THE OLD BOND IS BACK FOR BETTER OR WORSE 
After the immense success and critical acclaim of Skyfall, it was almost inevitable that the subsequent Bond movie would fall short of many moviegoer’s heightened expectations. Unfortunately— thanks to a combination of questionable writing and an incredibly far-fetched plot—Spectre would not only do just that, but fall even further.
Spectre starts off with great promise with an attention-grabbing, visually impressive fight scene that has become so characteristic of the franchise. The bad news is that the film would only go downhill from there, as the entire plot left something to be desired. One of the prime reasons is the writers’ strained attempt to tie together all of Daniel Craig’s past Bond films in a narrative web that was unconvincing to say the least: all the villains from all the prior movies actually turned out to be mere pawns of this greater super-evil organization, which has somehow acquired enormous resources and power, and yet nobody has even heard of. Ironically, this lack of believability actually made Quantum of Solace, with its plausible real-world manipulations, feel like more of an actual threat and Spectre more like Dr. Evil’s Virtucon in comparison.
The next strike against Spectre is a storyline that began to feel drearily repetitive. Bond once again has to go pseudo-rogue for the second time in four films to uncover a secret. As it turns out, this secret has astonishingly personal ties. The movie becomes yet another revenge story about a jealous individual who shares a background history with the main character, and has turned evil—a formula that has been beaten into the ground lately by Hollywood (see Batman, Superman, Star Trek).
The most glaring issue about this new Bond instalment is that the franchise, after using the reboot to bring 007 into the modern era with a darker, realistic, and grittier Bond, starts to go in reverse. After dropping the mounting absurdity that was slowly but surely making the series a joke (see Die Another Day), this instalment returns to the absurdity. This is not to say that a less-grounded, somewhat over-the-top Bond is necessarily a bad thing. I will admit that I personally enjoyed a number of the campy Roger Moore films, even Moonraker. But this was likely because I saw it more as a product of its time.
As such, I had highly different expectations for a movie made today. However, after establishing this new Bond with Daniel Craig, returning to a Roger Moore-esque Bond feels like a shot out of left field. Furthermore, campy 007 and realistic, gritty 007 mix about as well as oil and water. The entire film was punctuated with strained homages to previous Bond movies (for example, the train fight reminiscent of From Russia With Love, and oversized evil henchmen). Rather than nostalgia, this gave a feeling that the storywriters were just checking things off the list and going through the motions.
Christoph Waltz’ performance as the main antagonist was surprisingly underwhelming, as he came off as an inferior version of Javier Bardem’s Raoul Silva from Skyfall. However, this could perhaps be attributed to the fact that he was forced to work with such limited screen time (roughly 20 minutes at most), spending much of the movie completely unseen (a criminally poor use of someone of Waltz’s talent, by the way).
Finally, the filmmakers’ attempt to establish the new Bond-Bond girl relationship as a serious romantic relationship and not a fling is unconvincing at best. Indeed, we are all expected to believe that the emotional ramifications stemming from Vesper’s death in Casino Royale all of a sudden magically disappear when Bond meets this new girl. Monica Belluci’s Lucia Sciarra has a depth that pales in comparison with that of Ms. Lynd, and a chemistry with Bond that is about as stimulating as watching the grass on my lawn grow.
Nonetheless, there are a few positive takeaways from Spectre. The general subject matter is topically relevant, grappling with questions of cybersecurity, data privacy, and government surveillance. The movie is also capable of providing basic entertainment from the sheer visual splendour typical of a 007 film (the stunt work, car chases, helicopter fights, explosions, et cetera). Sadly, however, expecting anything more would be setting oneself up for disappointment.
Final Rating: 3/5 Stars