Episode 6: On Her Majesty's Secret Service

This probably means nothing and is way too late, but god damn, that ending had a fucking impact on me. And I admire your ability to manage the blur between comedy and sincerety while being real, I guess? This passage touched me. Thank you.

Krinkle

I haven't seen a Bond film in years, but this was always my favourite one growing up. Now that I am older, and a little wiser thanks to this podcast, I realize why is simply because George Lazenby's Bond comes off as so much nicer than the other ones... simply because he cannot act?!

You Bet Your Bippy, I'm Now A Policy Wonk!

I, as a Swede, genuinely thought "This never happened to the other fella" was a British expression used to say "I am in trouble in a unique way", and I told all my friends that this was *definitely* the case (I am a cis white male, incidentally). Also, is it really EON, and not Eon?

Teaflax

So sad that we are now moving on to the Moore era next. That guy was insufferable. Smarm-factor was always turned up to 10 and, quite literally, all his movies had ludicrous plots. Just skip to Dalton. Seriously.

Prateek

I'm a little surprised that you didn't point out the best out-of-context line in this movie: "I have taught you to LOVE chickens!" But seriously, this is by far my new favorite podcast. Back in January, my friends and I spent the month watching about half of the Bond movies, and it's refreshing to hear from a group of people who share our unorthodox views on these movies. I'm particularly looking forward to hearing you guys discuss The Living Daylights, which is my favorite Bond movie + my favorite Bond. (Oh, and a fun piece of trivia for you guys: EON actually asked Dalton to play Bond in OHMSS, but he turned them down because he thought he was too young for the role at the time. Which is perhaps for the best, since a Dalton/Rigg pairing would have been much too powerful for us mere mortals.)

Dana Himrich

Watch this space

Kill James Bond!

Extremely looking forward to the eventual Alex Ryder episode ╰(*´︶`*)╯

Kate

Loving this podcast so far. It's been almost ten years since I marathoner the films, but I'm really looking forward to the Dalton films. I'm torn on whether I like Living Daylights or License to Kill more.

khaliqtessi

Dd anyone else catch in the dinner scenes with the women, they had the African girl eating bananas? Not funny at all, but holy shit I can't believe they got away with that.

Just as a fun sidenote about the swiss air force: A few years ago there was some kind of incident with an airliner, and Air Traffic Control needed a swiss jet to force it to land. But, the swiss air force only operated during office hours, so they had to ask the french. If you care enough, I can search for the article

Jonas Schwammberger

George Lazenby, believe it or not, was capable of giving a decent performance in the right circumstances. A few years after OHMSS when the Bond money had run out and things were a bit rough he played the lead role in the giallo film "Who Saw Her Die?" in which he's called upon to portray an absent father whose daughter is murdered while he's busy philandering and has to try and find the killer while dealing with his grief. It's the sort of role that should be totally beyond Lazenby but he mostly does a good job with it. Killer Ennio Morricone score on that film too. And if you're ever running out of Bond-type films for the patreon episodes and want more Diana Rigg in your life I recommend The Assassination Bureau, in which Rigg plays a journalist who tracks down a shady murder-for-hire company run by Oliver Reed, and pays Reed to take a hit out on himself. There follows a bizarre comedy as Rigg follows Reed around pre-WWI Europe as he attempts to murder all the other assassins before they get him. Odd little film but very enjoyable. Co-starring Telly Savalas!

Ignatius

I kinda fridgelogic'd the reason why Bond would ask "You're in trouble, do you want to talk about it?" because in a sociopath-switch-to-off-by-default Bond would be able to relate to a self-destructive streak.

Simon Bitdiddle

I'm a Lazenby fan, see more of his non-acting in The Man From Hong Kong, another classic of dreadful lines, big fights and casual swagger.

SpookyPenguin

1. In the movies and in the novels, Bond is less about any kind of secret agent stuff and more about Bond getting completely owned. Even if the agent was right about secret agent films, they were wrong about Bond. 2. Sean Connery deserved every single miserable moment he spent having make up progressively added to him multiple times over for a series of botched aging timelapses. For one moment, we were living in the best timeline.

Made up name

It would have been worth it alone for that episode on Everything or Nothing

Steven M Toyoshima

This patreon was probably the best investment I've made this year ngl...

Questions for the hivemind: 1. When Lazenby rejected appearing in Diamonds Are Forever, it was partially because his agent said that secret agent films would be archaic in the 70s. How much did the next three Bond films prove Lazenby’s agent had a point? 2. Was the price of Connery appearing in Zardoz worth the cost of his return in Diamonds Are Forever? Or would the cinematic world been better off with Lazenby in that film instead (and likely no Connery in Zardoz)?

Don Kasak