The Daily Mail & The Guardian are reporting Ben Whishaw’s role in Skyfall is Q (Of course the source for all of this is based on a tabloid story from the Sun.). The character Q disappeared from the silver screen ten years ago, as sadly we must note so did Ian Fleming’s and Cubby Broccoli’s James Bond 007. Replaced with Cubby’s daughters interpretation of the Jason Bourne adventures, only more British… maybe.
A source told The Sun: ‘Female fans will have more than Daniel to gush over now Ben’s been cast as Q. He’ll be a big draw.
‘It’s a bold decision as it means Q will be younger than Bond for the first time.
‘His role will be very different from previous Qs. He’ll be far more serious, as is the trend with the new films.’
Nothing against young Ben it is just Desmond Llewelyn was such a wonderful Q is is hard to imagine anyone else playing the role.
A brief history of Q;
Peter Burton as Major Boothroyd (1962), Desmond Llewelyn as Q (Major Boothroyd) (1963–1999), John Cleese as Q and Q's assistant (1999–2002), Alec McCowen as Q (Algernon) (1983)
Q has appeared in 19 of 22 Eon Bond films; all except Live and Let Die, Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace. The character was also featured in the non-official Bond films Casino Royale (1967) and Never Say Never Again.
The ancestry of the Q character is rather complicated. In the Fleming novels there are frequent references to Q and “Q Branch” with phrases like “see Q for any equipment you need” (Casino Royale) and “Q Branch would handle all of that” (Diamonds are Forever), with a reference to “Q’s craftsmen” in From Russia with Love. In the sixth novel, Dr. No, the service armourer Major Boothroyd appears for the first time. Fleming named the character after Geoffrey Boothroyd, a firearms expert who lived in Glasgow, Scotland.[1] He had written to the novelist suggesting that Bond was not using the best firearms available. Boothroyd is also referenced occasionally in the Bond novels of John Gardner, but the author preferred instead to focus on a new character. Charles Fraser-Smith is also widely credited as being the inspiration for Q[2] due to the spy gadgets he’d built for the Special Operations Executive being called “Q-devices” after the Royal Navy’s World War I Q-ships.
Films
In the films, Major Boothroyd first appears in Dr. No and later in From Russia with Love, although played by different actors. Desmond Llewelyn stated that though credited as Major Boothroyd the original line spoken by M, “Ask Major Boothroyd to come in” was replaced with “the armourer” as director Terence Young stated Boothroyd was a different character.
Beginning in Guy Hamilton’s Goldfinger and in each film thereafter Major Boothroyd is most often referred to as Q; however, in The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) he is referred once again as Major Boothroyd in dialogue. Some sources[who?], most notably the 1980s James Bond 007 role-playing game suggested[citation needed] that Boothroyd’s first name was Geoffrey (the real Boothroyd’s given name), although no first name was ever mentioned in the novels or on screen. In the non-canonical James Bond Jr. cartoon series, Boothroyd’s grandson was Horace Boothroyd III (and was known to his friends as “I.Q.”), suggesting that Major Boothroyd was also named Horace.
Special Thanks to “Thunderpussy” for the original post.
Ben Whishaw is a joke, he can not play Q. I hope this film fails (just like the last 2 have!)
You seem to be taking the news of a younger Q better than that of a blonde James Bond, why is the website even still running: Daniel Craig’s Bond has more in common with Flemings Bond than say, Roger Moore (and his hair is roughly the same colour)
His Bond is comparable to the Dalton Bond and early Connery Bond (not as serious as the former, with slightly less humour than thee later) To say that Ian Flemings James Bond last appeared in Die Another Day is indeed a stretch as Ian Fleming was no doubt rolling in his grave at the thought of Solar Power lasers and invisible cars! Casino Royale on the other hand is the first appearance of Flemings Bond since License to Kill (a film that was essentially based on Live and Let Die the novel)