Decent, but not as Good as Skyfall

Rating: 7/10 (9 November 2015)

I was incredibly hyped for this film because of the excellent Skyfall that preceded it. It feels like the recent Daniel Craig movies have given us something new and fresh while still giving us plenty of the old Bond flavor that we love. This new movie by Sam Mendes does a lot right but Spectre isn't as good as Skyfall or Casino Royale. That being said, the film is still pretty good but there are a few scenes that left me scratching my head. I feel like they tried to combine some of the classic James Bond goofiness with the newer and darker Bond films and it just doesn't work as well as they were hoping for. Let's talk about the story first.
James Bond (Daniel Craig) finds himself in trouble fairly soon after the events of Skyfall when the former and deceased head of MI6 sends him a message to kill a man and find out what his connections are to a secret organization. Bond once again has to go AWOL (this Bond does that a lot) in order to find out more about the mysterious organization called Spectre. It turns out the head of this organization (Christoph Waltz) has been acting behind the scenes during the last few films and Bond is ready to end this game once and for all. While this is going on, M (Ralph Fiennes) is having trouble back home because of a merger between MI6 and the other intelligence agencies. It turns out there's also a sinister explanation behind this as well.
Most of the phenomenal cast from this movie were in the last film but let's talk about how they continue to be awesome. Daniel Craig is easily one of the best Bonds in my opinion. He's a brutal killer and not afraid to get his hands dirty but he also has a noticeable soft side. He usually shows this side towards his friends but we even see him show it towards his enemies at times. Fiennes does a terrific job as the new M. He's not afraid to order his people around and to dish out the punishments but it's obvious he cares for his people and possesses a strong moral perspective on what they're trying to do. Also, Fiennes scares me a little bit when he glares at people. That's one of the best glares I've seen in a long time. The rest of the returning cast do a great job as well and it's nice to see that they have large roles in the story and they're not relegated to one off appearances.
We have a few new people in this film that also give some great performances. Lea Seydoux plays Madeleine Swan, the main Bond squeeze for this story. Seydoux gives a great performance but it does feel like we've been through this too many times before. Skyfall gave us something a little different since his female counterpart was more of a mother figure but I should have known that they would revert to form in this film. Another character I enjoyed was Dave Bautista's Hinx, but only because of how menacing he was. He was a big guy with a big gun that you really don't want to mess with. He's intimidating but not much of a conversationalist. Last but not least, Waltz as the new villain of the franchise is over the top in the best way possible. The classic mad genius that wants to take over the world. Waltz can pull of the cocky villain pretty well and he always speaks his dialogue with a certain panache that just makes his characters fun to listen to. However, this guy is nowhere near as terrifying as Silva or Le Chiffre.
This movie has a lot to like about it. The action is exciting and the locales are interesting, which we kind of expect from a Bond film. I also like the idea of the story and it brings a lot of the plot points from the past films to an end in this one. You could tell that there was another organization behind the scenes in the first two Craig films but Skyfall felt like it was shoehorned in a little bit. Silva never mentioned working for anyone else but that's a conversation for another day. One thing that's different here is that the tone of the movie feels more like a Roger Moore Bond film rather than one of the newer ones. There's a lot more joking around in this movie and the plot holes are hard to ignore. I want to avoid as many spoilers as possible but let's go over a couple of examples. As far as tone goes, the torture scene in this movie is much more reminiscent of a Moore film than the terrifying scene with Le Chiffre from Casino Royale. An easy plot hole example could be from the beginning of the movie. The Day of the Dead celebration is still going on and somehow the parade has not been interrupted from an explosion that took out an entire building. The film is still enjoyable but it feels like the story could have been pulled off just as well in the Moore era of Bond movies.
Like I said already, the movie has a lot to like and it's nice to see the story finally come to a possible end. I just feel like I saw a completely different movie from what I was expecting. I was expecting a story more in line with the rest of the Daniel Craig films but this felt like something from the seventies or eighties. That's not necessarily a bad thing and I'm sure most people will love the film but it did feel a little off to me. I would still recommend the die hard Bond fans to give it a try though.