Read at your own risk. Spoilers included.

If you have NOT seen the new James Bond film and would very much like to. Warning, I’m about to curb your enthusiasm. I’m speaking in a lot of short hand here as I have no interest in writing an actual movie review, this is more a series of pointed rebuttals referencing elements in the movie, but I assume you’ll get the gist.

Oh, Spectre. How I hate thee. Let me count the ways.

At the end of Skyfall it was pretty clearly set up that M was the new leader of MI6, Money Penny no longer wanted to be a field agent and was now working at headquarters, Q had been established as the new, quartermaster, and that Bond had fully come to grips with his past and therefore his future: As a 00 intelligence agent serving Queen and Country, first. Yet, at this film opens rather than having him as a functioning field agent 00 working within the confines of the new, sleek MI6 with a new suite of co-workers and contemporaries doing the bidding of crown and country, he’s gone rouge/off the reservation on some half assed scheme to kill a random dude in Mexico because the previous M told him to in a videotape. Uh, what?

Why not share that directive with Mallory? (The new M) Who we established in the previous film as being kind of a bad ass himself and someone whom clearly respects Bond and the work his type of agent performs? It seems not that great of a stretch to believe he’d take the previous M’s directive seriously enough to warrant knowing the who and the why, not just the what. For that matter, so would Bond. There’s no reason to believe it wouldn’t have led to a sanctioned Mi6 investigation led by Bond; all completely above board and in-house.

What “stadium” full of people were the Mexican fellows going to blow up? And why? For that matter, how did Bond “stop that from happening”? Everyone who said anything about that plot line Bond killed in the opening scene without having revealed really anything at all. (Good work, intelligence gathering, James. Murder them all, THEN start asking some questions! Who’d you learn that foreign policy from, George W Bush?) I suppose we can, sort of assume/presume, that blowing up that stadium in some way would have been useful to Spectre. (Coercing the Mexican government into joining the intelligence consortium thing that C was brewing up back in London) but it seems a rather inefficient not to mention utterly ridiculous way of going about it.

“Moneyponey, search out any references to The Pale King”, says Bond upon his return from Mexico. On what, Google? What the fuck kind of a clue is that? It would likely have led her to the IDMB page for Pan’s Labyrinth rather than Spectre’s HQ.

Note to director and producer: If you don’t want the audience instantly keying into the fact that C, the rival of M and the head of the new intelligence organization that wants to in essence absorb and then dismantle MI6, is a villainous villain up to villainy then perhaps you shouldn’t have him delivering lines in a smarmy matter (all that was missing was a twirling mustache) and have him played by the actor who plays Moriarity on the BBC’s “Sherlock”. When he appeared on screen I had to suppress the urge to yell, “look it’s a bad guy pretending to be a good guy”!

Bond shows up at Spectre headquarters with no more complication than you or I might find a nearby Starbuck’s. Sweet!

Very subtle having their meetings at what appeared to be a billion dollar Roman villa. I was expecting a flashing neon sign to complete the scene.

Bond appears to believe that flashing that Spectre ring at the guards was all it took to gain entry. Really, James? It didn’t occur to you that was stupidly simple and that maybe, just maybe, they let you walk in? James, you so smart! Note to director and producer: You made James Bond look like a fucking idiot; he’s supposed to be smarter than that.

Drax the Destroyer from Guardians of the Galaxy is, who, exactly? I know from the credits his name is/was “Hinx” but at no time do we ever learn a thing about him. We’re just left to assume he’s some kind of visually striking nemesis/dolt for Bond to tussle with much as Roger Moore used to fight with Jaws back in the 70’s. There’s not so much as a single scene in the film that even establishes that he was ordered to pursue and execute Bond and/or what his personal motivations are. Super writing fellas!

SO glad the producers decided to bring back the gadgets in cars thing. I was just thinking about how awesome the Roger Moore era of Bond was, how can we get more of that stupid shit updated for 2015? Thanks Sam Mendez!

The angry fuck of The Merovingian’s wife at her Italian home. Because, yeah, of course that’s what would happen. I.e. Hey! I’m James Bond. I killed your assassin husband of convenience, followed you and your guards from his funeral to your Italian villa, murdered them because I have ESP and knew they were actually tasked at looking after you/if need be executing you rather than simply guarding your person before I even got here, and then after you clearly stated both that you think I’m irredeemable pond scum and that you’re a dead woman because Spectre will find you wherever you go and whatever you do, this somehow became an aphrodisiac which lent itself to some mad Bond boning action. Woo-hoo!

Bond gives her a post it with Felix Leiter’s number on it. Then he leaves. That’s how he/we know she’ll be safely whisked away! I mean, surely that’s all it would take for her to successfully evade Spectre, right? Don’t give it a second thought, Bond. I’m sure she’ll be fine.

Post script of utter ridiculousness. She’s attired in slinky lingerie including garters and stockings while this farewell is going on. Meaning, either, she was dressed like that for the funeral. (I kind of doubt it.)Or, after having been rolled through the hay by Mr. Bond she put that shit on so she’d look winsome and wanton laying on the bed while they have a farewell conversation; which as I relayed basically amounted to Bond saying call this number and good luck to you, Madame. (I said GOOD DAY, sir!)

The “connections”, and I use that term very loosely, between Mr. White, Hannibal Lector, Bowl Haircut Guy from Old Country for Old Men, and Quantum are pure idiocy. This is George Lucas sized ret-conning. One of the dozen screenwriters of this mess had the bright idea of saying, “What if…Spectre was actually in charge of everything the whole time”! And then they went ahead and shoehorned that revelation into this movie without even attempting to explain who any of it would have possibly fitted together and for what purpose.

Post script: In Quantum of Solace, “Quantum” *is* the ultimate big bad. (i.e. It was a stand-in for “Spectre”, which at the time no-one wanted to utilize in the new Bond films as it was cheesy, villain in a volcanic lair crap from the Roger Moore era of Bond.) They outright stated that it was a shadowy organization pulling strings, in charge of everything, hidden behind the scenes, etc. At no point did anything in that script even vaguely imply that organization was a part of a another. It was THE organization…until Sam Mendez & Co. wrote the script for this abortion of a flick and decided to bring back all of the 70’s crap the franchise has spent the last three films attempting to run away from. Sound decisions, guys.

Everything involving Mr. White’s daughter and Bond was completely absurd. The “hidden” health chateau, located atop the snowy hills of Mt. Fitness in Switzerland or whatever the fuck they were supposed to be as about as “hidden” as Epcot Center.

The idea of the health chateau itself was ripped off from the substandard non canon Bond film “”Never say never again”, which itself was a re-trend/re-make of “Thunderball”.

Q shows up. Ok, then. Why, exactly, the young genius quartermaster was willing to work expressly against the orders of the head of MI6 on behalf of a man he barely knows is never properly explained. I mean that’s one thing. (One stupid thing, but one thing.) Another is that he’s out-in-the-field at all. I mean, what?!

Nice plane chasing the car chase scene, director Mendez. And by nice, I of course mean completely and totally fucking stupid. You know how you elude an airplane? You stop the car. Or park in a garage. Or drive into a tunnel. Or enter a wooded area. Or about three dozen other things I can think of without even trying. But not these guys! Nope. They’re going to drive in nice open areas big enough to get dive bombed by an insane man in an airplane that defies the laws of physics and probability. And, Bond stops them! Because, of course. Bond: Faster n’ more furiouser!

Drax the Destroyer is not dead. See that hand twitch? That’s how you know that shit’s going to get real next time. Why it’s just like the “jokes” in the old Bond movies when Jaws would routinely get a house dropped on him or have a car land on his face, and then get up and dust himself off before continuing onto the next time he and Bond will meet up. Of course the old Bond movies in the Roger Moore era were deliberately a bit cheesy and would be a bit tongue in cheek about how unstoppable Jaws was. In this film, not so much. It’s all played totally straight. So you not only get not believable, you ALSO get not funny. It’s the best of both worlds, really.



Hidden room at the hotel which reveals hidden desert LAIR. (Think Dr. Evil’s voice when you say LAIR. Oh yes, they did it. It’s coming. Hold onto your fucking hat.)



Sidebar major thing I hated in this movie: Ariel shot of what is clearly London. And we get a nice “LONDON” title card. Ariel shot of what is clearly Mexico City. And we get a nice “MEXICO CITY” title card. I particularly like the title card “DAY OF THE DEAD” that pops up to helpfully let us know that the fucking huge, hundred thousand people plus, Dia De Los Muertos parade going on in downtown Mexico City is for that holiday. I mean, without the title card how could we know? It would have been a complete mystery! Audiences would be lost! Lost, I say!

Drax the Destroyers magically shows up on a train and James and he brawl in a manner the director/producers/screenwriters desperately hope someone will associate with the Sean Connery fist fight on a train in “From Russian with Love”. Nope. Sorry. It was stupid. And Drax gets his one and only line of dialogue in the entire movie. “Shoot”, says Drax as he’s yanked by the neck by a rope affixed to weights being pulled out of a train car. Presumably, he’s meant to show up (again and again) in subsequent Bond films a ’la Jaws. Shoot me now.

Now, finally, we meet Dr. Evil. And I mean, Dr. Fucking Evil. You see kids, the character of Dr. Evil is not at all subtly based upon the character of Ernst Blofeld from the old James Bond films; primarily of the Roger Moore era. (See also, “cheesy”, “70’s”.) He has a funky eye, a scarred face, and a Persian kitty. And the makers of Spectre decided that what would be really keen is to bring back to the big screen a character that has been so parodied to death that the very appearance will remind you more of Mike Meyers than anything actually threatening. So Christoph Waltz is, seriously, Dr. Evil in this movie. The fucking cat even shows up. And where do they meet? Why in his SECRET LAIR, Mr. Bond! Holy shit. I saw this fucking thing and still can’t believe they did that. And it gets worse. Stand by. You might need a shot of something strong.

The big reveal? The major plot point? The motivation of the big bad? The reason for everything? Why has Dr. Evil, (Sorry, I mean Ernst Blofeld) been plaguing James Bond all of these years and been “the architect of all of his pain”? It’s simple, really. You see Dr. Evil’s dad helped raise James Bond after his parents were killed. He asked young Dr. Evil to be friends with young Mr. Powers, I mean Bond, and once it became clear that Daddy liked James more than him, he KILLED Daddy and faked his own death so as he could spent the next several decades building a worldwide criminal empire. To take over the world(maniacal laughter) AND to vex James Bond. Because, to recap: My daddy liked you more than he liked me! Holy shit. The director, producers, and screenwriters of Spectre took the central plot point of Austin Powers: Goldmember and adapted it into a two hundred million dollar James Bond film.

There’s some more stupid bullshit in the denouement of the third act that unsatisfying resolves the James Bond/Mr. White’s daughter plotline, the fate of Dr. Evil, the end of C (Moriarty) and his new intelligence network, all before driving off into the sunset in Ye Old Aston Martin DB5, but I’m too exhausted by the entire ridiculous affair to go into any more detail.

James Bond will be back.

That’s at the end of the credits. Why did it feel more like a threat than a promise?