James Bond series

[Jack Parker]

Haha yeah, I also get ASM (I'm so happy Dan Slott is leaving the title), Batman, Action Comics, Daredevil,Iron Man, the current Miles Morales Spider-man and Doomsday Clock in addition to the Bond mini-series along with random stuff that catches my eye. The Bond series and Doomsday Clock are usually the only things I generally keep up on on a month to month schedule though. Everything else I'm usually several months behind on, so I'm less inclined to comment on them, though I post random stuff here and there. What other stuff do you collect?

And that sucks man. I'm sorry to hear it. I've gone back and forth about moving away from the single issue and just collecting TBPs. For the moment I'm sticking with single issues but that may change at some point.

[Enigma]

I read a bunch of stuff: various Image books, TMNT, MMPR, Transformers, Doctor Who, X-Men, Star Wars, some manga. I also read a lot of random stuff like: Charley's War, Marney the Fox, various crime stuff, coming of age works etc. I also read a lot of novels. I'm recording my collection soon, so I will post a link.

I'm changing partly for storage reasons, partly cost and partly because for longer series (like MMPR) I always forget things. I find that I enjoy it most when I just read it through.

[Enigma]

I am so happy to see this. Not sure if it is worth £22, but I haven't checked elsewhere yet... Out in July!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/James-Bond-...4TDZSH7XR57PXT

[Enigma]

Casino Royale arrived today - a couple of interesting things to note. It is in the same format as the ongoing series', which is fantastic to realise, with a sort of dark grey colour to go alongside the main series in white and the side-stories in black. Additionally, it has a number 1 on the bottom of the spine, so presumably we are getting adaptations of multiple other stories

[Enigma]

Ok, so I've finished Casino Royale... Holy crap - such a mixture of emotions. Let's get the bad stuff out of the way first. The art is terrible. I think that he does scenes and events very well, explosions and there is a full page near the end featuring Bond's eyes across the page which was very well done, that sort of thing. However, as is seemingly common with in the Bond comics, his grasp of Bond is rubbish. In fact, people as a whole are not well done at all. Pretty disappointing... Another saving grace for the art however, is the cover by Fay Dalton. I liked it on screen, but holy crap when you have it in your hands - I really felt like I was in the casino, it's creepy :P

Now for the adaptation itself. I think that they did well in taking the key scenes (it is very true to the book) and kept the raw feeling of the book - they keep some of the key phrases and lines from the book too, such as: "The scent and smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning"; "The bitch is dead now" (including an awesome full page piece of at, the only good character drawing, which belongs on a cover...). They mention it in the foreword, but they used an almost HUD-like way of adding detail to scenes, primarily regarding characters in the panels and objects etc, details. This helped a lot I think since it is squeezed into a fairly small book. Now, what I really like about this adaptation, is that (not intentionally obviously :P) it was released during The Body. It fits in so well with that series. I think that this adaptation explores Bond's mindset and the effect that the story has on him better than the book, which is a bit of strong thing to say I know, but I really think it does. That is no disrespect to Fleming, artwork naturally lends itself to better depiction of emotion I think. Anyway, the post-casino portion of the story is really well done. In particular, the torture scene is fantastic (and also hit me hard despite knowing exactly what is going to happen) and alongside the aforementioned 'The bitch is dead moment', is the only part where I thought that the artwork as a whole was well done.

Honestly, grab this ASAP. It is way better than I expected and it is neck and neck with the Felix series as my favourite Dynamite contribution to James Bond. I really want to show some pictures of the bits that I've mentioned, but I'm tired and don't want to spoil it for anybody.

[Jack Parker]

Glad to hear that the Casino Royale adaption finally arrived. I've been going back and forth on whether to pick it up for not since a lot of comic adaption for books I've read have been pretty hit or miss. Based on your description, I'll have to check to see if my comic book store has it this week as it sounds great. I agree that the cover for the adaption is fantastic. It's disappointing to hear that the interior art does not live up to the rest of it. Who is the artist? And I am curious to see if they will continue to adapt the other books as well assuming this one sells well. I would imagine they would just go in the order the books were released.

Also, the James Bond: Case Files comes out about a week before my birthday. I may have to order myself an early birthday gift.

[Enigma]

Doooooo it! The artist is Dennis Calero - I'm not sure if I've seen his art before, but the name rings a bell...

[Jack Parker]

Yeah, I don't think I've read anything that he has drawn before. One of the benefits of a lot of these Bond books are that they are exposing me to artists whose work I usually don't see as often.

[Enigma]

I just re-read Kill Chain as a collected edition, and I thoroughly enjoyed it this time. This seems to be a trend and I'm increasingly sure that the Dynamite JB comics read much better as collected editions than as monthly instalments. The Body is a bit different since it is halfway to being an anthology series, but even so.


Edit: I will be starting the James Bond guide in the next week or so.

[Enigma]

Testing something....

[Enigma]

I will be posting the JB guide in the next few days hopefully. It will not be complete (there is plenty that I haven't personally read), but will be an ongoing project, which I hope to get some input on. It will be split into sections and space reserved, and then added to as we go. Once I've posted it, you will see which areas I need help working on and it would be awesome to get some help for those sections. In particular, the video games, audiobooks and some of the novels.

[Jack Parker]

I haven't gone back and re-read any of the Dynamite JB comics yet though I keep meaning to, especially the ones by Ellis. I'm not surprised to hear that Kill Chain works better reading it all at once rather than as monthly installments. I'm betting Diggle's over mini-series does as well. Once I read through all of Fleming's novels, I'll probably jump over to re-reading the Dynamite comics.

An that's awesome! I'll definitely be up for contributing to the guide. It's a fantastic idea. I can probably assist with the novels, movies, some of the video games, and the Dynamite comics. The earlier comics and the audiobooks are outside of my area of knowledge.

[Enigma]

Awesome! The video games would be particularly useful as I can barely remember them :P

[JQP]

Setting a Bond comic in the present seems like going along to get along. The movies had to advance away from the sixties and the height of the Cold War in large part because of budgetary concerns; period pieces are a lot more expensive.

But comics have an effectively unlimited wardrobe, set, and SFX budget. I'd like to see a Bond series set in the sixties, with the space age aesthetic of Goldfinger, You Only Live Twice, etc. And evil commies, lots and lots of evil, genocidal commies getting what's coming to them.

Not sure that there's anyone left who could ink it properly, though; it would need a good penciler, and a proper, old-school master inker. Not to mention a writer with an ounce of common sense, who wouldn't retcon SJW dementia into the past; not sure there are any of those left anymore, either.

[Enigma]

I disagree. Setting Bond comics in the current era is perfectly reasonable, many younger readers will engage more with a context that they understand. Not to say that period pieces aren't awesome, I too wish that they would dive into period pieces more, but that doesn't mean that modern era Bond is not appropriate. The 'Origins' comic will be a period piece, although I've heard nothing about it for a while to be honest...