Abstract
This chapter introduces James Bond Uncovered, tracing Bond’s appearance across a range of media—spanning novels, comic strips, television, films and games—with particular attention paid to the processes by which Bond has been adapted. Responses to James Bond stories, from critics, theorists and consumers are considered, alongside discussion of a ‘Bondian formula’ that guides the production of Bond texts, principally the Eon films, as well as analysis of Bond in terms of franchise cinema.
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Notes
- 1.
Bond’s possible death from poison at the end of Fleming’s novel From Russia, with Love (1957) contrasts with this pattern, though Dr. No (1958) commences with reference to his recovery. The seeming killing-off of his character reflects Fleming’s disenchantment at the time. In a 1956 letter to Raymond Chandler he wrote ‘My own muse in not in a good way … It has been difficult to make Bond go through his tricks in From Russia, with Love’ (quoted in F. Fleming , ed., 2016, 230). Fortunately, the growing popularity of the Bond stories meant that the series continued.
- 2.
GoldenEye (1995) took the name of Fleming’s Jamaican holiday home and writing retreat as the source of its title.
- 3.
A different challenge faced Glidrose (later Ian Fleming Publications ), the business overseeing Fleming’s literary works. Fleming’s illness and death made their need for fresh Bond books more immediately pressing, and the first continuation novel, Colonel Sun, was published in 1968.
- 4.
Raymond Benson has written in both categories.
- 5.
A popular notion within Bond lore is that actors’ third Bond movies are generally their best. Connery’s Goldfinger , Moore’s The Spy Who Loved Me and Craig’s Skyfall (2012) would seem to bear this out.
- 6.
Moore’s 2008 autobiography My Word Is My Bond demonstrates the same phenomenon.
- 7.
Hunt was also 2nd Unit director on You Only Live Twice and went on to direct On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
- 8.
It was only with the 1996 film Mission: Impossible , itself derived from the 1960s TV spy show of the same name, that an effective US competitor to Bond emerged. As McKay observes, with ‘set-pieces, locations, sex and spying’ (2008, 308) de Palma’s film followed, and delivered effectively, on the Bondian formula.
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Strong, J. (2018). Introduction. In: Strong, J. (eds) James Bond Uncovered. Palgrave Studies in Adaptation and Visual Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76123-7_1
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