On Bond.

The release of the latest Bond fiilm – Skyfall – has got me thinking about Bond again. It sort of fills a hole between Doctor Who seasons (well, in an even numbered year).

I’ve come up with a -mostly bobbins – theory to explain one annoying yet constant point that niggles me whenever I watch any number of them. How come Bond looks, sounds, and acts different when the main actor changes?

I think they tried to make out it was the same guy for a time – certainly there was a planned scene where Lazenby was to have plastic surgery to explain why Bond looked a bit different. But assuming that Bond would be that same age as Sean Connery, that made it ludicrous even by Licence to Kill that it was the same guy. He’d be claiming his pension!

I know the books have made more of an effort to stay true to the ‘same man’ philosophy but in the films? I just don’t buy it.

So, here’s Gary’s Bobbins Bond Bet: it’s a codename, passed from man to man.

There’s already some precedent for this in the film MI6. M has changed from Bernard ‘pass the sherry’ Lee; to Robert ‘Paddington Bear’ Brown, to Judi ‘Time Goes By’ Dench. Q has changed from Peter Burton, to Desmond Llewellyn; to John Cleese and now Ben Wishaw.

Why not Bond? I know this isn’t the most astounding of revelations, but it’ll give me something to ruminate on in the wee small hours….

Why always me?

Why another blog?

Why does the world need another blog? And – even if it does – why does it need one from me? There’s no answer to those questions. In all honesty, the world doesn’t need another blog. There’s millions of them in the world amounting to a wall of opinion, noise and comment, and frankly only about 1% of them are interesting. Bloggers, it seems to me, have a bit of an attitude sometimes. Yes, it’s publishing, but really – who cares? So really, this blog will never change the world. It’ll never bring down a government, change a business or cause a revolution. Sorry.

So why a blog for me? I tweet a bit (@garybrannan or @gbrannanarchive, depending on what side of me interests you more) and yes, I Facebook (but that’s for friends only, thanks). Sometimes, in the wee small hours of the morning, I find myself having long, drawn out thoughts. Sometimes about archives. Sometimes about politics or current affairs. Or sometimes about the ins and outs of Doctor Who continuity.

 So maybe, that’s what this is for – a means for me to record my longer thoughts. If it makes you laugh once or twice, well – that’s bonus enough for me.

Hello world!

First post.  I expect to hear the crashing of bottles of Asti Spumante on the bows SOON.