The past is haunting

by Abhishek Singh, Staff Reporter

Expectations of Spectre, the new Bond movie that arrives in November 2015 have been rocketing above the sky.

Spectre’s name itself pays homage to old fans of the series. It pays homage because of the movie name since “Spectre” is a deadly terrorist organization since the first Bond movie.  Skyfall was an entire different direction for the universe, but it was the biggest change fans saw with the character Bond himself. It was interesting to see the potential of a newly born Bond, which can always be the case since the series has reached its 50 year anniversary.

While the reception of Skyfall was excellent, the fans felt a sort of displeasure because it wasn’t the typical Bond film where he had a mission, in Skyfall, there was NO mission. Which raises a serious question, will Spectre be better than Skyfall?

While little is known about Spectre, the audience can assume various themes and ideas only from its name.

According to IMDb, the synopsis states “A cryptic message from Bond’s past sends him on a trail to uncover a sinister organization. While M battles political forces to keep the secret service alive, Bond peels back the layers of deceit to reveal the terrible truth behind SPECTRE.”

The title and synopsis can infer various different possibilities and one that many fans hope, the return of Blofield. Blofield was behind the entire Spectre organization. As of now, no casting can be confirmed as for the character Blofield except the speculation and leaked documents which state Christoph Waltz starring as Franz Oberhauser.

However, it would be astounding to see a cameo or reference toward him since all Bond movies are similarly in the same universe. With that in retrospect, only one can hope that Spectre can be the Bond movie fans have been drooling for since the release of Casino Royale.

“From what I remember the movie was pretty cool (Skyfall) and every James Bond movie I’ve ever saw was one of the coolest movies of all time,” spanish teacher Neal Reff said.

Skyfall was the movie that twisted and turned Bond into an entirely new direction. While some liked it, some didn’t. It’s perfectly understandable why fans were unsatisfied with the final movie.

In the movie, Bond seems to be battling his own personal demons which affected performance and focus on MI6. While MI6 was in trouble and Bond was no where to be seen, it created an uneasy and interesting plot point.

However, Bond’s character was rather vague and seemed to lack personal intentions and most importantly it lacked an interesting villain. Bond has always been known to have great and interesting villains but Silva (played by Javier Bardem) was rather.. well plain. The background story of Silva was unexplained but only a couple sentences of revenge.

While the story was intact and interesting much like a Bond movie, the characters felt washed out and rather boring. Hence, making fans unhappy. While much is known for Skyfall and only one can assume Spectre may be better, which seems to be on the wish list with all James Bond fans.

“Yea totally, I’m gonna watch the next Bond movie this year (2015),” junior Joshua Contero said.

It’s up to fans to decide whether to open up after two disappointing Bond movies. There is no doubt that the Bond series will continue to grow and continue to innovate with an interesting character. Daniel Craig portrays Bond and fans seem to be pleased with him.

Spectre should hopefully bring back what the audience loves about Bond and extremely crave from villians. It’s an effect that excites all fans for November, and mainly the old school Bond fans.