Craig's First Mission with MI-6 is a Tough, Expectation-Shattering Endeavor

Rating: 9/10 (21 January 2013)

Bond's essential 21st century reboot is expertly orchestrated and potently thrilling, although I wonder if it may have pressed itself a bit too far in an effort to feel contemporary. The parkour and hold'em scenes in particular already feel out-of-touch, with both fads freshly occupying the rear-view mirror, but that's hardly a fresh hurdle for the series to clear. Daniel Craig makes for a far better Bond than I'd hoped, especially during the nail-biting action scenes or the prerequisite mingling with the high-cultured elite. He isn't the quip-slinging lady killer that Connery or Brosnan were, at least not yet, but he's twice as convincing when the time comes to flex a little muscle (or leap from one precariously-perched construction crane to another, as it were). This isn't a perfect effort - the poker climax is recklessly telegraphed, and the final forty minutes feel like a weepy, long-winded epilogue - but it is an action joyride, stuffed with clever winks and nods at the character's past, and one of the best Bonds ever made.