Skyfall Snobbery

I’ve been writing film reviews over on the Belfast Times recently, so there haven’t been many updates here. From now on, the entries will probably be more like this. And there’ll be game reviews from time to time as well. 

If you want the movie reviews, clicky on the linky above.

Anyway, here’s a coupla short observations for you.

Skyfall Screw-ups

So, since I saw Skyfall this thought has been running through my head. In the movie continuity it’s usually assumed that the name James Bond is a codename (it is, isn’t it?) as a way to explain away different actors portraying Bond. The book continuity obviously doesn’t need this. But Skyfall messes with that but taking James Bond back to his roots; the titular Skyfall estate where we’re told the names of his parents, Andrew Bond and uh…Mummy Bond. So that now James Bond becomes his actual birth name.

But then you have M, who muddies the waters to a stupefying extent. It’s spelled out in the film that she has been doing this job for a long time, since at least the Hong Kong handover, and as we’ve seen she was in charge of Bond during Brosnan’s tenure, does that mean that Craig is Brosnan (and by extension Connery, Lazenby, Moore and Dalton)? And then does that mean that the Craig films are prequels?

Well, no.

Obviously. 

Wait, that's not right.

But I think this is what bothered me the most about Skyfall. It posits that Bond has had this long history, by throwing in little nods to the franchises past (the Aston DB5, the Q branch exploding pen gag) which means that these things have happened in the past to previous Bonds, but at the same time expects us to believe that Craig’s Bond is the only Bond there’s ever been.

Well, it’s either that, or MI6 hired a guy whose name just happens to be the same as the codename they’ve been using for 007 for the past fifty years.

Unlikely though.

TV Snobbery

One thing that has been really getting on my nerves recently is snobbery, specifically when it comes to TV. More often than not I’ve been told I should watch one or all of the following; Community, Parks and Recreation, Louie, Girls. I haven’t watched any of those besides a few episodes of Community which I couldn’t get into. I’m sure these programmes are fine and all, but people constantly telling me that I should watch Show XYZ are ever going to change my mind. 

It especially grinds my gears when people tell me I should watch Show XYZ rather than shows I do watch like The Big Bang Theory. I love The Big Bang Theory. It makes me laugh. A lot of people (internet folks mostly) tell me that I shouldn’t watch it for no other reason than it’s popular. I always counter with the fact that it’s popular for a reason. Mostly because it’s funny. (Two and a Half Men is the exception however) And yes, while it may not be as cutting as other shows, and most definitely broader in its humour, it doesn’t mean it’s not good. People these days seem to think that for a show to be considered good it must be as niche and as cult-y and as watched by as few people as possible. The irony being that they never stop telling other people to watch it.

Fucking hipsters.