That is cool that he wants to bring back Q.

If they hadn't killed off Gemma Arterton, she would've been a perfect Moneypenny.

While they keep making good quality stuff, just keep going. Don't limit yourselves with 3 picture deals unless it's a story that was planned to be done that way.

Just like it went down hill on after Goldeneye in the last Bond saga. Seeing more formula Bond films like what Quantum of Solace is getting at is something I don't want to see. I cant make it through most Bond films without turning them off.

Some people like that. Great, good for them. The movie made a fuck load of money after all.

Some people want a little more meat in their movie, even if it is only a Bond movie. For them, QoS was a disappointment. Deal with it.

Oh, and QOS kicks seven different types of ass.

Marc Forster was too busy trying to turn Bond into Bourne that he forgot to tell a decent story and didn't even notice that Gemma Arterton, the minor "Bond Girl" in QUANTUM, had far better chemisty with Daniel Craig than that pretty piece of wood Olga Kurylenko.

Plus, he is a professional who follows orders and tries not to let his emotions control him (read “Casino Royale” when Bond reads Vesper’s suicide note/confession; his reaction is “The bitch is dead” and then he moves on, trying not to let her death get to him). This Bond just does what he wants, damn the consequences and damn what his orders are. He is a TERRIBLE agent. Maybe it was because I was in the army, and despite the fact I never saw combat or any of my buddies killed, I know that there is a reason you obey your orders. You are not privy to all the information that you commanders are. Sure your buddies might have been gunned down in an ambush, but you don’t go AWOL or go off the reservation looking to get revenge. Why? Because you don’t know the overall strategy that the commanders have and you might be placing other soldiers or the mission at risk by making up your orders.

I mean I am stunned at how bad an agent he was in this movie. Here is a couple of examples:

He refuses to obey direct orders and follow his superior’s commands: I don’t care how good of agent they say Bond is, no agency would put up with his recklessness and his insubordination. Even before he found out that there are Quantum members high up in the British Government, he was breaking orders for his own personal reasons and refusing to come in for debriefing. Like I said above, soldiers and agents are supposed to follow orders. If I am a soldier in Afghanistan and the Taliban kills one of my buddies, I am not allowed to commandeer a jeep and go into the hills on my own to go get them. I risk not only my life, but also that of the mission and my fellow soldiers.

He is responsible for the death of two of his comrades: Sure. Quantum might have been directly responsible for the death of Ms. Fields and Mathis, but it was Bond’s actions and recklessness that also got them killed. Once again to use the war analogy, the enemy might be directly responsible for shooting someone but that doesn’t mean you can’t hold your fellow soldiers partially responsible for incompetence and negligence. He seduced Ms. Fields and tricked her into helping him, and he convinced Mathis into helping him as well without really calculating the risk involved. I wonder if in the sequels Ms. Field’s ex-boyfriend or Mathis’ brother will appear looking for revenge against the man responsible for their deaths – James Bond!

He launches a completely unnecessary assault on Green’s hotel: Ok, there is no ticking time bomb, so why does Bond decide to launch a one-man assault on the place? It is just him and an inexperienced girl, both armed with pistols, attacking a place guarded by soldiers with assault rifles. Yeah, smart maneuver. There is no reason to attack the place anyways, because just because Green makes a payoff doesn’t mean you can’t pick him off later, same thing with that General. A smart agent would wait until he had a better time to get them.

Everything he did was unnecessary: Plus, the final thing that drove me nuts was that the entire case was actually pointless. Like I said before, their was no ticking time bomb, no deadline that had to be prevented. If Green gets the water rights, big fucking deal. The CIA or MI-6 can liquidate him later and then start a coup to over throw General Medrano. There was nothing going on in this movie that said Bond and the good guys had to tale immediate action. This isn’t like Thunderball with a nuclear bomb being used for blackmail, or even Day of the Jackal where a assassination is about to take place. Hell, they don’t even need a deadline. In Casino Royale Bond’s job is just to beat Le Chiffre in cards, which he does. It is Le Chiffre who is under pressure to get the money back by a certain date and because of that goes after Bond.

For those you say I am complaining too much, you are probably right. But I am not just sprouting off, “I hate Quantum of Solace”, I am explaining why I disliked it. And the reason I am saying this is because I like James Bond, and I like Daniel Craig as him, but I am disappointed with what they have put out. Hollywood will only make movies as good as you demand them to make, and I for one demand better.

I like the idea of a Kiefer Southerland/Jack Bauer type as one of the villains. I think Kiefer himself might be a bad idea because of all the baggage he would bring to the role. But the idea of an older, wiser, much more ruthless Bond-type as the villain intrigues me. Finally a villain who might be Bond’s better.

I would add a couple of stipulations though to what you said. I don’t think I would make him the main villain. Bond - and Jack Bauer - are operatives, field agents. They are the guys you send out to handle problems, not the ones you put in charge of an organization. While Bond and Bauer might be able to supervise and command a division or an operation, they wouldn’t have the skill sets to handle the administrating an entire secret organization or agency. But that leaves a question, who would be in charge?

Get an Anthony Hopkins type as the head of the group, operating as a kind of opposite number for M. Now you got some villains for a movie. It would be basically M taking on the head of Quantum, but instead of facing it other directly they would be fighting a war of proxy with their best operatives. It would be kind of like the old Bond movies when you had the main nemesis and his chief henchmen (Goldfinger and Oddjob), but updated for nowadays.

Just a suggestion.

However, to me, the film was a mess. Besides the bad direction and editing during the action scenes, the entire tone and story of the movie didn’t work. It was like the spy from Casino Royale was replaced by a stereotypical action star who just barrows through all of his problems.

Like I mentioned above, one of my big pet peeves of the movie was how James Bond acted. He is supposed to be a professional spy, yet in this movie he acted like a spoiled, hurt teenager. I know his girlfriend was killed (technically she committed suicide so she wouldn’t have to face the consequences of her actions) but that doesn’t give you the right to circumnavigate orders just for your own personal reasons. Someone mentioned how he just earned his license to kill – well it isn’t like a license to drive. It is something that you earn and after you have proved yourself worthy of it. You don’t get to use it for personal reasons, but at the discretion of the government.

Maybe it is because I was in the army that I can’t overlook this, but it does just drive me nuts. Two quick examples of James’ unprofessional behavior:

When he kills the man in his hotel room. So far, the only evidence they have to link him to Mr. White and Le Chiffre is that marked money. That is pretty flimsy evidence to say he is definitely connected to a terrorist group. And yes, he did attack James Bond, but that was after James Bond broke into his hotel room. I think you could claim self-defense. I mean, chances are he might be an unwitting courier or someone only tentatively linked to this group. Or he could be completely innocence and James Bond just killed. Lucky for Bond in the movie it is revealed he is an assassin (how convenient for him).

Once again I am going to mention the assault on the hotel at the end. I mean, you are a professional operative, probably ex-SAS, and your strategy is to do a full frontal attack armed with a SUV and some pistols on a place crawling with heavily armed guards? At least have James plant some bombs as diversion!

I will say there were some bright spots, mostly regarding Jeffrey Wright as Felix Leiter. That was the nuanced performance I was looking for. Here is a man conflicted between doing his duty and following orders, and also obeying his conscious and doing the right thing. Unlike Bond, who just wants to satisfy his own personal desire for revenge.

In short, just because you have a trilogy in mind, doesn't mean it'll be seen the way you want.

I mean, the scene where all the heads of Quantum meet at a charity opera, so Bond can conveniently learn how powerful this organization is and be able to take photos of those leaving? And of course they are trying to stay secret and not draw attention to themselves so their minions go out and have a shootout with James Bond right there at the event which SURELY the press will never notice. That played like old, fake Roger Moore’s Bond at it worst. You know what would have been more realistic? By having the heads of Quantum NOT meet. I mean, the mob learned after Appalachia, you don’t get together in large numbers because it draws attention to yourselves and you use messengers and emissaries.

Also, I disagree with those who don’t think Q is realistic enough to bring into the Bond universe. In the books his name is Major Boothroyd, and he is the chief armourer for the Q branch. His job is to outfit and maintain MI6 agents weapons. And even in this modern, more realistic universe Bond will sometimes need special weapons. Think Day of the Jackal (“Well security is going to be heavy, Bond, so we have taken the liberty of camouflaging your weapon as crutches so you should be able to get within 200 yards of the target”).

I think he actually goes to Q branch there instead of, say, the motor pool - but Thunderball is kind of an exceptional book in the Bond series...

OK maybe I'm being a bit purist, but even if you disregard the fact there are even any books out there, I STILL think having some stupid ass "Q" branch was a STUPID thing to do IN THE FIRST PLACE and a REALLY REALLY stupid thing to want to go BACK to.

Bond seems to be doing just fine with his Sony-Ericsson phone so far (everybody has a Sony-Ericsson, in case you hadn't noticed) and the LAST thing these films need right now is some bullshit contrived scene showing off a whole bunch of ridiculous tech that doesn't exist, except to serve as a convenient deus ex machina at a critical point in the film where the writers have literally run out of ideas.

NO THANK YOU

If I even catch wind of them reintroducing Q or R or any other similar bullshit, consider me officially OVER the franchise and DONE giving them another cent of my hard-earned.

Let me just make ONE thing clear because there are obviously a lot of people who MISSED this-

QoS is NOT a revenge flick - let me repeat that - it is NOT about Bond getting revenge!

Some of the very last lines of dialog sum it up perfectly - M says "it's nice to have you back" and Bond replies "I NEVER LEFT" - if it was all a bit too subtle for you, I suggest you go back and watch this film again - IT IS NOT ABOUT BOND SEEKING REVENGE.

Bond spends almost the ENTIRE film following leads he has picked up - specifically following the money - because that is HIS JOB. He spends about two minutes of the film, right at the end, dealing with the Vesper issue - and in case you missed it, HE DOESN'T KILL her boyfriend.

Continentalop, I get you're military and Bond does not behave in a very military fashion - and maybe if he did the films would be more "realistic"...

-but this isn't real life - this is THE MOVIES...

Actually - again this is maybe kinda subtle for some people - the closest this film gets to being about revenge is the fact that Quantum tries to kill M - his boss - and she purposefully leaves Bond on a long leash, doing just enough to keep her butt covered with her bosses but not enough to really stop Bond, because SHE wants to know about these people who infiltrated HER organisation to the point where she was sending their agents Christmas cards.

Seriously, if you didn't get this stuff watch it again - Bond is NOT going after the people responsible for Vesper's death in this film, he is investigating a secret organisation that is infiltrating governments and recruiting spies.

Let me repeat it just one more time for the dummies - THIS IS NOT A REVENGE FILM!