The series peaked with On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, but the bean-counters at EON Productions considered it Ian Fleming’s red-headed stepchild. The producers faulted George Lazenby, the first post-Connery 007, for the film’s initial lack of grosses and canned him after one outing. The commonality between that film and this is the appearance of a second Mrs. Bond (Lea Seydoux). (The presence of Louis Armstrong’s "We Have All the Time in the World" in these surroundings is frankly unclean.) The regular characters have changed much since the glory days of Connery. Q (Ben Whishaw) snacks on gummy worms. Christoph Waltz’s exposition-spewing jailhouse cameo as Ernst Stavro Blofeld owes more to Hannibal Lecter than it does 007’s nemesis-cum-brainsick foster brother. The Russian accent Mel Brooks adopted in The Twelve Chairs was more exacting than David Dencik’s sibilant Slav. Dialogue exchanges are interminable and director Cary Joji Fukunaga’s pacing is as thuddingly tedious as anything Roger Moore had to offer. The smooth transition of power between Bond (Daniel Craig) and 007 (Lashana Lynch) could be just what the script doctor ordered. (2021) — Scott Marks
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