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They did run out of road eventually, but all stories do- and then they come to an end.
This is a good point. There weren't many more directions for Craig's Bond's endings to go.
I suppose they could have done YOLT amnesia but (a) that would read in 2021 as Bourne in reverse, (b) it's almost as depressing as Bond dying so why not go all the way and kill him, (c) amnesia is a silly soap opera concept to begin with, and (d) amnesia for Craig's last film really would set up Bond #7 poorly by comparison.
I do think NTTD's ending is much braver than, say, The Dark Knight Returns, which is too clever, and too derivative, by half. Faking one's own death is almost as bad a cliche as the hero entering the witness protection program.
Eon chose the best of the options they had and killed off their hero heroically and made it personal to him. In a way, I bet Barbara knew. Michael is not young.
I guess you could have him heroically take the blame for something or other to save MI6 in some way and sort of go on the run, never to be seen again? I guess that's sort of your witness protection thing :D
Agreed that amnesia is a bit too naff, although it does give a bit of the tragic ending. May as well just kill him for that though.
I guess you could do a variant of the happy ending thing and give him a knighthood? Bit cheesy? I guess having the daughter means you could perhaps have done the Spectre ending again but it would feel different enough, although would it be very Bond for him to go off and live with his family? I dunno. Interested to hear any thoughts for alternatives.
But yeah I can’t think of a more fitting ending to NTTD specifically than killing Bond off. How they specifically did it there’s I think a lot of leeway and I might have gone down a different path but it felt inevitable as the conclusion
Not to say that having a new Bond for B25 would’ve yielded any different results as far as the Amazon takeover - but I do think it’s an interesting scenario to ponder.
As far as the best ending to the series - you can’t go wrong with OHMSS or CR but I don’t think the series should shy away completely from endings where Bond does get the girl just for the sake of doing something different. Give me a nice healthy balance of both and I’ll be happy.
Yeah you're probably right; I can't quite see it, but if they went Brofeld and "Die Blofeld, die!" it feels like there might have been a way of making something as out there work. Maybe have the nanobots established as eating the memory centre of the brain or something- that kind of works?
"James Bond Will Return"
Personally, I'm fine with Bond dying and love the film as is, but I suppose audiences coming off the pandemic who perhaps wanted less of a "downer ending" might have been served by that alternate reality.
The question on this thread is "does NTTD have the best ending in the franchise"
So for anyone who doesn't like the idea of James Bond being killed off, the answer will be "no". They will prefer the ending of almost any other movie in the franchise.
Hmmm, would Fleming have post scripted Bond's death with "James Bond will return"?
Fleming's FRWL ending was ambiguous and in the end he chose not to kill off Bond, then or later, nor did he go to the lengths that NTTD did to try and make the decision definitive and irreversible for those following.
In any case the question is about it being the best ending in the franchise, not the best ending for Craig-Bond, or the best ending for James Bond's career
Is the ending of NTTD better than that of OHMSS etc?
Ending - Bond has saved the World but can never be with his family again, due to the nanobots. We see him lying on hilltop watching his family through binoculars from a distance. He lowers the binoculars and looks wistful, camera slow zoom out away up into the sky... (or similar)
That's as may be, but it doen't necessarily make NTTD the best ending in the history of the franchise, or even the best ending in the Craig era
Bingo
Yeah that's cool, I guess you have to give him a form of tragedy at the end as it just sort of fits the character in a way, and the family thing would work. Maybe work the story so that he has to fake his death from only them for some reason and they can't know he's alive? Not sure how, but I'm sure it could be written that way.
Yeah, I kind of still think it could have been more upbeat at the end, a bit like how OHMSS ends on that big version of the Bond theme even though Tracy's dead. I reckon you could have ended it on Madeline in the Aston telling her story about a man called Bond, James Bond- and then just actually cut to the story: a montage of Bond in his pomp doing loads of crazy Bond things, jumping off a mountain on skis, driving a tank through a city, piloting a mini jet, a jet boat.. y'know, loads of big Bond stuff with the theme blaring out. A bit like how the Spider Man films used to end on those big shots of him swinging through the city. So he'd be dead, but you'd kind of still be ending on a high.
I was fine with it too (and still am, even more emphatically) because it worked on several levels:
1. The death of this version of the character, in an altruistic suicidal way, which is an element of heroism.
2. The symbolic death of the character, which has been hinted at many times over (YOLT, TMWTGG, and DAF, as well as SF). NTTD plays on this trope and takes it to a new level. No, Bond hasn't actually died....he'll be back in the next film. So is very "meta."
3. The mythic death of the character, which functions across #1 and #2. If you slow down the explosion, the image of Bond is split in two, a signifier of Bond's duality, in Jungian terms. Remember what Madeleine said in SP: "There are two of you. Two Jameses." Indeed. This version of Bond was the most Jungian of all.
4. More recently, the death of EON. This really seals it. In some way, I think DC, BB, and MW knew this was going to be the end of the franchise, as we knew it. Makes sense. 25 films. Boom. The end. It all works.
I am still not 100% pleased with the execution of #1. When Bond said in SF "Did I overcomplicate the plot?" who knew he'd be talking about the next two films. NTTD took directions it didn't need to. I never would have had Bond poisoned at the end. Instead, the decision to stay and make sure the doors remain opened, for the sake of his child and the human race, should have been his and not one he was forced into. But those are my two cents.
I don't think audiences in 2021 wanted to see a Bond banished from seeing his family just for the sake of Bond not dying.
It's essentially life in prison, which is arguably worse than death.
An interesting perspective
Crikey, I think you jumped the metaphysical shark there!
Who would actually ever do that? (apart from yourself)
Yes, with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, I tend to think there was an element of this involved and I am ambivalent about it.
An insightful philosophical distinction
Does that mean that you believe that every heroic character who uses violence must eventually die violently?
He who lives by the sword dies by the sword?
I certainly agree that Babs-Eon and Craig developed a fatalistic attitude toward Bond, particularly after the success of Skyfall, where they decided on the death of M as a dramatic send off for Dame Judy. Modern audiences seem to love to wallow in melodrama, and what could possibly top that, other than the death of Bond himself?
All part of the current fashion for constantly building up and then killing off significant characters for surprise twist value, which, in the Bond-verse, began with Mathis, who was introduced and built up in CR before being despatched, for shock effect, in QoS.
Never happened to Dirty Harry / Rambo / Rocky / John McLane or Martin Riggs, but I guess they never made it to 25 (27) editions... even John Wayne eventually died on screen in 1972 (The Cowboys)
However, pre Craig, Movie-Bond was never that sort of character and it will remain a subject for debate whether he should be.
He's a fictional character, he's banished or he dies, take your personal pick, but personally, I would think that Bond dying would trump Bond not being able to be with his family on a list of audience concerns.
You think?
Eventually Bond would watch "Cast Away" (with Tom Hanks), and learn to move on with his life...
You know his name, and he knows things often don't work out as we would like, even if Craig did tend to play him as an emotionally insecure teenager at times.
If you take a life do you know what you'll give?
Odds are you won't like what it is...
The coldest blood runs through my veins...
Forget how to feel
Life is gone with just a spin of the wheel
And Bond would "treat those two imposters just the same"