SPECTRE: Predictions and Speculation (SPOILER FREE ZONE)

Thought this might be a good idea for predictions/speculation, so our ideas aren't lost in the press conference thread.

I'd like to address Bellucci's character, Lucia Sciarra.

I'm suspicious. There has to be something special about this character, now that we know they're bringing back SPECTRE and classic Fleming characters. If you look at the modern Bond girls since GOLDENEYE, none of them have been older than 35. After banking $2.5+ billion since 2002, I doubt they're going to change the formula this time around, just for the hell of it to see what happens.

As Gravy suggested in the other thread:

Quote :

Belluci is playing an Italian character pronounced: Lucia. My guess is she's Blofeld's wife. Sleeps with Bond. She pays the price with her life. Then Blofeld gets back at Bond by killing something he's shown that he loves: Madeline.

Madeline will be the woman to make Bond want to get married and think about a normal life, but their time together will be tragically cut short when Blofeld and Hinx fire a bullet into the windshield of Bond's DB10, killing Madeline.

That's a theory. I certainly think she's going to be a love interest, in a way like Tracy was in OHMSS. Plus, Craig's going to be 47 by the time this film is finished, and Bellucci is in that age range. I think she's the best candidate for a Mrs. Bond, or, like Gravy said, a woman that he falls in love with.

Either way, this isn't just your run-of-the-mill, bag and run Bond girl.

Or she's Blofeld.

Bellucci as Blofeld would be a great twist.

Erica Ambler wrote:

Bellucci as Blofeld would be a great twist.

We'll see. If Mendes did anything last time, he showed people he could steal from TWINE and make people forget it just happened a few years ago. If he feels the need to go back and steal the Elektra/Renard dynamic...the storyline...then he will and he'll do a great job at it. But long time fans of the movie and books will remember that Nina Bismaquer was also Blofeld in FOR SPECIAL SERVICES, so we do have an inkling of what to look for in this movie.

Not sure I like this title, but it beats some of the other suggestions. The teaser poster is great. You don't really know what the shattered glass is supposed to mean. We see the Octopus, but was the Octopus the target of the shot, or did it emerge from the bullet hole to take responsibility for the person that was just shot????

The more I think about it, the more I believe Bellucci has been brought on to be the main villain; Waltz's casting was a red-herring. He'll be the face of the organization, but she's the brains and the power. At the end of the movie, it is Oberhauser driving the car that speeds by Bond and Madeline, as Lucia Blofeld leans out the window and fires a shot into Bond and Madeline's car. Madeline is dead. The retirement/wedding is off.

Fade to ONE REPUBLIC's version of ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD or a song similar to APOLOGIZE.

I don't think they'll have Bond fall in love with the same actor who fell in love with Vesper, and I don't think they'll redo Tracy. I do wonder if Lucia Scarria (which is a name I really like) could potentially be Maria Freudenstein...

The big reveal is 007 is Blofeld.

I will throw it out there and say Quantum becomes SPECTRE so that the producers save QOS from becoming pointless, but also because the new one liner re: Spectre's plot suggests that a message from Bond's past could be Quantum.

Here's what I'm thinking: Sciarra is the head of whatever is left over of Quantum. Blofeld is trying to wrest control from her, and when the first attempt fails, he tries to manipulate Bond by posing as Oberhauser.

FieldsMan wrote:

I don't think they'll have Bond fall in love with the same actor who fell in love with Vesper, and I don't think they'll redo Tracy. I do wonder if Lucia Scarria (which is a name I really like) could potentially be Maria Freudenstein...

One of the things I see in SKYFALL is the idea that there is this whole secretive, shadowy world out there - and that when it reaches out to us, the effects are devastating. So I wonder if SPECTRE will work in the opposite direction. I think Swann might be an innocent in all of this, someone who catches a glimpse of that world and immediately becomes marked for it.

Why revive something of which Eon should be ashamed?

SPECTRE is associated with the heyday of Bond. Forget the shoddy imitation.

FieldsMan wrote:

I will throw it out there and say Quantum becomes SPECTRE so that the producers save QOS from becoming pointless, but also because the new one liner re: Spectre's plot suggests that a message from Bond's past could be Quantum.

Going closer to the books, my guess would be that Blofeld was originally a member of Quantum, and that over the years he had been collecting a large sum of money and info to himself. Bond took down Quantum, but Blofeld makes a run with everything he obtained to form his own organization.

Mendes should forget Quantum. Different continuity.

I'd largely abandon Quantum, but if they should be referenced ever again I'd prefer they be mentioned as being disbanded, just an organization that Bond took care of long ago. Basically like how SMERSH was mentioned to be dissolved in the novels as SPECTRE was coming into focus.

Erica Ambler wrote:

Why revive something of which Eon should be ashamed?

SPECTRE is associated with the heyday of Bond. Forget the shoddy imitation.

100% agree.

I like how Mendes has even convinced EON to move on from that Quantum bullshit.

Mendes knows the material and brings the money home. Let him do what he wants. I'm just glad that he has all of the Fleming material at his disposal now and isn't afraid to use it.

Erica Ambler wrote:

Mendes should forget Quantum. Different continuity.

I think he forgot about it after seeing it.

A lot of people like to stretch and claim that there's continuity between CR/QOS and SKYFALL. There isn't. Get over it.

It's not that I think there is continuity between CR/QOS and SF (as continuity has been fucked from the get go in the Bond-o-verse), but I'm assuming the outcome will be something like what MP suggested, especially given the plot line that was just announced.

And on that, I gather Ralph Fiennes won't be entirely desk bound, either.

SKYFALL is what I call a soft reboot, taking place in the same timeline but it's very distant from where CR/QOS left off. The only real references being Bond waiting for M in her flat and the conversation with Severine alluding to Vesper.

I feel there is greater stylistic continuity between the classic era of the series and SF than there is between it and CR-QOS so I am more than happy to consign CR & QOS to a dead end alternate universe of Bond... they are probably the only two Bond's I wouldn't be sorry if I never saw again.

As to Bond24 I am disappointed we are going back to SPECTRE and Blofeld...it just seems unnecessary. Even worse would be to retread the OHMSS arc a la Tracy..... to that end I could see it turned on its head however, with Bond actually responsible in some way for Blofeld's love interest death which in effect turns the pair into mirror images of one another inspired/driven in two opposite directions (making Blofeld female works doubly well in this scenario).

Makeshift Python wrote:

the conversation with Severine alluding to Vesper.

What conversation?

lachesis wrote:

I feel there is greater stylistic continuity between the classic era of the series and SF than there is between it and CR-QOS so I am more than happy to consign CR & QOS to a dead end alternate universe of Bond...  they are probably the only two Bond's I wouldn't be sorry if I never saw again.]

Spot-on.

lachesis wrote:

(making Blofeld female works doubly well in this scenario).

Absolutely right.

Erica Ambler wrote:

Makeshift Python wrote:

the conversation with Severine alluding to Vesper.

What conversation?

"I know when a woman is afraid and pretending not to be."

You can take it or leave it.

lachesis wrote:

I feel there is greater stylistic continuity between the classic era of the series and SF than there is between it and CR-QOS so I am more than happy to consign CR & QOS to a dead end alternate universe of Bond...  they are probably the only two Bond's I wouldn't be sorry if I never saw again.

Agreed. I think SKYFALL is more closely related to GOLDFINGER than CASINO ROYALE or QUANTUM.

Am I the only one who doesn't want to see a female Blofeld?

Makeshift Python wrote:

Erica Ambler wrote:

Makeshift Python wrote:

the conversation with Severine alluding to Vesper.

What conversation?

"I know when a woman is afraid and pretending not to be."

You can take it or leave it.

Could mean anyone.

FieldsMan wrote:

Am I the only one who doesn't want to see a female Blofeld?

I don't want to see Blofeld at all....but if we do, clearly its not the Blofeld we knew so why not?

Control wrote:

lachesis wrote:

I feel there is greater stylistic continuity between the classic era of the series and SF than there is between it and CR-QOS so I am more than happy to consign CR & QOS to a dead end alternate universe of Bond...  they are probably the only two Bond's I wouldn't be sorry if I never saw again.

Agreed. I think SKYFALL is more closely related to GOLDFINGER than CASINO ROYALE or QUANTUM.

Which makes sense, given that Bond by SF is supposed to be the Bond we're more familiar with in the classic films, whereas CR/QOS are supposed to be his "Bond Begins" rather than actually representing what his following films would be like.

Makeshift Python wrote:

CR/QOS are supposed to be his "Bond Begins" rather than actually representing what his following films would be like.

CR/QoS is how Craig saw Bond  - an imperialist woman-hating bastard. Skyfall was Craig accepting Bond as the rest of the world saw him.