Kevin Roegele said:
First of all, Bond movies have not been going strong for forty years. There was trouble when Connery left, filling the shoes of the man the audiences knew as Bond; then when Lazenby left, and Connery left again. Bringing in Roger Moore worked with Live and Let Die, but The Man with the Golden Gun performed comparitively lethargically at the box office. Thus, EON took a three year break to make the best bond ever and save the series, hence The Spy Who Loved Me - a very different film to The Man with the Golden Gun.
There were problems again when Licence to Kill was deemed to gritty by US audiences, Dalton not achieving the popularity of Moore or Connery, and Bond seemed to be collapsing under the likes of Lethal Weapon and Arnie movies. A six year legal battle didn't help either. Many considered 007 was a cold war relic as a series and should be abandoned - addressed in the movie GoldenEye, which came along and saved the series.
As for the stuff about restarts - Bond has been restarted repeatedly. The Living Daylights is a restart - Timothy Dalton's Bond is simply not old enough to have done the stuff Connery's Bond did in the 60's. GoldenEye is a restart.
Bond has to change with the times - that's why he's lasted. A Bond for the previous generation will not appeal to the current cinema going generation. And they have changed with the times. Look at From Russia With Love and Diamonds are Forever - so different it's hard to believe they are of the same series, let alone both within Connery's reign. Look at Moonraker - one of the most successful of all Bond movies - which suits the late 70's taste for big spectacle and sci-fi, and then For Your Eyes Only which followed, a very sober, John Le Carre-style Cold War thriller.
That's why Bond has lasted, because like batman, he adapts to the mood and taste of the audience.
No, Bond has not been restarted.
They may have continued on with re-casts, but none have ever been a restart. None of those movies that you have ever mentioned have thrown out trademark Bond elements, such as Q, Moneypenny, and the gadgets, as is the case with these movies. None of the movies have thrown out his history, to make him a rookie agent in the year 2006, making that when he becomes part of MI6.
No, they have kept those elements in place, with different actors. Even Brosnan and Judi Dench, who brought in the newest era of Bond, didn't bring a restart. They brought a continuation, in which this was the same Bond character from the previous 15 movies, or however many came before
GoldenEye, and an M character who was a new member in the line of M's that have headed MI6.
Casino Royale, however, throws the Bond character out the window, and is making an all new character. This isn't the same James Bond from
Dr. No up until
Die Another Day. This is a new Bond, and it's not just because it was a recast. Sean Connery, George Lazenby, Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton, and Pierce Brosnan are all different actors who played the same character. Daniel Craig is not playing the same character. He is playing someone different.
And I am not excited about it. The nature of Bond films as they are is to evolve with the times. You don't need to remake the character, and make him a rookie in 2006 to evolve with those times. They aren't doing it for any productive purpose. This is change for the sake of change. Because restarts are the fad right now.
And you mention all the problems this franchise has had over the decades, but the sole and simple fact that these movies have gone on for 20 movies, over 40 years, a feat that NO OTHER movie franchise has ever accomplished, is a testament to the fact that the character of James Bond never died, never got old. Maybe at some points, the interest wasn't as high. But that interest always came back, in one way or another.
This franchise isn't a laughing stock, like the Batman movies, which were considered to be disgraces to the character of Batman. Those movies NEEDED a restart. That character needed something to be done to exorcise the demons of the original 4 movies.
Bond didn't.
This may sound like I'm taking this a bit too seriously (and maybe I am), but
GoldenEye is kind of tainted for me now, knowing the same guy who did that movie is the same one who's gonna destroy the character, with needless changes for no other reason than for the sake of change.
