The Real James Bond – Joy Ohiaeri

A man in a tuxedo walks up to the bartender and orders for a martini, shaken not stirred… Just as his  order comes in, he notices a beautiful woman seated beside me and introduces himself; my name is Bond, James Bond..

That’s a line from the James Bond Legend, one of the most successful franchises of motion pictures. Basically it’s about a secret agent code named 007 with the British agency MI6 agent that always saves the day… and gets the girl as an extra catch in the bargain. And no matter how many times the story is told or how many remakes they make, it just never loses his flavour. And who can blame us? The world clearly needs saving. So as long as there’s a villain threatening the world’s peace we’re always going to need a Bond.

The Bond franchise has spurned out six Bonds over the years with the likes of Sean Connery; loved his Bond not to mention his ability to age gracefully. Then we had a brief spell with George Lazenby. Up next was Roger Moore. After which we had Timothy Dalton, though I never understood how he made the cut. Then came my favourite Pierce Brosnan and finally the current champion Daniel Craig.

I find Craig to be a deviation from the Bond character. How? 007 is meant to be this suave and charming guy that gets the bad guy without blooding his fingers. Craig I felt was the opposite. His Bond movies were tad violent for my taste. Guess the Bond franchise wanted to go in a different direction and their gambit paid for considering Craig grossed in the highest figures of all the Bonds from the box office. So violence does pay.

Back to my favourite Bond character, Pierce Brosnan born May 16, 1953 in Ireland. He was Bond from 1995 to 2002 with four 007 movies to his credit ‘Golden Eye, Die Another Day, The World is not Enough, Tomorrow Never Dies’. For me Brosnan was the perfect Bond; dashing, charming, saving the world without working up too much sweat.

Pierce’s movies had the usual Bond techy gadgets and great villains. Brosnan also revived the Bond series after a six year lull caused by legal disputes. Plus he also got to act with Hollywood’s starlet Halle Berry on Die another Day… Need I say more? But feel free to disagree if you will.

The Bond series just released Daniel Craig’s fourth movie as 007 titled ‘Spectre’. So I think we may be ready for another Bond. Wonder who’s it’s going to be? Once I heard a rumour that Colin Farrell almost made Bond but his bad boy ways put a stop to it. Yeah right you say. Like I said, a rumour. But it would have nice to see him as Bond. And for all yah canvassing for Idris Abba as the next Bond. Wake up folks! Bond character is a WHITE secret agent if you get my drift. So please let’s move on. I think Idris will have better luck auditioning for the SHAFT franchise. So I’m going to stick with Colin for now.

We would Love to hear who your favourite Bond character is and who you would like to see play the next Bond. Cheerio.

And keep watching the movies.

The Real James Bond was written by Joy Ohiaeri who writes from Lagos and is a big movie lover. She can be contacted on Twitter @jollyhoodmovies