LogFAQs > #919587569

Just finished Thunderball.

Well, at least we don't have to worry about my list being the exact same as the other guy's, right?

4.. Doctor No.
3. From Russia With Love
2. Goldfinger
1. Thunderball

Fairly sure I've committed some sort of blasphemy here, but I really, really enjoyed Thunderball. Not sure what the hate is for it tbh.

I really liked Largo as a villain, particularly his back and forth with Bond, with them each very much knowing everything about the other, and knowing that the other knows everything about them, but trying to play it off. I liked the inversion of Bond's own tropes, with Fiona not so subtlety referencing Goldfinger, with Pussy Galore's side-switching after fucking Bond, that was a great confrontation. I also really liked that Domino was the one who got to kill Largo. Usually they give the important kills to Bond, so that was a nice touch.

I'm also a sucker for underwater shots. They're super hard to do and pull off, and there's some really beautiful underwater cinematography here, especially for the time. I'd argue it's definitely the prettiest Bond film so far.

The giant underwater fight scene at the end jumped back and forth between being really fucking awesome and really fucking stupid, but that's kinda the tone I've gotten from the Bond films as a whole as of yet, so it fit well tonally IMO.

The only things that I didn't like were the jetpack at the beginning and the weird thing with the back stretcher thing at the health spa, or whatever that was? Both of those looked real dumb tbh, but those were both really early in the movie, nothing else looked nearly as goofy as those things in the rest of the film. Also, the health spa definitely had bond at his rapiest yet, so that wasn't great.

Those things aside though, I thought the film worked really well. I really enjoyed SPECTRE being back in play, this time with a coherent and interesting evil plot. (I honestly couldn't tell you what their plan was in From Russia, With Love other than "Get revenge on Bond!!!... and something else... I think....")

So, yeah. Apparently it's not a popular opinion, but Thunderball's my favorite so far. Still have a fuck ton to go though.

I might try to see if I can get ahold of the original Casino Royale simply for completion's sake, but if not then it looks like You Only Live Twice is up next.
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"She was like, 'Oh, did you see that firefighter? Hes so cute.' And I was like, Mom, I just got blown up."