchi in From Russia With Love.
 
4. Never Say Never Again (1983): At 52, Sean Connery was actually three years younger than Roger Moore when he donned 007’s fitted tux after a twelve-year absence. What a difference those three years made. While Moore’s competing entry Octopussy is a tired mess, Never is a lean and muscular entry centered around Connery’s supremely confident and wry take on 007. The plot is indeed a remake of Thunderball, with Bond squaring off once against SPECTRE as the terrorist organization kidnaps a pair of nukes with which to demand ransom from the world. The film is aided immeasurably by its cast, surprisingly strong for a Bond film: Klaus Maria Brandauer as nutty villain Maximillian Largo; Barbara Carrera as scenery-chewing femme fatale Fatima Blush; a young Kim Basinger as the Bond girl; Bernie Casey as an African-American take on CIA agent Felix Leiter; even fucking Max Von Sydow shows up as Blofeld. In the minus column, the soundtrack is wretched; the producers couldn’t use the iconic Bond score, and its absence is painfully obvious. A welcome coda to Connery’s legendary take on James Bond.
 
5. A View to a Kill (1985): After the wretched failure of Octopussy to breathe new life into the Bond franchise, fans might have been forgiven for expecting the worst from Roger Moor’s swan song as 007. The franchise was over two decades old, Moore was pushing 60, and Hollywood audiences had moved on to Indiana Jones, Marty McFly, and Axel Foley. Fortunately, AVTAK is a welcome, if lukewarm, return to form. The plot, in which a very blond Christopher Walken tries to corner the microchip market by flooding Silicon Valley, is so ludicrous that it could only have sprung from the mind of a Hollywood screenwriter. But Walken and Grace Jones’s femme fatale May Day bring so much energy to their parts that they seem to have wandered in from another film altogether. There’s a terrific action centerpiece with Bond and Tanya Roberts trapped in a burning elevator shaft, and a gonzo climax featuring a dirigible, the Golden Gate Bridge, and Walken swinging an axe. A ridiculous but fitting capstone to Moore’s career as Bond.
 
6. Moonraker (1979): Following the mega-success of 1977’s Star Wars, “James Bond in space” was a no-brainer for Eon Productions. While a box-office success, Moonraker has since been largely dismissed by critics as the moment when the Bond films entered the realm of pure camp. Most of the big action scenes are played for laughs, Richard Kiel’s returning villain Jaws is given an inexplicable redemption arc, and the third act assault on yet another fortress (albeit, a space-fortress) filled with jump-suited goons passes beyond cliché and into parody. I’d long dismissed the film as hopeless junk, but watching it again reminded me that it arguably offers the most fun of any Moore entry. Moore seems to be having a blast, and Lois Chiles’s Holly Goodhead at least possesses agency—even if Chiles’s acting is no better than Barbara Bach’s. Michael Londsdale’s deliciously dry and droll Hugo Drax remains one of the better Bond villains, too. Worth reevaluation.
 
7. The Spy Who Loved Me (1977): A box-office hit, TSWLM was regarded in its day as a return to form after the underwhelming and underperforming The Man with the Golden Gun. For my money, the film has aged badly, with a terrible disco-infused soundtrack and a performance by Barbara Bach, as Soviet agent Anya Amasova, that can charitably be described as “wooden.” The plot is essentially a rip-off of You Only Live Twice, with a third-act climax—an assault on the villain’s fortress filled with jump-suited minions—that had already become a cliché. It’s also the third Bond film to feature a shark-filled pool. On the plus side, Moore finally appears comfortable in the role. The mid-film car-versus-helicopter chase, featuring a Lotus Esprit that turns into a submarine, is pretty great. Notable for introducing the 7-foot-2 actor Richard Kiel as Jaws, who would return in Moonraker.
 
8. Live and Let Die (1973): LALD, Moore’s first entry in the series, is essentially a “blacksploitation” film with a white man as the hero—which, by today’s standards, makes it the most problematic entry in a franchise filled with problematic tropes. On the one hand, it’s pretty great to see Black actors Yaphet Kotto and Gloria Hendry rock the villain and femme fatale roles, respectively; not until Bernie Casey took over as CIA agent Felix Leiter in Never Say Never Again would a Black actor feature so prominently in a Bond film. On the other hand, you have a lot of dreadful New Orleans voodoo shenanigans that have aged terribly. You also have Clifton James as Sheriff J.W. Pepper, a racist caricature who calls all the black characters “boy.” As fortune-teller Domino, Jane Seymour is beautiful but remote, little more than window dressing. The film may be a mess, but we’ll always have Paul McCartney’s baddass title track.
 
9. Octopussy (1983): By his sixth entry in the franchise, Roger Moore had been playing Bond for a decade, and it was clear that both he and the producers were running out of steam. Hopes were high after the superior For Your Eyes Only; alas, Octopussy is mostly as ridiculous as its name. The action sags, the Indian location gags are borderline offensive, and the screenwriters somehow see fit to disguise poor Roger Moore in both a clown costume and a gorilla suit. To add further indignity, Moore is dubbed with a Tarzan yell as he swings on vines through the Indian jungle. As the title character, Maude Adams is a game presence, but the film saddles her with a flock of female minions dressed like Things One and Two from The Cat in the Hat. The climactic fight on the outside of a flying prop plane is fun, but over too soon. Sadly forgettable.

Read "Ranking Bond" Part I

Read "Ranking Bond" Part III

Editor's Note: With our new web site and expanded audience hungry for content, we're reposting some of our most popular content from the old version of Phabulousity. This James Bond movie ranking series was originally posted in November of 2020. Please enjoy!
 
As we all know, eight months of COVID quarantining takes a toll: On your mental health, on your physical well-being, on your stress levels, on your social life. We’ve been lucky; my wife and I both already worked at home, our son has adapted well to virtual learning, and we’re all (knock on wood) safe and healthy. Perhaps least among our worries, but worrisome nonetheless, is that we’re running out of fucking television to watch. The wife and I blazed Mad Men early. Then it was on to seasons 1 and 2 of Fargo. Then we revisited the Sopranos; other than the cell phones and Tony’s propensity for print newspapers, the series has aged well. Now, we’re reduced to Schitt’s Creek and HBO’s The Vow. In other words, it’s getting desperate at Castle Ferguson.
 
So, it befell to me to talk my thirteen-year-old into working our way through the James Bond filmography: twenty-four films, ranging in quality from pretty great to mind-bogglingly awful. Why revisit Bond, when the entire conceit of a hyper-masculine white male snogging and shooting his way around the world has become such a toxic trope? Because Bond is cinema history—and, as a Gen-X dad, it’s my duty to give my son a proper pop-culture education.
 
Because it’ll take a while to work our way through the entire filmography, I’m breaking my ranking into distinct periods based on the lead actor. First up: The Connery years.
 
1. From Russia With Love (1963): From Russia With Love established the James Bond cannon. Its influence reaches throughout the Bond filmography; Daniel Craig’s 007 is essentially an homage to the character Connery creates in this entry. Iconic character tropes include Lotte Lenya’s Rosa Klebbs, the butch German villainess; Pedro Armendariz’s Ali Kerim Bey, the sidekick who dies in the second act to raise the stakes; and Robert Shaw’s Red Grant, the deadly superhuman assassin whom Bond must vanquish in the climax. As Grant, Shaw is outstanding; you really believe he wants to murder Bond, and their brutal clash on the Orient Express stands as a top-five Bond fight scene. The attack on the gypsy camp also remains one of the best Bond set pieces. But Daniela Bianchi’s Tatiana Romanova is a most insipid Bond Girl; she spends the entire film mooning over Connery, admiring herself in the mirror, and trying on lingerie (plus, her dialogue was dubbed). Russia features the debut of Desmond Llewelyn as Q, Bond’s gadget supplier; Llewelyn would play the role until 1999’s The World is Not Enough.
 
2. Goldfinger (1964): The most iconic and stylish of the Connery Bond films, if not the best. The (certainly misogynistic) image of a dead and naked Shirley Eaton covered head-to-toe in gold paint is arguably the most indelible image from the entire canon; the scene established the trope of a Bond sexual conquest dying in the first act. Goldfinger also cemented the final set of Bond tropes: Opening set-pieces distinct from the main plot; sexist female character names (Pussy Galore, anyone?); pop-star-sung songs over the opening credits; and of course, the silver Aston Martin, one of the most famous cars in cinema history. The third-act Fort Knox robbery is a deflating letdown, but the first two acts of Goldfinger are classic Bond. Harold Sakata’s Oddjob remains a top-three Bond antagonist.
 
3. Thunderball (1965): Bond at the height of his 1960s prowess. Chasing a pair of missing nuclear weapons stolen by the infamous terrorist organization SPECTRE, Bond finds himself racing to and fro across the Bahamas in a truly impressive collection of short-shorts. Notable primarily for the badass underwater speargun battle at the climax, as well as for villain Emil Largo’s shark-filled swimming pool, a conceit later parodied in Team America: World Police. By this third entry, the series wasn’t breaking any new ground, but it’s still good fun.
 
4. Dr. No (1962): The first entry in a beloved canon of films is always special; that doesn’t mean it’s the best. Notable primarily for introducing several stations of the cross for subsequent Bond films: The “Bond. James Bond.” introduction; the “shaken, not stirred” martini; Honey Ryder (Ursula Andress), the first Bond Girl; M as Bond’s boss and Miss Moneypenny as his work-wife; and the third-act construct of an evil genius holed up in a fortress/laboratory surrounded by nameless minions. The film also began the unfortunate early Bondian practice of casting actresses for their looks and then dubbing their dialogue. No real standout moments, but the film established many core elements of the Bond playbook.
 
5. You Only Live Twice (1967): By this point in the franchise, Connery had soured on both the constraints of the Bond role and the fame associated with it. With a script by famed children’s author Roald Dahl, you might expect YOLT to be one of the strongest entries in the franchise—but you’d be wrong. Bond is a curiously inert protagonist, mostly wandering around Japan and observing the action driven primarily by Donald Pleasance’s villainous Blofeld (famously parodied as “Dr. Evil” by Mike Meyers). The climax doubles down on Dr. No’s third-act big battle within the villain’s underground lair/laboratory. This particular climactic battle features Japanese ninjas fighting Blofeld’s jump-suited minions with katana swords, so that’s cool.
 
6. Diamonds are Forever (1971): After a one-film absence with George Lazenby in a one-and-done performance, Connery returns to the franchise to make bank in his final appearance as 007. Too bad that the film is such a mess. Diamonds is nearly devoid of the spectacular set pieces that define the best Bond films, and the climactic battle on Blofeld’s oil rig is weak sauce compared to the best Bondian blowouts. Bond girl Jill St. John is ill-used, wearing a curly fright-wig and fairly bursting out of various bikinis and low-cut tops. Highlights include future sausage magnate Jimmy Dean playing a Howard Hughes-type reclusive billionaire, and watching Bond get his ass kicked by femme fatales Bambi and Thumper.
 
Read Ranking Bond Part II

​Read Ranking Bond Part III

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