James Bond cannot be genderbent

Piorn

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James Bond is a character that is defined by maybe 5 traits at best(man, suit, vodka martini, british, cars, whatever). He is a vehicle for spy and action stuff. The fact that so many actors can pick up these key traits and become "the James Bond" speaks volumes.
He's "Spyman vs the enemy". He's an archetype. He's not interesting, his actions are.

A female british spy would work, it just wouldn't be James Bond.
 

the December King

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Jux said:
I find it all strangely possessive that people are so against a female Bond, or even a black Bond (not here specifically, but I think a lot of people remember the outcry when Idris Elba was floated as a possible Bond candidate). I don't understand what it takes away from people, having him reimagined as another gender, or color of skin. 'Because it's canon' is frankly a lazy argument, and nothing more than an appeal to tradition.
Personally, I don't want to sound like I'm against the idea, like I'd aggressively protest somehow, or lobby to, I dunno, have the studio shut down or something. If it gets green lit, then I'm sure it would make someone somewhere happy to see, and who am I to take that from someone?

But on the other hand, I'm not interested in seeing a film featuring a female James Bond, I wouldn't watch it, and therefore wouldn't spend money on it. I find that sex and gender identity, at least in the case of James Bond and other action/adventure films/games, play a large role in my relating to the protagonist and potentially enjoying this sort of escapism.
 

Jux

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Something Amyss said:
watched the hell out of Sherlock, and even other versions of the character (House before it got boring, Monk). I think the problem here is that Bond really became popular FOR those rather racist, sexist, even rapey elements. Other than the martini, what's a character trait of Bond that's clearly defined that doesn't revolve around them? I grew up on Bond, and I'm kind of at a loss.
The character elements that I would say define Bond and are intergal to his character are that Bond is a spy who uses cool gadgets, is a lone wolf sort of character who rarely relies on any kind of team work (equal teamwork, having 'helpers' is as far as I'd say his teamwork goes), is suave (probably what most separates him from Bourne, along with less emphasis on martial arts in the fight scenes), and has a pretty dry sense of humor/wit.

While no doubt I'm sure plenty of people are attracted to the character for the male power fantasy, and all the sexist, rapey shit that comes along with it, I don't think that needs to define the character. You can still have a sexually open Bond without all that stuff. Though 50:1 says that if we ever do get a female Bond, all the sex stuff will still be titillatingly played for the male gaze.

The difference I would say is that Sherlock Homes can be rewritten in a way that keeps his core traits without losing the flavour. Monk is obviously a Sherlock Holmes character, despite not being a racist, drug-addicted sociopath. House is a possibly racist, definitely drug-fueled sociopath, but still.
For House, it's flip a coin, either a rare tropical disease, or cancer.

James Bond is...well, a spy. I mean, you could argue that he's kind of the ur example of the modern spy thriller, but nothing about the character endures. Jason Bourne is a frequent comparison, but what do they both have in common? Not much. If anything. I've watched the Bourne series less, so maybe there is some stuff. They're both spies? House is a doctor, and he's still identifiably Sherlock.
The angle is played different for Bourne too. Bourne is sort of an unwilling participant, trying to fight against his own government while looking for his identity. It plays to that anti government streak of individualism where as Bond is more than usually an us v them, cold war kind of set up.
 

Jux

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the December King said:
But on the other hand, I'm not interested in seeing a film featuring a female James Bond, I wouldn't watch it, and therefore wouldn't spend money on it. I find that sex and gender identity, at least in the case of James Bond and other action/adventure films/games, play a large role in my relating to the protagonist and potentially enjoying this sort of escapism.
And I guess that's fair enough, Bond is a sort of escapist character. I ain't tryin to hold a gun to anyones head and say 'you have to see this or you're you a -ist'. I personally like the idea of seeing people other than a substitute for myself in those roles. And I think other people (women in this case) might like to see that kind of representation for themselves if they feel like you do, wanting to have that kind of shared identity.
 

RJ 17

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The only "issue" I'd see with it is the fact that James is a blatant and unapologetic man-whore. He's probably got more STD's than Captain Kirk, considering all the women he's been with.

This would make a FemBond therefor have to be equally promiscuous. I certainly wouldn't mind, but I'd imagine certain sections of the audience would probably take offense to a lovely, confident female spy getting laid at least 3 times per movie.

:3
 

the December King

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Jux said:
...I personally like the idea of seeing people other than a substitute for myself in those roles.
Touche- a completely viable approach to escapism, seeing the world from a different perspective.

And I certainly have enjoyed having a character that at first blush I share little with, their point of views and perspectives explained to me through good development, or at least made somewhat relatable, as the story dictates.
 

Something Amyss

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Jux said:
The character elements that I would say define Bond and are intergal to his character are that Bond is a spy who uses cool gadgets, is a lone wolf sort of character who rarely relies on any kind of team work (equal teamwork, having 'helpers' is as far as I'd say his teamwork goes), is suave (probably what most separates him from Bourne, along with less emphasis on martial arts in the fight scenes), and has a pretty dry sense of humor/wit.
I'd say things like "spy" and "cool gadgets" are more genre-defining than Bond-defining. Dry wit seems to be optional, and I have trouble separating "suave" from "rapey" in this context. Though it could probably also be argued that "suave" is another genre trait. Not everyone has it, but it seems a commonality.

While no doubt I'm sure plenty of people are attracted to the character for the male power fantasy, and all the sexist, rapey shit that comes along with it, I don't think that needs to define the character. You can still have a sexually open Bond without all that stuff. Though 50:1 says that if we ever do get a female Bond, all the sex stuff will still be titillatingly played for the male gaze.
I want to see a female Bond who unapologetically fucks with the same level of criticism Bond tends to get. None. But you're right there, odds are it would just be basic posturing for the camera.

I just honestly have trouble seeing Bond without those traits, though, because he pretty much becomes any other spy. I mean, he likes British cars and Martinis, but these are traits you give to background characters in a Roland Emmerich movie, not defining traits of a main character.

For House, it's flip a coin, either a rare tropical disease, or cancer.
And if it lands on its side, it's Lupus?

(hey, it was Lupus that one time, improbable though it seems)

The angle is played different for Bourne too. Bourne is sort of an unwilling participant, trying to fight against his own government while looking for his identity. It plays to that anti government streak of individualism where as Bond is more than usually an us v them, cold war kind of set up.
Fair enough. I bring up Bourne because I'm not really a big spy thriller fan and Jason Bourne is the guy people compare to Bond. He was the franchise who revitalised the spy thriller and people called him the James Bond for whatever generation. He probably saved the Bond franchise in the way that Star Wars made a continued Star Trek franchise possible.

TBH, the closest I've come to James Bond in a long while is I read the first Destroyer novel when it was reissued. Created: The Destroyer is very much steeped in classic Bond. Like, Casino Royale. Remo Williams is a slightly more sociopathic Bond, recruited against his will. but by book 2, you already get into the pseudo-Asian mysticism of Chiun (the first book describes things in terms of Judo and the like. I'm not sure Sinanju was even in their minds at this point). And...if the whole series was like that, I'd probably never read another. It's interesting watching Remo grow from Bond Clone to borderline superhero, though. because he's so much cooler when he's fighting ghost ninjas and all-consuming monsters.

Granted, some of Bond's gadgets got pretty freaking crazy, and that's probably the best parts of his movies. But you can get the same from a ton of spy movies. Hell, XXX had a lot of the gadget spectacle. Hell, the Fast and Furious franchise does that now. Hell, I don't even need to leave Vin Diesel movies, apparently.

Again, I do chalk part of this up to Bond[footnote]James Bond[/footnote] likely being the ur example for many if not all of these tropes. But that's the thing about brands. They're only valuable as long as they remain distinct.

Still, we're down to "suave" and "willing participant."
 

blackrave

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Don't be silly, of course he can be genderbent.
Better question is "should he be genderbent"?

Michel Henzel said:
undeadsuitor said:
Michel Henzel said:
Who the fck needs a female James Bond when we already have bloody Cate Archer. What, she not good enough?
Does she have a movie?

No?

She was in two videogames 14 years ago?

oh, right
In short, perfect time for her own movie ^__^
Hell, no.
Why does everyone thinks making movies out of games is a good idea?
What is needed is Operative2... I mean NOLF2... eeem... sequel to NOLF:A Spy in a HARM's Way.
 

NiPah

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DudeistBelieve said:
...You can genderbent anything.

Literally all that's required is swapping the gender of the character.

It doesn't change anything. it certainly wouldn't turn Bond into some feminist character. It just becomes a version of the character thats like "It's everything you loved about James Bond, but now he is a she, and she is pretty and you can imagine fucking her and it won't be gay! Not that there is anything wrong with gay fantasy you yourself just aren't into that, but you are waaayyyy into James Bond!"

And I'm for doing, just because. Fuck it. Why not? Are we really going to stand here and say James Bond is something so sacred it can't be fucked around with and toyed with?

Of course, I'm looking at this from an artistic lens. From a business lens, could be a different story.
Going to echo this, why the heck not? Gender bending a character is pretty much for the absurdity, offering interesting dynamics and challenging the status quo, if nothing else it would be a unique experience.

And now I know I watch too much anime.
 

happyninja42

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Isn't a female Bond just that woman from Archer? Insanely capable, charming, yet also a drinker?

I do love The Dom's review of Bond, and how he compared the book Bond to Archer, and stated he was the most canonically accurate depiction of Bond there was.

 

The Material Sheep

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Piorn said:
James Bond is a character that is defined by maybe 5 traits at best(man, suit, vodka martini, british, cars, whatever). He is a vehicle for spy and action stuff. The fact that so many actors can pick up these key traits and become "the James Bond" speaks volumes.
He's "Spyman vs the enemy". He's an archetype. He's not interesting, his actions are.

A female british spy would work, it just wouldn't be James Bond.
I think that's a pretty reasonable take on it. He's not really a complicated character that needs deconstructd, he's just an archetype, kind of like Indiana Jones.
 

sumanoskae

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Callate said:
sumanoskae said:
Exactly the same, and anyone who threw a fit about it should then be invited to grow the fuck up.
...Can you think of any successful PR or advertising campaign in which "grow the fuck up" was the sentiment expressed?

One may personally believe that a scene is the same whether a man or a woman is the focus, all other factors being identical. Believing that that said perception applies to everyone who views it... Well, it pretty much demands a determined lack of awareness as to how people consume and react to media right now. Even if Bond films only played in the United States or the UK, there wouldn't be such a homogeneous view.
It's not that I don't know about how people will react, it's that I don't fucking care, and I am not obligated to care. Obviously this would piss people off, but why does that matter? Artists are not responsible for everyone else's irrational double standards and delicate sensibilities, in fact I would argue that one of the hallmarks of great are is being ABOVE those things.

That's the fundamental fallacy of trying to please everyone; you end up pleasing no one because you don't recognize people as individuals with ideas and feelings unique to them.

The idea that the masses are "Too dumb" or "Too close-minded" to put up with being challenged is precisely why nobody ever challenges them, and precisely why they are uncomfortable with BEING challenged in the first place; it's a self fulfilling prophecy. It's like a band-aid, the more ginger you are with it, the more of a pain in the ass it is to rip off.

Besides, the purpose of a PR campaign isn't to get people to like you it, it's to make them curios enough to see the movie. You will draw a lot more attention if you're willing to break the mold and make a definitive statement than if you just fall in line.

Dogma doesn't survive because the unwashed masses are obedient, it survives because the exceptional few are silent. Not because of bad students, but bad teachers.
 

Wary Wolf

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Would be better than Daniel Craig :3

Nah. Bond for me is about fast cars, gadgets and machine gun fire. So whilst gender bending is fine on that front, as long as the action is still kick ass then I'm ok with it.

I'd miss the Bond girls though, but that's only some extra icing on an already delicious cake. But it's also something that is reasonably iconic to the series. I guess we could absolutely have Bond men/toy boys ;)

Unfortunately I don't think Bond would work as a straight gender swap. Sure give us a kick ass female protagonist. But a straight copy might come across as lazy really. You need to make a gender swapped Bond more than just a Bond with a vag because Bond does have this element of masculinity to him that might come off as a bit odd as a woman character.

Ie. will need a little bit of a rewrite. Lazy script writing on that front would burn *EVERYONE'S* ass.
 

IamLEAM1983

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Breakdown said:
I don't get why people want existing characters to be genderbent. It seems really lazy and cynical, like an admission that a female character will only work by appropriating the popularity and success of an existing male character.
In most cases, it's just curiosity. Spider-Gwen can be understood to be a "genderbent" Spider-Man, same as the Clone Saga's resulting female Parker family member, whose name I've conveniently forgotten. You could also argue that Miles Morales is a "race-bent" representation of the same character.

Heck, head to DeviantART. A lot of folks just like to casually entertain the notion of popular characters having a different background than what is canonically presented. The whole "Gender-Benders are Feminazis!" nonsense is an absolute waste of time, and not every attempt at that can be construed as a feminist statement - much less as a "Character + Boobs" substitution.

While not gender-focused, I think the whole Black Heimdall kerfuffle is a good example of that. Idris Elba brought something to the role that other auditioned actors didn't, and his name being attached to Branaugh's Thor could have struck some of the actor's fans as a badge of quality; so there he was.

That said, Jane Foster being Thor's newest avatar kind of irks me slightly. I can understand her potential and I'll wait and see in which ways Marvel's scriptwriters are going to exploit the concept, but part of me sees that as a kind of sudden response to the more active rounds of criticism Pop Culture has gone through as of the last few years.
 

Breakdown

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IamLEAM1983 said:
Breakdown said:
I don't get why people want existing characters to be genderbent. It seems really lazy and cynical, like an admission that a female character will only work by appropriating the popularity and success of an existing male character.
In most cases, it's just curiosity. Spider-Gwen can be understood to be a "genderbent" Spider-Man, same as the Clone Saga's resulting female Parker family member, whose name I've conveniently forgotten. You could also argue that Miles Morales is a "race-bent" representation of the same character.

Heck, head to DeviantART. A lot of folks just like to casually entertain the notion of popular characters having a different background than what is canonically presented. The whole "Gender-Benders are Feminazis!" nonsense is an absolute waste of time, and not every attempt at that can be construed as a feminist statement - much less as a "Character + Boobs" substitution.

While not gender-focused, I think the whole Black Heimdall kerfuffle is a good example of that. Idris Elba brought something to the role that other auditioned actors didn't, and his name being attached to Branaugh's Thor could have struck some of the actor's fans as a badge of quality; so there he was.

That said, Jane Foster being Thor's newest avatar kind of irks me slightly. I can understand her potential and I'll wait and see in which ways Marvel's scriptwriters are going to exploit the concept, but part of me sees that as a kind of sudden response to the more active rounds of criticism Pop Culture has gone through as of the last few years.
I don't know anything about Marvel superhero comics but I'd guess that Spider-Gwen and Miles Morales are replacements for Spider-man, rather than Peter Parker, and so I'd see them as distinct characters in their own right, rather than a "new" version of Parker himself. With Thor it's a bit more complicated since it feels like he had his identity stripped away and given to somebody else. It's like the difference between getting fired at work and replaced by somebody else, and having somebody take your identity, job and even your appearance, leaving you as a non-entity.

I know somebody is bound to start going on about inscriptions on Thor's hammer or some other such nonsense, but save your energy, comic book nerds! I don't care.
 

And Man

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Eclipse Dragon said:
is ripped/incredibly good looking
Not sure if anyone mentioned this, as this is a large topic, but the original idea behind Bond is that he was just average looking and wasn't particularly attractive, and that he was able to woo all of those women through his charm alone. Just something I wanted to point out.
 

Jux

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IamLEAM1983 said:
You could also argue that Miles Morales is a "race-bent" representation of the same character.
I'm not so familiar with Gwen, but I'd argue that Miles isn't so much a 'race bent' spiderman. Different origin story, different motivations for putting on the mask. Peter was driven by the guilt of not saving Uncle Ben. What drives Miles exactly? There certainly are parallels between the two characters. The teenage awkwardness, learning to balance personal lives with the hero stuff. But I think Miles is too different from Peter to warrant the 'swapped' dismissal.
 

Benny Blanco

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mduncan50 said:
I love that it can be played by white men that look completely different, have different accents, be from different countries, and act completely different, but the fact that it may be played by someone of a different skin color or someone that has a vagina and it's just inconceivable.
I don't even think it's that. People mentioned the prospect of Idris Elba as Bond and I think that would work: he's British. A foreign (not from the British Isles or the Commonwealth) Bond probably would not. Not from OMG RACSM AND XENOPHOBIA but from the restrictions
which intelligence services place on foreign applicants. Not impossible, but...

I think that if you make Bond a woman, you radically alter the character of Bond and (equally important) the way in which other characters are likely to react to that character. This also affects the international feel of Bond movies. For instance, James Bond can swan around the world without being required to wear a veil or be accompanied by a male relative.

Although a Jane Bond vs. The Police of Vice and Virtue chase & fight sequence sounds awesome. Would watch.
 

mduncan50

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Benny Blanco said:
mduncan50 said:
I love that it can be played by white men that look completely different, have different accents, be from different countries, and act completely different, but the fact that it may be played by someone of a different skin color or someone that has a vagina and it's just inconceivable.
I don't even think it's that. People mentioned the prospect of Idris Elba as Bond and I think that would work: he's British. A foreign (not from the British Isles or the Commonwealth) Bond probably would not. Not from OMG RACSM AND XENOPHOBIA but from the restrictions
which intelligence services place on foreign applicants. Not impossible, but...

I think that if you make Bond a woman, you radically alter the character of Bond and (equally important) the way in which other characters are likely to react to that character. This also affects the international feel of Bond movies. For instance, James Bond can swan around the world without being required to wear a veil or be accompanied by a male relative.

Although a Jane Bond vs. The Police of Vice and Virtue chase & fight sequence sounds awesome. Would watch.
You can check any thread on any site that suggests a black James Bond and see the same reactions from people as you see in this thread about a female one. Even if we assume that the JBs are all supposed to be one person, I honestly don't see any distinguishing feature to the character that would prevent it from being any age, race, or sex. Whether or not it would do well in the theaters is another matter, of course.
 

Wary Wolf

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mduncan50 said:
You can check any thread on any site that suggests a black James Bond and see the same reactions from people as you see in this thread about a female one. Even if we assume that the JBs are all supposed to be one person, I honestly don't see any distinguishing feature to the character that would prevent it from being any age, race, or sex. Whether or not it would do well in the theaters is another matter, of course.
I'll argue some of that, just to niggle. I think James does exude that sort of confidence that goes with competence, which would make it difficult to be of any age. I mean you can absolutely have a very young looking James, but that confidence might come across as cock-suredness. Or at least make a younger James seem to be older than he is based on his actions. I suppose you could have an origin story, but I think that would again go to: would it do well in theaters?

I think in many ways the actual stereo-type of Bond is what limits his character from being perhaps black (Samuel L. Jackson as Bond? Be awesome but...), and more noticeably female. So there is a lot of imaginative work for studios to create something that breaks the mold if you will. And honestly I don't think there would be many that have the capacity to do it right or willing to take that risk.

I think some of the arguments here are more to do with, would the casting just be a catering to a female/black audience? Which would be actually perfectly fine. But with the important caveat that it remains a solid movie. I try to think Hollywood could do it, but that's just me being optimistic :)