The franchise has regressed.

Rating: 4/10 (30 November 2012)

I much preferred the direction the franchise was heading with Quantum of Solace and Casino Royale. They were saying times have changed and so they did away with all the fancy gadgetry and made it more of an action based film wrapped around a character (Bond) that seemed to be more human-like; a character that people can actually see exist in real life. I felt those two movies were magnificently done because they were able to keep Bond's "suave characteristics" while still being able to do away with the cheesiness of previous Bond movies.
The franchise was heading in the perfect direction; then came Skyfall......Now if they reverted back to the old style after introducing a new actor to play Bond then I'd be more accepting of it because it'd be more of a "revamp" of the character and the setting and time in which he exist. An example of this would be the transition between having Pierce Brosnan play Bond and having Daniel Craig play bond; the setting and overall feel was different. However, since this movie is still played by Daniel Craig, it's hard to grasp the concept of how different the first two movies are from this one.
In the movie, they kept on repeating on many occasions that times have changed and new tech has surfaced while Bond was presumed dead. However, I feel that this "new technology" is rather fake and doesn't give the sense of "a new day and age" at all. Moreover, the way in which they had Daniel Craig portray Bond in this movie is a complete let down. They initially chose Craig because of his athletic build and ability to portray Bond as a "blunt killing instrument" as said by Dench in Casino Royale; Craig was exactly this in the first two movies. In Skyfall however, they made him into a prancing ballerina similar to how Pierce Brosnan portrayed Bond. I think that the overall feel of the movie has regressed rather than progressed.
To further solidify the fact that it has regressed, look at the gender of the character that they chose to replace M. When they first chose Judy Dench to play the role, it marked a significant point in history because the franchise was portraying how a character such as Bond who frequently cycles through women as if to have no respect for them could somehow find himself so respectful and tamed by a women (Judy Dench). They say that they're heading in a new direction in which the "Bond Girls" are not seen as his equals. When they said this of Quantum of Solace, I believed it. However, in Skyfall, not only did they replace Judy Dench with a new head of MI6 that is male, they also did not introduce a bond girl that is even remotely close to the independent and strong character played by Olga Kurylenko in Quantum of Solace(Camille).