It’s funny to know that this movie was intended to come out before the pandemic, because by releasing it now it might provide some unintentional food for thought for the morons who believe that a certain virus was actually conceived in a lab.
I genuinely wonder if those people will read that far into this film, I’d find it deeply amusing.

The good news is that there are definetely a lot of things this does better than _Spectre_.
The action is memorable and way more visceral (though it doesn’t quite surpass the _Mission Impossible Fallout_ bar) and the characters are generally more interesting.
I loved the women in this in particular, they all have distinct personalities and they’re not flawless human beings or overpowered (e.g. Ana de Armas is bubbly and fun, but at the same time she’s inexperienced and chaotic), like some blockbusters tend to do.
At the same time, we shouldn’t pretend that this film invented strong female characters for Bond, especially after we’ve had Eva Green and Judi Dench.
Meanwhile, James Bond himself has a very satisfying arc in this film, which isn’t too dissimilar to [spoiler] Tony Stark’s arc in Avengers Endgame [/spoiler], with a bold pay off in the third act. I’m happy that this film gave us confirmation that Mads Mikkelsen [spoiler] didn’t end up castrating Bond [/spoiler] in _Casino Royale_.
It’s paced very well, more like a traditional action film and less like a drama, which was the case for _Skyfall_ and _Spectre_.
And finally, the whole thing just looks great, it’s produced exuisetely. The cinematography isn’t quite _Skyfall_ level, but Roger Deakins is an impossible bar to clear for any cinematographer.

Unfortunately, this film really struggles with its tone, bouncing wildly between cartoonish nonsense and very dark, dramatic moments.
The plot is extremely silly and there are many cartoony moments, but it also has some scenes that feel more in line with the grit of _Casino Royale_.
It wants to honor the traditional Bond stuff, but at the same time it can’t let go of the roots of the Daniel Craig iteration, which makes it feel like an uneven artistic vision, because the foundation of Craig’s Bond rests on this idea that this isn’t the traditional Bond.
Also, Rami Malek didn’t leave much of an impression on me, kinda feeling like a stock villain (very much like Waltz in the last film). There’s not really an interesting motivation there, or an interesting evil plan. It’s a campy and theatrical plan, and it feels very familiar.
Finally, this film can be fairly predictable at times (for example: [spoiler] Matilde being Bond’s daughter was extremely obvious, they never should’ve played that as a twist. The same goes for Lea Seydoux being framed [/spoiler]).

So, it’s good, it pushes the creative boundaries of what a Bond movie is in some ways, which is the best stuff.
But I kinda hope they bring in someone with a fresh, fully realized artistic vision for the next reboot.

7/10

Ps for the Bond producers: please, please make a spin off with Ana de Armas’ character.