Shaken, Not Stirred: The James Bond Fandom

Bond is everywhere, but most of us only know a slice of him. So we brought in our friend Jeremy, a longtime James Bond fan, to help us map the whole 007 universe and explain why this franchise keeps surviving new decades, new tastes, and new leading men. From Ian Fleming’s creation of James Bond to the early films like Dr. No, we talk about how the series built its signature DNA: the gun barrel sequence, sleek suits, high-stakes espionage, ridiculous gadgets, and the kind of set pieces that still show up in modern action movies. 

Then we get personal and debate the real fandom question: who is your Bond? We compare the Pierce Brosnan era, the gritty emotional shift with Daniel Craig, and the lasting influence of Sean Connery as the template so many later choices build on. We also dig into what makes Bond different from other spy franchises like Mission: Impossible and Jason Bourne, why Q’s gadgets and the Aston Martin DB5 are more than just cool props, and how modern Bond has to evolve past the older films’ casual misogyny without losing its identity. 

Finally, we look ahead. What rules should a 2026-era Bond follow? Should the next film be a period piece, an origin story, or something that taps into current geopolitics without turning into a headline? We also swap favorite Bond villains, rank a few top films, and end on the most replayable part of the franchise: Bond theme songs. Subscribe for more deep dives into the fandoms people love, share this with a friend who argues about 007, and leave a review to help more listeners find us.

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Transcript

Welcome And Real Life Catch-Up

SPEAKER_02 0:00

All right, coming to you from Phantom Outpost Studios. We're here for episode 28.

SPEAKER_01 0:06

Oh, we missed that. I'm a fan of the horn, honestly. It's classic.

SPEAKER_05 0:13

It is. It is. Well, Mikey, it's been uh it's been an episode since you've been with us. Uh, we're sorry we missed you for for Golden Girls, but uh hope everything's going well for you in the in the household. How's the baby?

SPEAKER_02 0:24

Oh, thanks for asking. Baby's doing great. She is just she's hilarious. We took her to the strawberry patch this weekend and just let her go to town. And it was it was amazing. She was covered head to toe in red, just completely like, and she hasn't she hasn't stopped smelling like strawberries since that's okay. There's worse things that she can smell on. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_05 0:43

And you've been busy too. You've been like out of town the past couple weekends and uh yeah, just family stuff.

SPEAKER_02 0:48

I had a bachelor party, which was super fun, just yeah, great, great connection time with people. So yeah, it's been good. But Ben, what have you been up to?

SPEAKER_01 0:57

Uh recovering from we talked about last weekend, like working like 15 days in a row or whatever. Um yeah, so recovering from that, I had today off work, so went to the pool, did an outdoor cookout over like an open fire and stuff like that. So yeah, good times. So yeah, hanging in there. Uh Nick, what's new? How's the new house?

SPEAKER_05 1:19

Yeah, it's great. Um, yeah, just uh been enjoying summer break, which uh was was well earned. It was a long year, made it through. Yeah, um, so yeah, it's been just nice kind of laying around a little bit, uh laying low and yeah, hanging out with the kids. Tori was volunteering with VBS uh last week, so that was kind of me just hanging around with Kyla for the the daytime, and then she got home and was, I don't know, doing whatever she did. Ran around and did whatever.

SPEAKER_02 1:49

Whatever pregnant women do.

SPEAKER_05 1:50

They just but uh yeah, no, it's been it's been good. It's been uh just a nice, kind of relaxing start to the break, which is nice. Ah, that's great, man. Glad to hear it. Well, yeah, well, who's with us today?

SPEAKER_02 2:02

Yeah, so we've got my buddy Jeremy from church. Jeremy, so great to have you. Thanks for coming on. Thank you guys for having me. Yeah, we're gonna be talking about James Bond, which is honestly, I don't know a lot about. I mean, he's obviously been in the zeitgeist for, I don't know, 50 years, but yeah, I'm excited to learn more. So nice. It'll be it'll be fun. Let's Nick, why don't you kick us off? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_05 2:27

Hello and welcome to Fandom of Fandoms, the show where every single episode we are diving into the worlds that fans love the most. And uh today, like Mikey already said, we're diving into James Bond, and there is a lot of content for us to discuss. It's gonna be a fun time. I'm I'm really interested to see like where the where the conversation goes. So ready to hear what uh what Jeremy has to tell us about it. Yeah. So let's let's jump in. Mikey,

Bond Origins And Why He Endures

SPEAKER_05 2:50

I think you got the got the origins, right? Tell us a little bit about James Bond.

SPEAKER_02 2:53

Yeah, definitely. So uh, in case our listeners have never heard of James Bond, uh James Bond is the iconic British secret agent known as 007. So he's a suave spy who has spent decades saving the world from villains, criminal organizations, and global threats. Um he was created by author Ian Fleming in 1953. Oh, so wow, a lot longer. Yeah, I thought it was like 70s. Um Bond has become one of the most enduring characters in popular culture, appearing in dozens of novels, films, and adaptions that blend espionage, action, gadgets, and intrigue. So yeah, huge, huge history for the character. But I know we always kind of start with like our backgrounds. Um so Nick, what what's your background on James Bond?

SPEAKER_05 3:33

Yeah, um so to I guess it's always done in eras, right? You know, so I think of my and all of our errors really have been uh in in the most recent one. Like I came on just at the tail end of Pierce Brosnan was kind of the the end of things, but I wasn't old enough to like watch his movies in theaters. So the first ones that I actually saw in theaters, you know, were Daniel Craig. And so watching that all the way through, and every time a new one was released, I was excited about it. I watched all of the Daniel Craig uh James Bond movies, and so that's the majority of of my background, and then obviously being a person that uh partakes in video games, uh, you know, I I was around for for Goldeneye, the the the best shooter of all time in some people's case. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 4:19

I was gonna say have you gone back and tried to play it?

SPEAKER_00 4:23

Yeah, I was gonna say it for the time, yeah, it was groundbreaking, but your favorite character, odd job? Probably, right? And then everybody's yeah. Yes, for the hat. The guy was just so small that I could you could just like you could never shoot him, and then he would just like pop up out of nowhere, and you were like, hey kid, hit this guy, come on, come on, and he would just end you.

SPEAKER_01 4:41

Uh before hitboxes were a real thing.

SPEAKER_05 4:43

I was a big, so um I had for PS2, it was um oh my gosh, what was the big one for that? Uh I can't remember what the what the name of the game was. I'm I'm blanking. But anyways, that was uh aside from the Goldeneye, like there was another big uh two it was in the early 2000s for PS2, and I played the heck out of that one. It was it was similar to uh to Goldeneye, but definitely Nightfire, maybe I think that might be where that sounds right. Yeah, now that you say that name, it it really rings the bell. Nightfire. That's what it is. Nightfire. That was that was a fun one. I like that one a lot.

SPEAKER_02 5:18

Nice, nice. Well, Mikey, yeah, honestly. I mean, like I said earlier, like just in the zeitgeist. I mean, I've known about James Bond since I was a kid. I was also the Pierce Bronson era, I guess, like kind of tail end of that. The first one I saw in theaters, I want to say was Casino Royale with um Daniel Craig, so same as you. And I think I was like geared up to be really into it, but I don't know what happened. I kind of just stopped watching them, and I might have seen one or two others like since then, but I mean that was years ago. I can't remember the year that Casino Royale came out. Um, so really not much background at all. My friend, some of my friends had like the old video games. I've played a couple of times, but I mean you guys know my background with video games. Like I've rarely played almost non-existence. Crash Bandicoot was the only thing I've played mostly.

SPEAKER_01 6:03

So yeah, honestly, not much background. But what about you, Ben? Probably close to that. I have seen all the Pierce Brosnan ones. I kind of fell off middle mid Daniel Craig, like you did. Uh how many movies has he been in? Was it four or five?

SPEAKER_00 6:15

25 Eon productions, and then two that were non-Eon productions. Okay. That's all the bonds.

SPEAKER_05 6:19

I think Daniel Craig, I think, was five. Okay. Yeah, he was the most recent incarnation.

SPEAKER_01 6:24

And I've seen I think I've seen four of the five uh Daniel Craig. Whatever the latest one was. Was it Skyfall or No Daniel to die? No Time to Die. Yeah, then two, because I haven't seen that one. Yeah. So like uh I enjoy them. And again, like Michael said, I I want to be in them. It's just when it came around, I was never like, oh my gosh, I have to go see it. So like yeah, and Nick never invited me to go see them. So yeah.

SPEAKER_05 6:46

I I I'll be real, I don't know. I definitely missed a couple of them in theaters for sure. Like I caught them later on because it was it was a long time, I think, before I saw uh Spectre. I had to be convinced, like after everybody told me how awesome Spectre was, and I was like, all right, I gotta go check it out. And so uh yeah, that was that was well after it was in theaters before I finally saw it.

SPEAKER_02 7:06

Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 7:08

Yeah, well let's uh oh well I almost called you Mochri. Which Michael, yeah, Michael just ingrained that into me. Um Jeremy. So how did you get into James Bond?

SPEAKER_00 7:21

Uh I would probably say I probably the first one I saw was probably the world was not enough. I probably just saw it with my dad or something like that. And then I think maybe the second one, I think, die another day. But yeah, really when I think got into them. Does anyone remember uh TV station called Spike TV? Yeah, absolutely, for sure. They used to play all these uh James Bond marathon movies, and that's when I kind of very much a Spike TV thing, yeah. I remember I was seeing like all the Roger Moore films and the Sean Connery films, and that kind of really got me into seeing a lot of those films, and I was like, okay, these are really interesting and kind of cool.

SPEAKER_01 7:49

So nice. Well, so what what keeps you coming back? What makes it stand out to you amongst other action franchises?

SPEAKER_00 7:56

I think just because it's such a unique character in the face of cinematic history. It's one of the oldest, too. I mean, the first film, obviously, you have to Doctor No coming out in 1962, which is such a it was such a different phenomenon. I mean, even when that movie came out, nobody really kind of understood it. But I think it's because there's so much about who James Bond is. He like he looks great in a suit, he has good-looking hair, he shoots a gun, he kills the enemy, he has these gorgeous women, and it's like kind of like the ultimate kind of male fantasy. Everything like a guy kind of wants to be in many particular ways coming up because driving great cars, yeah, awesome gadgets and watches and stuff like that. Got your Aston Martins and everything, and it's just like, wow, this is so cool.

SPEAKER_05 8:34

Yeah, so now I was thinking the same thing when I because uh whatever it was, the world is not enough or what it that was consistently on TNT or any of that. With the commercials and everything, the edited versions. Back in the day when you actually kids, you know, you used to watch movies on TV. It's wild. I can't, I don't know, cable. I I it's a it's a different age because it doesn't exist anymore. I don't feel like near as many people are doing that.

SPEAKER_01 9:01

I love how you just addressed kids as if kids watch or listen or listen to our podcast.

SPEAKER_05 9:07

My students have discovered Mason. Oh, all right, dude. Wow, it's getting big.

SPEAKER_01 9:12

Yeah. Want to shout anyone out?

SPEAKER_05 9:14

I'll just shout out to my students. If any of you catch this and you're actually listening, you know, send me a message sometime.

SPEAKER_00 9:21

Maybe someday invite one of them on the show. Exactly.

SPEAKER_05 9:24

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 9:25

We can talk Skibbity Toilet. Something.

SPEAKER_05 9:27

Yeah. I I was I'd been trying to get

First Bonds And Favorite Eras

SPEAKER_05 9:30

uh I can't remember, I think Fortnite was one that I was trying to get an episode on at some point. So I feel like you need a younger generation person to talk about Fortnite. Yeah, dude. 100%.

SPEAKER_01 9:40

Yeah. Uh well, back to Jeremy. Like, did you ever read any of the books?

SPEAKER_00 9:44

So I have actually not read any of the books. I've been just strictly in with the movies. I know a pretty good amount of some of the stories and everything. Obviously, Cassina Royale was his very first one that Ian Fleming wrote to, but that was the really first one. Kind of an interesting fact about Ian Fleming is that you guys know who played uh Saruman in Lord of the Rings? Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:02

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

Ian Fleming is his cousin.

SPEAKER_01 10:04

That's no way, that's hilarious.

SPEAKER_00 10:06

If you look it up, I'm not kidding you. And a lot of who Ian Fleming kind of physically modeled the character off of was Christopher Lee. And of course, I can see why. About a decade afterwards, he was obviously Francis Scaramanga, the main villain, and The Man with the Golden Gun, too.

SPEAKER_05 10:19

So he's like the most interesting person. Absolutely. He is for sure. Fascinating.

SPEAKER_00 10:26

He's like read all the Lord of the Rings books.

SPEAKER_05 10:27

He's met like Professor Tolkien, you're just like, he was the only one, I think, on the cast that had met Tolkien. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:34

Wow. I think he even served with like British Special Forces too, or something like that. He he's really lived a full life. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:40

Wasn't he like, I think I heard he was like a sniper or something like that for those British Special Forces.

SPEAKER_00 10:44

So like, yeah, again, like something very something very unique to it. But yeah. That is cool, though.

SPEAKER_05 10:49

I've never so Ian Fleming based the character around him. Is that what you said? Is that a little bit of a bit?

SPEAKER_02 10:57

That's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

Well, I we're I know this is kind of like jumping into our discussion questions ahead of time, but like the the it's one of the biggest discussion points, I think, of the Bond fandom is who is your Bond? Who who do you pick?

SPEAKER_00 11:09

Oh gosh, that's uh difficult question. It comes down really for me to two to two people, and it's a lot of people would agree with this as well, be either Daniel Craig or Sean Connery. Okay. Now, before I get into that, I will say Piers Brosnan, I think, was great. He had the look, he had everything. He I think he was let down honestly by some not great Bond films. Yeah. I mean, the best one if he he did, it's be it's be honest. It was Goldeneye. And and that was great. And and his intro into it was fantastic. But that was his first, though. Yeah, it was.

SPEAKER_02 11:38

I didn't I actually didn't realize that Piers Brosnan only did four Bond. I thought he did way more than that, but I'm looking at my list right now. He only did four. And I'm like, what? Only four on there? That's crazy. Who did the most?

SPEAKER_00 11:48

Uh Roger Moore, he did seven. I believe.

SPEAKER_02 11:50

Oh wow, that's crazy. He was the third James Bond. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:53

Well, technically the second. So it was weird what happened because Sean Connery did um, I think the first five, then he stopped, and then George Lazenby, who almost nobody knows, he was actually an Australian. He did on a Majesty's Secret Service, was actually actually watching before I came over here. And then he stopped it in, and then Sean Connery did Diamonds Are Forever, and then he resigned from the role.

SPEAKER_02 12:15

I gotcha. Okay, makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 12:16

Weird, but so it's very strange that kind of that happens. I mean, it's it's a weird franchise, too, that like it's one of the most rebooted out there in theory, because it's not like these characters carry over because everything takes place in whatever generation it is. Like, you know, yeah, that's true. They're all present day. So, like, yeah, it's one of the most rebooted out there. So it's it's fascinating. Uh Nick, do you have a famous or a favorite bond? Ooh.

SPEAKER_05 12:38

Um, I mean, I got you gotta go. It's I I think about it almost like uh, I mean, this is a weird reference to bring in here, but I think about it like Doctor Who. Like you always remember your first bond, the one that you know, the one that you jumped in on, like Pierce Brosnan, I would say is more like that was my my parents' Bond, but me, like it was definitely all about Daniel Craig. And if I'm being completely honest, I have not seen very much of the older film. Like I've seen clips and things like that of like Sean Connery and Roger Moore, but I have not sat down and watched I I'd be lucky if I've seen you know a full movie for from any of the the old ones. I've seen mostly clips, so that'd be you know, I I I I hate to admit it, but that's that's one thing that I need to like, I need to fill in my gaps. That way I can make a better judgment of it. But I did, I mean, just you know, uh Daniel Craig, I thought was a phenomenal Bond, and I did a great job, and I enjoyed all of his films.

SPEAKER_00 13:32

He really was an excellent incarnation of it because he gave the characters so much more depth than it really had in previous generations of Bond films. I'm probably jumping ahead here, but he was but he gave it all the all the background that he gave, all the kind of realism, the kind of raw emotion, the who he was, everything from come from when he first started with the role all the way till the very end with um no time to die. But he he was excellent with it, he really was, and a lot of people didn't think he was because like this kind of short guy who's blonde, this is not this is not gonna be a good James Bond, and he really quickly put that to rest with with a lot of his films.

SPEAKER_02 14:06

So yeah, that makes sense because James Bond is kind of like this like idealized, you know, like macho man kind of character, and I feel like almost that kind of plays into like a lack of emotion, but then Daniel Craig was kind of the opposite of that, you know. He did have like a lot of emotion and like you know depth, like you're saying.

SPEAKER_01 14:25

So yeah. I definitely like like Nick was saying, you remember your first. I definitely if you asked me to picture James Bond, I picture Pierce Brosnan. I do too, actually. Again, like yeah, that's like those are the first movies I witnessed before I knew that they were they were past actors and yeah, like anything about the franchise. So like he's my James Bond in my head. But I do think slick hair, I think, it really and like yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:48

Wasn't Pierce Brosnan? Wasn't he the face on the games too? I'm pretty sure he was. But I think that's part of it too for me. Like, I just picture him even though he never played the games. Well, my friends had the game. Oh, okay. I've had a couple times.

SPEAKER_05 15:00

I feel like the like Pierce Brosnan, also, if you go back to his movies, even if they weren't very good, there were some iconic moments. Oh, yeah. 100%. Um, you know, just while I was watching Goldeneye before that was my preparation because I hadn't seen seen it, you know, before I I wanted to watch it all the way through. And just the amount of like just iconic moments that going through that movie, you know, and the the tank with the the horse thing on top of it, the this uh, you know, there's a man, I I don't know. I mean the the uh weird uh communist train that's going through. That's what it is what it is. Satellite dish. Yes, the satellite dish. I think about um oh man, the um uh like which movie has like the giant ski skiing down a mountain sequence.

SPEAKER_01 15:47

That's what I was thinking. The world's not enough for the world's not enough of the thing.

SPEAKER_00 15:52

Okay, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:53

Because that that that to me is iconic. It's because it's like a it's a good act action sequence in general. Like, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 15:58

Well, at the top of the mountain, isn't that when he's in the in the jet and like spinning it around, like firing at things? Am I imagining that? I feel like there's a scene.

SPEAKER_00 16:05

That's the intro to Tomorrow Never Diesel.

SPEAKER_05 16:08

I I don't know, just like scenes within Pierce Brosnan's movies, I I have a better recollection of those scenes even than I do of you know most of the ones in in the Daniel Craig iteration. Like even though I I like those movies better overall, iconic-wise and like memorable like things from the movies. I think that Pierce Brosnan's got more per personally. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 16:31

Yeah, nice.

SPEAKER_01 16:32

So you were saying that Sean Connery was the original? Yes. Okay, for some reason I had it in my head, someone else was, but I knew he was like one of the most iconic ones. So like have you you've gone back and watched those?

SPEAKER_00 16:44

Yeah, I so I've seen every single one of him at least once. Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 16:48

That's that's a that's dedication for sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:51

I was gonna hit the applause, and it's not on this page. I asked you about that beforehand, Michael. Be okay with it. We're fighting.

SPEAKER_04 16:59

The name's Bond.

SPEAKER_02 17:01

James Bond. That was Sean Connery, right? That's Daniel Craig. Ah, frick. Just because he had a little bit of the Scottish in there. That was the very last line of Cassino Royale.

SPEAKER_00 17:13

Nope, still an iconic uh boyfriend. But to kind of answer your question, if I were to say who is kind of my Bond, I would still kind of have to go back to Sean Connery. He's the original Bond, he's the OG. He he was there's so much of what was based off the characters, and even Ian Fleming was so happy with the way he did. He actually made James Bond Scottish in his origins because of how well Sean Connery played the role, and so it's it's hard for me to not put him at that list. I mean, there's a lot of things I can disagree with. I'll have to talk about the films a little bit more, but yeah, disagree with it. Actually, funny story about Connery. So he was by the time uh he was doing these roles with James Bond, he was actually starting to bald fairly badly.

SPEAKER_02 17:52

Oh man. Really?

SPEAKER_00 17:53

I didn't know it was all genetic, and so his hair's not real, it was a toupee.

SPEAKER_02 17:57

Oh, that's funny. Never knew that. Wow. That's good to know. Okay, so Sean Connery does have flaws. That's good.

SPEAKER_01 18:04

Uh no, he's still perfect. Yeah. Yeah. Just wasn't right for the role at that time in that way. So uh man.

SPEAKER_02 18:14

Well, Jeremy, what so I guess you know, continuing with our segment here, you know, what makes James Bond stand out over other action heroes?

What Makes Bond Different

SPEAKER_02 18:24

Now, I think in my notes I had put like Ethan Hawk as an example. Ethan Hunt. Ethan Hunt. Oh my gosh. Ethan Hawk. I'm glad you knew where he was gonna was like, I didn't think yeah, Ethan Hunt. Yes, yes. Mission Impossible. Um, because and yeah, and I was trying to exclude like, you know, superheroes, like those types of action heroes, because yeah, James Bond is like just a normal dude. And so I guess what kind of makes him stand out over some of these other yeah, types, action types.

SPEAKER_00 18:52

Well, comparing to people like um Ethan Hunt or Jason Bourne, for instance, a lot of what he does, he actually works for the government. He's not kind of like a against the system, against the grain type of individual, which is what a lot of these movies are kind of made of of somebody who's like fighting the system because we all kind of like that idea. It's like you're against a machine, you're against the system, you're trying to break it, you're trying to beat it. In some particular way. So he's not really any of that. He's just trying to fight an actual villain. So he's fighting against kind of a private individual in and of himself. And I think also kind of what separates from him is that uh for a lot of these Bond films, you know, he would always find his like damsel in distress, and so he would go home with one of those where it's like a lot of those films really didn't have any of that. So that's definitely a different element to it.

SPEAKER_02 19:34

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 19:35

And maybe to an extent a lot of the different gadgets, so it's like going back to kind of Ethan Hunt, his gadget was just like, you know, the masks that he wore. He didn't really have, you know, like an exploding pen or a watch that could do like 10 million different things and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_04 19:47

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 19:48

I would also say kind of with his, obviously, we talked about a little bit about this before, but because it's been around for over 60 years now, there's so many more different kind of types of Bond. It's not just for you played by one single actor, obviously, like Matt Damon plays Jason Bourne throughout the whole thing. Yeah, but um Tom Cruise plays Ethan, Ethan Hunt, which somehow he was able to do. Like he was still doing those since when he was six years old, which is it's extremely crazy. But yeah, going back to the Bond thing, you have all these different kinds of incantations, and you had different directors and different and different people who had like were writing the script, and so they all kind of gave their little inputs as to who Bond is. That came up in our Batman episode too.

SPEAKER_05 20:28

Oh yeah, like when you've got this many different iterations of it, it kind of is reborn multiple times, and some of the stuff gets left out in certain uh iterations of it and comes back in different ways. And so that is I I do think that does make it more entertaining, you know. I mean, I I'm I'm looking forward to whenever the next Bond movie comes out and he's reborn again, you know. They're they're they're rebooting it, and whoever it is is gonna put their own spin on it. That's gonna make it I mean, exciting, you know. It's just it's what's what's it gonna be? What's it gonna look like? Same thing with Batman. Every time there's a new Batman that comes out, it's like, ah, what's what's the what's this new person gonna bring to the table?

SPEAKER_01 21:06

I mean so what something else that came up in our Batman discussion. Do but for Bond, do we ever like learn his origin stories? Yeah, good question.

SPEAKER_00 21:14

Um in the movies, I mean, obviously in Skyfall does talk about a little bit about his background. Okay. Spoiler alert, uh by the way. Oh, wait, I'll give a spoiler alert.

SPEAKER_02 21:29

That was really loud, sorry.

SPEAKER_05 21:31

It sounds loud to us, but it's actually not too bad on the on the final mix. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 21:36

So obviously, in um that one when he finally meets uh Alec Trevelyan, who was his lifelong friend, who ends up becoming his enemy, he talks about how we were both orphans, but your parents had a luxury of dying in a climbing accident. And then of course it talks a little bit more about that in Skyfall and how he like grew up in that in that house, and how when his parents died, he hid in his like cellar like deep underground for like three days, and when he came back, and when he came back out, he wasn't the same person anymore. And obviously, it goes his Background about how James Bond, recruited from the British Secret Service from the Royal Navy, blah blah blah, this and that, yeah, and all these different things. But uh it probably in a book, it talks a little a little bit more about it. I'll be honest, I haven't read any of those. But there's been some discussions online that they might try to do like an origin story about James Bond. Kind of like what was he like kind of before? Sort of like, you know, what was he doing in the Royal Navy? What were his missions? What what were the events that led him to joining this British Secret Service? So I'd watch that. Yeah, I would too. That sounds really interesting. Yeah. Has anybody ever seen the uh Alex Ryder series or read the books?

SPEAKER_02 22:34

No, I've heard of it. I've I've never I've never seen it.

SPEAKER_00 22:37

I was gonna say I'm aware of of what it is, but I have not so uh they were they were primarily like pre-team books, but it was kind of like what was like James Bond like as like a teenager or something like that.

SPEAKER_02 22:46

That's cool.

SPEAKER_00 22:47

And so and actually the author Anthony Horowitz actually has recently read several of the new James Bond books. Oh nice. So kind of it kind of makes you think about that. Like this guy was maybe like a teenager and he was like doing something and he like he got into these missions, which would be kind of interesting if this really was kind of who James Bond's story was. Now, what the what the uh Brock those so the Broccoli family are the ones who produce all the produce all the Bond films since the very beginning. So wherever they want to go, or where I think Amazon MGM Studios, they they are the primary controllers of the Bond franchise, wherever they want to go, obviously they're gonna go with it. But yeah, I'm interesting to see. They uh they recently confirmed also, I think, a new director, uh Dennis Villnerve, to direct the new James Bond film, which I think is a great decision there.

SPEAKER_02 23:27

Oh, really? Okay, I don't think I've heard his name before.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

Where is he from, do you know? Um he he's done all the Dune movies. Oh, him okay.

SPEAKER_02 23:34

So does that mean Tom Holland's gonna be James Bond? Of all the picks, my word.

SPEAKER_00 23:40

You know, I was thinking about that quite a while ago. It's like he could be, but he's and I'll and I'll bring it up, but he's not in any discussion. He's still too young, and I think you have to really shed that being a Spider-Man kind of off of you because it's because Bond is so much of a serious role, like you have to like get him right, you have to get the actor correct.

SPEAKER_02 23:58

Yeah, I think we've got we've got some discussion about that later on. Yeah, we'll come back to that. Yeah, we'll come back to that.

Where To Start Watching Bond

SPEAKER_05 24:04

Well, let's let's get into the starter pack then. So we we finally have another fandom where there's just so much content that you could start with. Um, you know, where where would you recommend somebody that wanted to just they've never really cared about Bond before? Where would you start them off?

SPEAKER_00 24:20

Well, there's two places you could really start with. You can go kind of the modern new one with Casino Royale because obviously James Bond is completely rebooted. You kind of see him through like all these original missions, and also Casino Royale is an excellent film, so you could go there, but to be honest, you would have to go all the way back to Dr. No because so many of the things in the other films just don't make sense because there's all these little like tidbits in the previous films that make sense, like with the Astomar and DB5. You have to, you know, watch Goldfinger in order to get every single reference out of it. And there's so many of those references that you have to go back in time. Now you have to take into consideration what life was like from the 1960s, what the social norms were, what this was, what that was. Because if you don't, it's none of it's gonna make a lot of sense to you. And you're gonna be like, wow, this guy is an incredible misogynist. Which a little bit, yeah. Yeah. Essentially, essentially, uh the new M in uh Goldeneye basically like rips and one if you ever if you guys know the scene I'm talking about there.

SPEAKER_01 25:13

Not offhand now. So um This is the first M that was of a woman, though, right? In Daniel Craig's Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:20

So surprisingly enough, she actually got a lot of uh pushback originally, but because Judy Dench is just an exceptional actress. Like when she she was only on screen for like a few minutes and she just completely just like stole that role. Yeah, she describes like, hey Bon, you don't like my method, you think I'm this, you think I'm that, you think I'm an accountant. Uh more than your gut instincts. And he's like, the thought had occurred to me. He's like, Good, because I think you're a sectionist, misogynist dinosaur, a relic of the war. And I have no problem sending you to die for sending you to your death, buddy.

SPEAKER_05 25:46

It was a good scene. I did, I thought it was excellent. I did think the same thing. And then it was it was almost a payoff, too, from early on in the movie. There's a there's a scene where he's being evaluated that that M had sent the colour.

SPEAKER_00 25:59

Oh, like Carol Oh, Caroline and the As Namar, and then he gets chased in the and they get chased in a Ferrari.

SPEAKER_05 26:04

And so there's this whole entire bit where uh he he says something to her about how like oh she she orders him to stop the car right now.

SPEAKER_00 26:12

And he says, James, I want you to stop this guy, bro. Stop this guy at once.

SPEAKER_05 26:17

And he goes, I gotta call it from the car. You're good. That's amazing. He goes, see, I don't have problems with female authority, and then he starts making out with her.

SPEAKER_01 26:25

And then confirms the male fantasy, as we've discussed. Uh God.

SPEAKER_05 26:35

But then it calls back because I was I was like, man, that is weird. And then it calls back because then when Judy Dinch does show up on like on the on the movie for the first time, like that kind of gets brought up, and you're like, okay, I see there's this connecting point a little bit. So you had to have a little bit of a she even talks about that.

SPEAKER_00 26:52

That pro girl said to evaluate you. Those charms were off on her and like they don't work on me. Sorry about it.

SPEAKER_05 26:57

Wow. Oh gosh. No, I think that's a I I would, I mean, especially since those are where I started, I think it makes a whole lot of sense that that Casino Royale, with it being a young bond, uh is is a good place. That's a good starting point for sure. Well, let's uh we're we'll take a quick break here in a couple minutes, but before we get there, oh sorry.

SPEAKER_01 27:16

Oh no, that that I thought you were just going right to break. Yeah, I was gonna say, oh, we're missing our most important piece.

SPEAKER_05 27:21

This is important. So our impassioned plea or elevator pitch. Um, if you had to try to convince somebody in a minute, minute and a half why they should watch Bond, what would you say to him?

SPEAKER_00 27:34

This is the greatest cinematic character, I think, in history. And I am going to say that because nobody has made more movies than James Bond is. This is a the epitome of a spy novel. This is epitome of a franchise, this is epitome of so much cinematic history to back to it. If you look at who's been described as the greatest cinematic figure, James Bond is like right up there on every single list that you see because he's been in the theater, been in movies for so long. There's not a movie character that's been in 25 or technically 27 films. And if you want to, if you really want to understand like what like the ultimate male fantasy is, which is what we talked about earlier, this is really kind of who he who it is. The guy who looks good, knows the right things to say, great with a gun, saves the world, obviously gets beautiful women. If you really want to understand like why people are so fascinated by this, check them out and then watch them. Because you will not be disappointed. There's very rarely been like a bad bond film, and if you start with Cassina Royale, like it's excellent. Yes. It really is.

SPEAKER_01 28:38

Awesome. That's good. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:43

Absolutely. I am extremely convinced. When you said he's great with a gun, that was the part that was the part of my.

SPEAKER_05 28:56

Oh gosh. Well, we're gonna take a quick break and then we'll be right back with more discussion about James Bond.

SPEAKER_02 29:07

Getting us in the mood here. I love it. Hyped up now.

Spy Fandom Culture And Bond Spoofs

SPEAKER_02 29:18

All right, we're gonna jump into our uh fandom culture segment. Um, so to start off, Jeremy, is there any content outside of the main movies that you enjoy?

SPEAKER_00 29:29

Uh probably kind of go back and more with the espionage films. I do like a lot of those. Like I like the uh Mission Impossible series. I thought that was extremely well done. I'm a huge fan of a lot of those things. Same with the Jason Bourne films, the man from UNCLE. I think I think was all really good. Like I've always kind of naturally liked those films. I think they're just very interesting and fascinating because the characters are very there's a lot of depth to them. There's a lot of like calmness and kind of quietness about them. But in terms of like maybe like outside of the Bond films, um I do appreciate good like science fiction movies. I'm a big Lord of the Rings fan. I've always liked those films. I used to be a bigger fan of the Star Wars movies, but I kind of made a deal. Unless I have kids, I'm probably not gonna watch them again because I think just because I think I was like, you know what? I'm okay with not seeing those. So never see those. But uh in terms of recently the Dune movies, I've been very passionate about those.

SPEAKER_05 30:19

Yeah, that's cool. Have you watched uh have you watched Archer before?

SPEAKER_00 30:22

Uh the TV series a little bit. Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_01 30:26

All those things like that we talked about like Mission Impossible, Born, etc. I don't think they exist without no Bond. Bond was the first one. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:33

No, 100%. And and the Bond series like really spawns so many different like subcultures within the uh the espionage genre.

SPEAKER_02 30:42

So so I I mean I've got to bring it up since we're talking about you know subculture.

SPEAKER_00 30:47

We were talking about this a little bit before, right?

SPEAKER_02 30:48

Yeah, is Austin Powers. I mean, what is yes, so let me let me give a disclaimer here. Um, I will never watch Austin Powers again for as long as I'm alive. I would I recommend to every all of our listeners do not watch it. Wow. But the reality is just your convictions, right? Just my convictions, yeah. But the reality is in my 20s, I did watch all three of them like more than I could even count. So I know the movie is really what I'm saying. I used to be able to quote so much of Billy Ember. Yeah, 100%. Yes, and and of course, Michael Kane, one of my favorite actors, uh, plays Awesome Powers' dad. How many episodes has he come up in? Uh, I think he's just in the last one. Oh, oh, Michael Cain, yeah. Every episode. Yeah, yeah. In the John Williams. Even John Williams, yeah. They come in every episode.

SPEAKER_00 31:38

It's been in movies for forever.

SPEAKER_05 31:40

Oh, yeah, basically. I'm glad you guys found a segue to work uh John Williams in somehow. It has been. There's like a streak.

SPEAKER_01 31:47

We need to start, we need to put out a uh fandom bingo card. And John Williams is the center square. Yeah.

unknown 31:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:54

So hey, what do you guys think about Austin Powers?

SPEAKER_05 31:56

I mean, I have actually I I've seen again, it's clips. I've watched, you know, the the TV version um and seen and just caught parts of it. I've never sat down and like watched the movies all the way through. I know it's wild. I I probably would think they're hilarious. I I have no doubt. Um, but yeah, I just I've never sat down and watched them all the way through. But Archer, either you guys watched that.

SPEAKER_01 32:21

Yeah, I've no, I haven't seen it. Maybe not the last like four seasons, but like the first couple, I was.

SPEAKER_05 32:26

It's very funny. Very funny. And it definitely, I mean, again, it it's it is like you were saying, it's property that could not exist without James Bond because it started with that and then has now spawned spoofs and you know comedies and that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_01 32:42

I mean, it's just both Austin Powers and Archer are yeah, spoofs for sure.

SPEAKER_05 32:46

And so I don't know, it's fascinating to think about that. The you know, the this is such a mega fandom that then even though it's not technically a spin-off of James Bond, it it is a spin-off of James Bond in many of the inspired by Jesus inspired by yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:02

Oh man. Okay, do you have any hot takes about the James Bond fandom or like one of the movies, one of the characters?

SPEAKER_00 33:13

This is the question that I've been thinking about for a while. Okay. Well, one of them is definitely that I think that Roger Moore should have been cut out from probably about two of the Bond films in the 80s, just because he was so old to be by a view to a kill, he was, I think, approaching 60, which is just way too old to really properly think through the James Bond film. Not that he was bad, but it was just if you see that movie and the previous one, Octopus, you just get this impression, you're like, yeah. Maybe they could have done something else. And I think maybe then you cover you could have gone with two of the uh have you seen the Timothy Dalton renditions of James Bond?

SPEAKER_02 33:48

No, but he had two movies, right?

SPEAKER_00 33:50

Yeah, he did um License to Kill, which was in 1989, and then before that, which is Living Daylight, which I believe that was 1987.

SPEAKER_03 33:57

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_00 33:57

And he he's a very different, he was the version that really stuck closest to the book. So he was a but when he came out, like people were like, this is a really dark version of James Bond, because he really was. He was very just like D, very like, I am going to find this guy and I'm gonna send him a message type of individual. He wasn't the sort of like easy clips or kind of like funny lines that like Roger Moore did and all that stuff. But I think if maybe you put him in the in those previous two, it you I think the director John Glenn would have gone very differently with the way that the movies went because they they were not well loved by fans. I don't think they're particularly great either. I would not if you were gonna start the bump, I definitely wouldn't recommend those ones.

SPEAKER_02 34:37

Okay, but gotcha. Yeah, but I think probably interested to see like a darker tone of James Bond. So yeah, I might I might have to.

SPEAKER_01 34:44

I mean, wouldn't were the Daniel Craig movies? I mean, I guess coming coming from Pierce Brosnan's kind of out there for some of them. Like it seemed a little extreme for some of his missions and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_00 34:55

But it brought like everything in. He tried to kind of combine what Sean Connery, Roger Moore, and him all into once. Because you remember the very like one of the last scenes in um Goldeneye where you where Alex goes for England James? No, for me. He needed to like he's holding a guy by his leg on top of the satellite that she just releases him to his death. I mean, yeah. That's that's pretty cold-blooded, right?

SPEAKER_01 35:15

Yeah, in terms of uh character, but but I feel like tone-wise, like the Pierce Brosn movies had like a some maybe it was just like the late 90s, early 2000s in general, just like a lighter tone almost, and then like yeah, Daniel Craig's are a little like grittier to me at least, but I I would agree with that.

SPEAKER_00 35:33

They're definitely a lot grittier. Just because it's the that's just the way the directors wanted to go and wanted to create something a little bit more realist and give it more like tone to it. But I would I would completely agree with that.

SPEAKER_05 35:43

Yeah. Well, I mean, you're starting out in Casino Royale, and you know, he gets caught eventually and is tied naked to a chair and getting tortured that way. So it's dark for sure.

SPEAKER_01 35:54

I remember being, yeah, that was wild, especially again coming from the Pierce Brazen era to step into that and like, okay, this is different. Oh man. Are there any creators on social media or otherwise that you follow or have seen that kind of focus on James Bond stuff?

SPEAKER_00 36:11

Not particularly. There's your there's your random like Facebook post that talk about it, but not in particular. The James Bond kind of group is not they're not kind of like all out, and that's not like a Comic Con version. That there's not like a massive like social media, but there are people who follow it enough that will give pretty honest reviews about the whole situation, but they try to be more like quiet about them. Whereas like, you know, American characters and like comical characters are sort of shock and awe, very typical of like American, whereas British is more of like stiff up her lip, more like quiet tone. You know, people wonder why so many of like movie villains are portrayed by Brits is because like they pronounce their consonants because they sound deeper, they sound more sophisticated, yeah, yeah, so they're they're definitely a lot more subtle, but they do make their presence known. But there's not like any like major gatherings or anything.

SPEAKER_02 36:56

That's okay. Yeah, well, if you're gonna do a James Bond cosplay, I mean you literally it's just a tuxedo and a gun, so there's not much to it, you know.

SPEAKER_05 37:04

Yeah, I was just thinking, you know, the fact that he is a British character, is he like I mean, I feel like he's more he is British and and created by a British person, but it it's almost like uh the the an American persona has overcome in a sense that he because he's got such a big following, I feel like within the United States. If I had to say like which which countries, I mean maybe it's just because we got Hollywood anyways, but like who's who is taking on the most amount of of uh content, I guess, of James Bond. Is he I mean he's he's a British hero, but is he really? Is he more American? Like who who's looking up to a more, I guess? That's kind of how to phrase that.

SPEAKER_00 37:46

Well, in terms of like sheer numbers, I think it would definitely be the American just because there's so many more, obviously, Americans than Brits. I mean, we overshadow the country by like multiple folds in terms of their population. But in terms of like the actual actors and the way it is done, I mean, obviously you have primarily British actors. One of the main things that actually uh has been talked about recently is like who is going to get to put in ex James Bond.

SPEAKER_01 38:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:06

Now there's been talks about like, oh, we could get like an American actor like Glenn Powell to recently do it, obviously, his recent edition on Top Gun. But he himself has actually said, listen, James Bond needs to be British. If you do that, you take the very essence, which is what I've believed in for years. You can't make James Bond like not a different country. Now, like George Lysonby was Australian, Piers Browson was Irish, technically, which is you can let that slide a little bit, a little bit there. But you you can't have him be an American. It would, it would, it would just ruin who James Bond is in terms of like the very personality, the epitome, the rendition, everything.

SPEAKER_05 38:39

So I think within the the uh at least several of the movies, I know he was in in Goldeneye, there was a uh what a CIA agent, and I think in several of the other.

SPEAKER_00 38:48

Jack Wade, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 38:49

Yeah, and then in in Daniel Craig's versions, there was there was an American. Felix Slider. Yeah. And so they do they do input like the the American versions. I was thinking about that when I was watching Goldeneye, about how vastly different these two characters are on the screen when you go and you you watch them, and it's I mean it it's obviously done on purpose, like to show, but a little tongue-in-cheek, like yeah, yeah, you know, this is oh, this is what American wild cards.

SPEAKER_00 39:18

But maybe that because of like cinematic history, because I think growing up, all these like foreign and foreign individuals, you see all these American movies, they think of all these like Wild Wells films, like John Wayne is gone home, just like shooting things wild and crazy, and like how we're so much of like, oh, we're gonna sit there, we're gonna blow this up. We're gonna sit there and just gun this whole thing to death. I mean, maybe that's American subculture and how like we're so we're so obsessed with Ghana's like, hey, we're gonna you're gonna mess with something. Okay, bam.

SPEAKER_02 39:45

Honestly, that's kind of bringing to mind um Kings the second Kingsman movie when they come over to the States, and it's that's a good, that's a good again, like yeah, another spin-off a little bit.

SPEAKER_05 39:54

Yeah, yeah. Well, let's let's jump into our larger

Would You Rather Bond Edition

SPEAKER_05 39:58

discussion here. We always like to start with uh would you rather our rapid fire section? Um, so uh I want to thank Mikey. Mikey came up with the would you rather questions this time. So let's uh let's jump right in. Would you rather drive Bond's iconic Aston Martin DB5 with all the gadgets, or have access to every gadget ever made by Q? Aston Martin, definitely.

SPEAKER_00 40:23

That is just such an iconic car, and maybe the car lover and me just like absolutely love that thing. It is so cool. It is so it is so nice, it makes a great noise. It has all you know, like the exploding roof, the machine guns. I mean, they they even made like different renditions of it in like the Daniel Craig movies where it has like Gatling guns inside of like the um the lights. And I was like, wow, this is just so cool.

SPEAKER_05 40:48

I want like I want one. So this one I I think is is a tougher one. Would you rather have Bond's perfect tuxedo style or his ability to stay calm under pressure?

SPEAKER_00 41:02

Staying calm under pressure. Yeah. Seems a little more applicable. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 41:06

The responsible answer there. I feel like everybody wants to say, like, oh man, the the tuxedos are on point. He does look good at anything.

SPEAKER_00 41:12

Well, here's the thing, because the tuxedo is great, but if you're able to stay calm under pressure, you can pull off the tux street as well.

SPEAKER_05 41:19

That's a that's a fair point. Uh, would you rather be Bond for one mission or be the villain with the giant secret layer?

SPEAKER_02 41:27

Bond for one mission, definitely. We're kind of in a secret layer right now here at Phantom Alpha Studios. It kind of is. Yeah, if you look around, you know, we ought to do a social media, like a video tour of the studio sometime and just show people like what's actually here. I think it'd be pretty cool. Okay behind the curtain. Yeah, peek behind the curtain, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 41:47

Uh would you rather have unlimited martinis or unlimited international first class travel? That seems a little offsided there.

SPEAKER_01 41:58

It is. 100% the martinis.

SPEAKER_00 42:00

Hey, you do you, but definitely the first class travel. I don't know how you would be able to beat that.

SPEAKER_02 42:05

Right. And you yeah, you probably get martinis on the first class travel too.

SPEAKER_05 42:09

That's true, absolutely. Uh would you rather only watch sorry, I would lost my lost my spot there. Do I have that one on there? What is that? Would you rather only watch the Bond movie starring Sean Connery forever or only the one starring Daniel Craig? Oh man, this is hard.

SPEAKER_00 42:32

Sean Connery. But that but that is a really hard one. Again, it's the the the real OG Bond. It's there is there's a few more good films. I'm a I'm a little bit more of a fan of the Sean Connery films than Daniel Craig's. Now having said that, Daniel Craig has two of my all-time favorites that are like like at the top of that list. But it's it's hard not to pick Sean Connery over that. But man, that's a hard one.

SPEAKER_05 42:56

What I guess we didn't ask this. What what are did we ask your favorite Bond movie? What is your favorite Bond?

SPEAKER_01 43:01

I was gonna I was gonna jump into our general discussion with that. Like this maybe one of your top three Bond movies.

SPEAKER_00 43:06

Oh, top three. Uh can we make it top eight? If you got him, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:11

If you've got them ready, go for it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:13

Um so I would have to say man. The best one that Roger Moore ever did, which is The Spy Who Loved Me, I would probably put that at I'm gonna bounce around here a little bit, probably number six. I would put Goldeneye, probably number seven. Uh Dr. No, I'd probably put it number eight. Yeah, the original. So that so that would bring me to the top to the top five.

SPEAKER_05 43:39

So those are like the honorable mentions. Like, yeah, that's a good idea.

SPEAKER_00 43:44

I can't make a proper list without at least putting some of those films in. I would have to probably say For Marsha with Love number five. Even though I wasn't originally a fan of this one, uh I became a fan of it recently. Goldfinger number four. My ultimate my for the longest time it's been my favorite Sean Connery film, Thunderball, the underwater uh fight sequence, and that is awesome. Okay, and for like 1964 technology, I thought I think it was absolutely brilliant. Is that and then I've always I flip-flopped a little bit on these two because I had what we what was my number one, and then it became a number two, and then when I saw it again, went back to number one. But nice, but it was Casino Royale. Okay, oh really? Okay, yeah, and then number one, Skyfall.

SPEAKER_05 44:32

Okay, wow, okay. Skyfall is so good.

SPEAKER_00 44:35

It is Skyfall's excellent. And I I saw Casino Royale, then I was like, oh, Casino Royale's number one. Then I saw Skyfall again, and I'm just going, yeah, Skyfall's better.

SPEAKER_05 44:46

You did have a lot of the older ones on that list, though. Yeah, that was good. Yeah, that was well balanced. You didn't I didn't hear any of the let's see, did you even have a Pierce Brosman one up there that he didn't make the total golden eye? Oh, that was a golden artist number seven. Yeah. Yeah, that's uh that's a good list. Um let's see. Well, let's uh I guess I got one more rapid fire question, and we can go into the rest of our discussion questions. Um would you rather survive a Bond movie car case car chase or a Bond movie ski chase?

SPEAKER_00 45:17

Bond movie car chase.

SPEAKER_05 45:20

Those those can get pretty the the the amount of a little more adrenaline, I feel like. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:24

Sure, but the the ski chases in some of the Bond films is if you especially if you see um oh my gosh, I'm completely forgetting. For your eyes only, that was a really cool ski chase, and I don't know if you've ever seen it. That was all time great because he's like chased by all these guys on machine guns and bikes and just skiing through this whole like ski town and everything just whooshing right through everybody is so cool.

SPEAKER_02 45:47

That's cool. Well, why don't we jump into our just group discussions?

Reboot Rules Plus Dream Casting

SPEAKER_02 45:51

Um, I can kick us off with one here. So if Bond were created for the first time in 2026, uh what would have to change and what absolutely shouldn't change?

SPEAKER_00 46:03

Well, the gun barrel sequence you can't change. You have to keep it there. The opening credits, you can't change that. I think we mentioned I think we mentioned this before. You have to keep James Bond British. The character has to be a Brit in order for it to really do their you I think you have to keep M. I think you have I think one of the things you maybe have to change, you can't have it be the kind of typical misogyny that you kind of saw in a lot of the previous Bond films. And in recently, they didn't really have a whole lot of that. They really tried to cut that down and have it be, you know, proper female characters, especially with modern cinematic times. I think you need to make sure that stays relevant there. Um you can't have him be like wimpy or anything like that. You have to keep you have to keep him tough. You have to keep them, I think a little bit more calm and cool. I think that that's just a better rendition. I think that it sort of goes back to what do kind of men want out of this, out of this guy. They want to see somebody who's like, as we talked, as we talk about calm under pressure, able to handle the moment, able to do the right thing and kind of save the day. I think you need to kind of keep that.

SPEAKER_02 47:08

Yeah, that's great. That's a great answer. Do we have a lot of calm, collected, like calm, collected, stoic male heroes right now? I don't know if we do at the moment. I think there's been a bit of a shift in movie culture to show more emotion with men, which is tremendous in and of itself. But I actually think that like a Bond type character, I mean, maybe Ethan Hunt. Yeah, because I'm trying to think of the two uh the newest um initiative possible that just came out. He was pretty, you know, pretty stoic and non-emotional, but I don't know. What do you guys think?

SPEAKER_05 47:43

I don't have nobody comes to mind off the off the top of my head, but I'm sure that they're I mean, they're they're out there, and it it's definitely I I you brought up a good point that um especially as times have changed, that the the hero, the male hero has changed over that time as well. And I think that there's always that worry when there's gonna be the new iteration of Bond, is it going to take too much away from what the character was originally? You know what I mean? Like, is is it going to change it too much? And so I I think you bring up a good point. Ben, anything come to mind there for for you?

SPEAKER_01 48:16

I can't think of anything recently. I feel like everything I'm pulling is from a decade or more in the past. So, like, yeah, I can't think of anything at the moment.

SPEAKER_05 48:24

Somebody's probably like screaming at there. Yeah, they're they're really like, ah, they forgot about this. Shout us out. Hey, no, shout us out. Let us know. If you guys got anything, what is who is the the stoic male hero these days that's besides James Bond, who's the most stoic out there?

SPEAKER_02 48:37

Maybe maybe I'll throw in Roku Mandalorian. He's probably a close Mandalorian. Very stoic. Yeah, he's kind of you know quiet, stoic. Anyway, let's keep going.

SPEAKER_01 48:46

Um I'll go. It's kind of a spin-off of that. It's not on the sheet, but uh just as we were discussing it, I I was just thinking about it. Does would a new would it the new iteration of Bond work if we went back to when it was written in like the 60s, 50s, 60s? Like, would would it work like if we made a new version of Bond, but instead of taking place modern day, it took place in the 50s and 60s? Would that work cinematically, or does but do you feel like Bond has to be a present-day sort of thing?

SPEAKER_00 49:15

I think you had to put certain present-day things just because you would get so much pushback. I mean, even back in the 1960s when it came out, I'll I'll just uh read something here. There was a lot of mixed reception to it. I mean, it was I mean, Bond was called a blithering bounder, a great big hairy marshmallow. I'm I'm literally reading it. I'm literally reading it up over here. It's his almost always manages to seem silly. The Vatican completely condemned it because they called it a dangerous mix of violence, vulgarity, sadism, and sex. No, the Kremlin novices he condemned it, but obviously they're communists and this is capitalist. But it was it was really not liked. I mean, the real the real kind of bomb when he kind of came about was for Russia with love. That's essentially the kind of genesis of like starting a whole thing. Because when Dr. No came out, it was people like, okay, I don't get it. It's just some Playboy. Yeah, yeah. That's gonna be a cry so often. But is that kind of answering it? I think so.

SPEAKER_02 50:09

Yeah. I love period movies, even with like Fantastic Four being kind of set in the futuristic, you know, mid-century. I love that aesthetic. Um, and so you know, probably up until you know three or four years ago, my one of my favorite TV shows of all time was Mad Men. And it was the same thing, you know, set in like the late 50s, early sixties. And so I I think it'd be cool from just like a I don't know, cinematography standpoint to see like a kind of a period piece like that.

SPEAKER_05 50:39

But it would be interesting for sure. If they if they said, Hey, we're gonna come out with the the bond that's set back in that time period, the original time period. I'd I'd be intrigued enough that I'd want to see what it's like. And it's it is interesting that it has I mean, may maybe it is just the fact they continuously rebooted it, and so that's why it did age with the you know, the rather the character became kind of timeless and and uh lives in all generations kind of thing. Like I it's it's kind of strange. There's not a lot of of properties that are like that. There, but they exist, but it's it's not a common thing. I feel like that a lot of times you go back to that that time period sometimes. I don't know. That'd be I you brought that's that's an interesting question. Anybody else? I I'd be interesting to hear again from our audience who would watch a bond, uh, a Bond movie set back in the 60s, but is is produced now now.

SPEAKER_00 51:29

Well, you have kind of in like the modern times, obviously, with Oppenheimer coming out on that sort of a period movie kind of base back then, and obviously it kind of centrals along one figure. That was obviously a massive hit. Now the story is obviously different, but again, going back to kind of a period movie, I it could definitely work if you have the right direction, the right writing, get the uh Bond actor obviously correct. You it could be amazing.

SPEAKER_02 51:52

This also is not on the sheet. Do you have someone that you would love to see play Bond, Jeremy?

SPEAKER_00 51:57

So I'm kind of glad you brought it up because I've been looking a lot of up the uh actors who will be who could possibly be the new James Bond. Now, Aaron Taylor Johnson for a while, the guy who did uh kick ass, he's been he's been the most like recent one who's kind of been like up there, but he's kind of his odds of becoming it kind of dropped a lot down. The one big one that I kind of like is Callum Turner, the guy from Masters of the Air. Have anybody ever seen that show?

SPEAKER_02 52:21

I don't think I saw it, no.

SPEAKER_00 52:23

So he's like six foot two. He has like he even has like the jawline, uh, like the right structure for like to be a good James Bond James Bond character. I think he could def I think he could definitely become it. Some of these other guys I'm looking at, I'm like, uh no.

SPEAKER_02 52:40

Tom Holland, no.

SPEAKER_05 52:41

See, you know who is at the top of my list. I don't know that it's it that he's at the top of my list anymore. I think that it's been too many years have gone by, but I was I was a big fan when there was the rumors coming around that Idris Elba was gonna be. I could I would have taken that like that. That became a big thing for me.

SPEAKER_01 52:56

Yeah, I would have loved him too old now. Well, someone when when I was thinking about this, that came to mind. He's I don't know, he's not in the zeitgeist role anymore. Richard Madden, who was in Game of Thrones, the oldest Stark, King of the North. Okay. I think he could have been a good bond.

SPEAKER_05 53:12

I don't know that again, like Rob Stark.

SPEAKER_01 53:16

No?

SPEAKER_05 53:17

Okay, Rob Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_00 53:19

Yeah, yeah. Actually, yeah, I'm looking at yeah, he could pull it off. I see it.

SPEAKER_01 53:23

He's got some of that again, calm, collected demeanor, and he could pull off Suave, I think. But yeah, I think so.

SPEAKER_05 53:30

Okay, okay. You're showing me the picture that reminds me, it reminded me of who he was.

SPEAKER_00 53:34

And this one here, he definitely looks like he can pull off of a good Bond. It's the face right there that he's making, like he's got the Yeah, yeah, I get that. The other guy who was like he was linked to it for a little bit, but he's now too old is um Henry Cavill.

SPEAKER_02 53:50

Oh yeah, I would have loved that. Oh man. But he was uh he was a villain on in Mission Impossible. No. Yeah, he was a villain in Mission Impossible.

SPEAKER_00 53:59

So what? What can't he what can't he cross over? Again, just I think a little bit too old at this particular time. He can do anything he wants. Like it's like his mid-30s, not that way to do that. And I think he could pull it.

SPEAKER_02 54:11

Someone else who is also too old who would have been just so perfect is John Ham. Do you guys know John Ham? He was but also not British.

SPEAKER_01 54:18

Yeah. Well, that's true.

SPEAKER_02 54:19

Yeah, I'll say he was the main actor in Mad Men, but he has that just incredible, like stoic, you know, silent type. You know, he's got the jawline. He's just yeah, he's that is important, the jawline.

SPEAKER_05 54:29

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 54:30

Oh my word. Let's get back to some different discussion questions. Jeremy, who do you think is your favorite Bond villain? That's like kind of a classic staple of the Bond movies as a an iconic villain.

SPEAKER_00 54:42

So, this is something I'm probably not gonna be a uh probably well liked by the viewers about at this. I'm gonna say Royal Silva. And he's not necessarily the highest in people's lists. Obviously, people bring up like Bullfeld, even Max Zorin is probably high on the list. The reason I I like Silva is because he was extremely intelligent. He was he was very smart and calculated with everything that he did. He had a whole background story, the character had a lot of depth, but his mo but his motive was extremely simple. It was just a straight up revenge against M okay for what he wanted to do there. But because he because he like planned and calculated everything out from like where this is going to be exactly at this time, at this location, this is gonna happen. So he was I I kind of like the intelligence of that. I like the sophistication, the planning of it, putting everything together and to say, okay, here's what's gonna happen here. Bang. Now, of course, then it comes to full fruit. In some ways, it kind of did kind of full fruition because obviously that rendition of M dies at the very end of the film. But he I thought his I thought his was really good. And but in a very calculated way. He was very intelligent. I really I really liked him.

SPEAKER_05 55:58

See, I really liked uh I think my top that that comes to mind. I really loved Rami Malik as as Lucifer in the uh which one was that? No Time to Die. No Time to Die. I I he was so unhinged, and I think it was it was so I I I guess I'm thinking more even from just a an actor perspective and how he played the role. It was I don't know, I really enjoyed him as the as the villain, but definitely that was he was uh oh man, what'd you just what was the name of the actor that played it in Skyfall?

SPEAKER_00 56:30

Um Javier Bardem.

SPEAKER_05 56:32

Oh yeah, nice. It would yeah, that was he was also very good. Those are top tier. And I'm a big uh the other one that comes to mind is Christophe Waltz.

SPEAKER_00 56:40

I yeah, Starmer Bluff on Inspector, yeah. Nice. Very good.

SPEAKER_02 56:46

What's the most underrated Bond film that doesn't get enough appreciation?

SPEAKER_00 56:53

Well, I know a film that's maybe not always at the very top, is I would I would still say Thunderball. It's because if you talk to most people who are fans of Sean Connery, it's definitely up there, but people talk about From Russia with Love, they'll talk to Goldfinger, they'll call it Dr. Nell. I I still think is absolutely great. Depending upon who you people talk to. Honor Majesty's Secret Service, the one with George Lazenby, is definitely up there on people's lists. I do I do think that film is very good as well. And I would then I would probably say maybe Living I think I don't know, Living Daylights is pretty good. I would I would have to see those two the two newest ones with um excuse me Timothy Dalton again because both of those are because both of those are very good, but I would probably say the my second favorite Roger Moore film, Four Your Eyes Only, is pretty good. I I I really wish I could put more of the um Roger Moore films, it's just so many of them would they they they try to like capitalize, especially in the 70s on period time, and it just didn't work for a lot of the films. Like they put like James Bond into space because obviously Star Wars had just came out of mind. They're just going, it's not a bad movie, but this is totally ridiculous. This is this is not James, James Bond is not Luke Skywalker. Darth Bear to come up with a lightsaber. Come on, guys, what are we doing here?

SPEAKER_05 58:16

Yeah, Fast and Furious go into space. Well, I was just thinking, like, when they do you know reinvent Bond again, like how are they going to differentiate? Like, I just feel like all the stories have been told at this point. What could where could they go with a with a plot of a James Bond movie to make it something that is going to stand out from something that existed previously?

SPEAKER_01 58:38

But James Bond, the digital hacker, takes down cryptocurrency. That's pretty good.

SPEAKER_00 58:43

Well, we kind of talked about this a little bit earlier, but maybe going a little bit of of his uh background. Yeah, kind of like as a teenager as a young adult.

SPEAKER_02 58:51

Yeah. And the thing is too, honestly, I think what makes a great movie, it's it's definitely when it the characters are good and the characters are written well. I mean, you can have the same plot-ish, you know, as maybe previous films or something that's kind of similar, but if the characters were written well and you've got all you've got a lot of development, that's what's gonna make it good. You know, it's so I don't know.

SPEAKER_05 59:14

It was just something I threw out of the couple of things. Yeah, that's a great question. Yeah, I was just thinking about it. I'm like, they they've I you know, have they done everything they can with the character? And I I I think that you that there are there are areas that are able to be explored, but are they gonna go there? Like, is are they going to go and show the young James Bond and the you know, go in that direction? Or uh, like we talked about previously, making uh more of a period piece, James Bond. Like, is that is that something that they'd be, you know, that the studio would explore? I don't know. I just I'm I'm kind of intrigued, obviously, to see where where it goes next.

SPEAKER_00 59:44

I have thought about this. Maybe he goes literally against like another country's government because another country's government is kind of against this. I mean, we see this kind of now in modern politics, it's like what we're doing is against what maybe this country's doing and what this country's doing, and what this country's doing. Obviously, you have this conflict between like the United States and kind of still Russia and now with China, and depending upon your political affiliation, you know what it's like with Israel and Palestine and European Union, and and you know, with Mexican drug cartels with Mexico. So you have like all these different like political things that if you put them into the right film, it can resonate with audiences, and that's the number one thing you need to do, I think, in a film. You need to have it like resonate with the audience. The audience need to feel something like that's attached to it.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:26

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That makes sense. I think they'll have to do the thing that like a lot of uh movies do and like make up a fictional country so that we're not stepping on any toes or like someone like the UK versus whoever, like yeah, make it up. Well, I'm gonna I'm gonna kind of wrap it up. Jeremy, we've since we've been talking so much about like what what would the next one look like, etc., has there been any news? Like I know Amazon MGM recently purchased like the Bond rights, but has there been any news at all that like something is in the works besides the director being tied to it?

SPEAKER_00 1:00:58

Uh there's director being tied to it. Obviously, we talked a little bit about the actors who are gonna be in it, but it hasn't nothing really major has come out in terms of who's gonna miss maybe do the screenwriting, what's the plot gonna be? I mean, I think they need to get all these actors and everything else kind of all completely finalized, but yeah, they've been talking about a little bit that it might something might come out in 20, late later 2027, but nothing's been necessarily official.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:22

Yeah, so I feel like they'd have to start filming like now to make that date. But yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:27

I'd be remiss if I let this episode go by and we didn't talk about the Bond theme at all.

Best Themes Then Wrap-Up

SPEAKER_05 1:01:33

We've talked about Bond girls and who would play the next James Bond and all that, but what about Bond theme? What's your your top Bond theme? You got one for us, Jeremy? Like what are you what comes to mind as far as like your favorite of the the starter music here?

SPEAKER_00 1:01:48

Oh, I would actually I would probably say the You Know My Name from uh Chris O'Donnell from a Casino Royale. I always thought that was a pretty good song. Um the Duran Duran in um Duran Duran did one.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:03

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:03

A view to a kill. I actually thought that was a really cool song. And I know that's a and again, that's a probably a very hot take as well. But let's know it's like this is good. I actually like the song. It doesn't fully make a lot of sense at James Bond, but I thought I thought it was really good. And then I also think uh Adele's Skyfall theme, I thought it was pretty good. That really's iconic, yeah. That really fit with that movie.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:22

I liked um oh, who who did it recently?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:26

It was um uh oh, I know who you're talking about as well.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:30

I can't think of his name right now. I'm blanking on uh he's got the is a guy with the high voice. Um Sam Smith. Sam Smith, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:37

He did uh the one for Spectre. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:39

I I like that one a lot. Aside from, I mean, I like the Dells, obviously. Skyfall was phenomenal, but yeah, Sam Smith, I thought that was a good one. And I I've forgotten about I need to go back and watch Casino Royale, but I I seem to recall that being really good too.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:53

Thunderbolts is really good too with um Tom Jones because he has this like uh really just like really strong voice. If you ever listen to it, he has this like really like high bellowing voice. That was what that one's really good too, just really powerful voice.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:06

All right, we need to put out a playlist for our listeners. If you can make one, they can share it.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:10

They're obvious one.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:13

Yeah, there probably is one, yeah. I should find and just like listen to all the Bond themes in one playlist just to see.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:18

I was about to say, I was listening to someone that I was driving over here. I was like, okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:21

Getting them maybe uh social posts. Yeah, have it be a good poll. Like go go vote on our poll about your favorite James Bond theme. I'll get it out.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:29

See, now you've said it, now I've got to do it. You're welcome. We're gonna be sitting there and plugging in Discord. You've got two weeks till this comes out. It'll be there. Uh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:38

Well, Jeremy, thank you so much for being out. Yeah, you're knowledgeable. We really appreciate it. Yeah, very knowledgeable. I'm I'm so impressed. Yeah, we really appreciate you coming on, and yeah, that was that was great. So, uh Ben, what's next for the podcast?

SPEAKER_01 1:03:50

Uh next is uh Game of Thrones with a friend of mine named Jamie. She's in my DD group. Uh, she's actually sister-in-law with Keith, who did our F1 episode. So really excited to talk to her about Game of Thrones. I mean, we'll probably be focusing on the main series. There's obviously like a couple spin-offs that we'll mention. But yeah, super excited to talk about that. I know Nick knows a good amount. I doubt Michael knows anything, as usual. But it'll be fun.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:14

Email me too, I don't know if I should reveal this now or wait until the episode comes out. Nah, reveal it. The revealer right now. The teaser. I still I never watch the final episode.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:24

I never wrong one. I mean, it's again, it's one of the most controversial. Everybody told me the TV ever.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:35

Like everybody told me how bad it was, and I was like, No, no, no, no, Nick. You're the one though that would like it. Probably. You're the child who would think you would.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:43

Yeah, I never. Well, I have an opinion, I have opinions on it that I we will cover next episode. But yes. For sure. That's surprising still. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:53

That's gonna be my mission before next week. I'll have to watch the uh watch the finale like that I that I never did. I know I pretty much know what happened. Like, I mean, I saw all the spoilers, I know what happened, and I'm not even I don't even know. I we'll we'll get into it next time. But it's yeah, I'm I am excited to talk about it, that's for sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:10

Awesome. Well, thank you guys so much for everything. Appreciate it. And uh to our listeners, thank you guys.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:16

That's a wrap on this episode of Fandom of Fandoms. If you loved it, hit that follow button at FOF.pod on Instagram and threads, and leave us a quick review wherever you're listening to this podcast. It's like fuel for our little nerdy spaceship. Got a fandom you want us to tackle? Shoot us a DM. Until next time, stay curious, stay passionate, and keep repping what you love.