Casino Royale - New Bond, New Girl, New Villain

Saw the film over the weekend. Generally pretty good, though the last half-hour really dragged; the big action setpieces are very much frontloaded.

But...

Spoiler:

I still think that the decision to take the series out of continuity--to "reboot it" as it were, is awful, essentially pissing on 20 films and 40 years of cinema. It seems that just because "Batman Begins" was a success, the filmmakers decided to tack on a reboot as an afterthought.

And it really was an afterthought--changing five or so lines would have left the film totally in continuity with the others. Granted, Bond never had the strongest continuity, but damn it, it was continuity. To piss all that away for an afterthought of an add-on just makes me mad.

Continuity's not just a river in Egypt, folks.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by LeHah

That arguement doesn't make any sense. Goldeneye, Living Daylights, OHMSS or Live And Let Die were all reboots that did the exact same thing this one did - but they didn't piss all over the series like you claim.

They weren't reboots in the way I'm using the term. Yes, they featured new actors with different takes on the character, but they were fully in continuity with the previous films, even ones with different actors, in that they acknowledged that those movies had taken place.

For example, in OHMSS, Lazenby's Bond is shown going over gadgets he collected in previous adventures, even though he was played by Connery in those movies. Moore's Bond is shown putting flowers on his wife's grave in "For Your Eyes Only;" Dalton's Bond "was married once," according to Leiter. And Brosnan's Bond goes through a whole roomful of junk from previous films in "Die Another Day."

There are more examples, of course. "Casino Royale," like the other Bond transitions, features a new take on the character. I'm fine with that and I like Craig's Bond. I just wish it didn't start the series' continuity over from scratch.

There's nowhere I can't reach.