The reason why Dr. Evil saying "We're not so different, you and I" to Austin Powers is great is because they're the same actor.

I mean…it’s rami Malek ffs…give him a decent script

He unironically wrote an amazing plot for no time to die, a better one than an entire team of professional script writers

I think there are two ways to fix Safin. Either expand on his motivations and backstory or do the exact oposite. Why not keep him as the creepy masked guy? A villain of few words, who is mysterious but also intimidating, would have worked well in a personal Bond centric story. Maybe if he got his facial scars when encountering Madeleine in the begining and wants revenge for it? It could have been that simple.

This is so upsetting because I absolutely adore Rami malek and his outstanding performance in almost every movie/tv show he does. This movie really doesn’t do him justice and it’s a shame

This Bond series was so sloppy with it's evil organizations. "The big bad is Quantum, and they are everywhere and unstoppable... but still not as bad as Specter, who is the same but more so... but are actually really easy to destroy."

The problem these days with a villain having one motivation..... is that there have been plenty of villains that already have had the same motivations and in turn it becomes a cliche. So i don't mind that there are multiple motivations for a villain... all that really matters is execution.

11:15 Bond has been betrayed countless times in these movies. His initial reaction to the betrayal even reinforces this a bit, as he very quickly realizes and accepts the betrayal, and even maintains focus and self control in spite of it. I feel like the twist is good because it gives Bond immense guilt. He realizes how much pain she must’ve felt being falsely accused, and regrets completely ignoring her when she tried to plead her innocence. I appreciated how it deviated from the typical Bond tropes like that. At the same time though, I feel like they should’ve acknowledged that more and took actions to show that their relationship would never be the same when they finally did reunite.

I agree it was quite odd when he let the daughter go for essentially no clear reason.

Some of the most cliche dialogue for a villain in a big film in some time IMO.

I felt sorry for Rami too, because you've got Christop Waltz as Blofield, a developed character. I think Rami's character was a filled in (ie last minute) for the story.

This video gets a lot of things right except the Blofeld part. He had two pretty good reasons to tell Bond that Madeleine was innocent. Firstly, it would break Bond's heart to know that he lost 5 years of his life because of his inability to trust. Secondly, it would make it much clearer for Bond who the real enemy is. Mind you, Bond didn't kill spectre, Rami Malek did. So now Bond could chase the main guy rather than trying to figure out if Madeleine cheated on him

It’s also quite frustrating to have him be the one who kills Bond after all the other way more impressive vilains he has defeated

The "we are not so diferent" line in no time to die is made even worse when you consider that In skyfall they already had that character. And its even worse because despite being infinitely more similar to bond, Javier bardems character didnt have to say it. It was inplied very organically.

This really is a film that had a villain just because it needed one. Honestly I think they wanted to make a story about just Bond and his arc but needed something

I only saw this movie for Rami and they gave him barely any screen-time. I felt catfished. I would have liked to see more of his obsession with Lea’s character

I think Blofeld was great in that scene. He made Bond realise he lost 5 years with the person he loves the most on earth all because of him. That is pretty evil imo.

It could have been so simple: Safins father was the original founder of SPECTRE but Blofeld killed him and everyone else in SPECTRE didn't care or speak up. Now he feels like they betrayed him and he needs to take revenge.

The main takeaway from this video is how great Dr.Evil's theme is. It not only captures the feeling of a James Bond theme, but it is also completely over the top and hilarious.

Unrelated to the villain, but I really felt James' apology and reconciliation with Madeline should have been at the very end just before he dies. I feel the whole arc of the Craig Bond has been an emotionally closed off person gradually letting people in, and I think it would have been more powerful to hold off on fully letting Madeline in again until the very end, apologizing and telling her he loves her right before dying.

Sky fall is 2 hours and 17 mins long and silva shows up exactly 1 hour and 10 mins into the film and is still a FANTASTIC villain!!! Introducing a villain into a story more that half way through can still work if executed well 💯

Bad guys walking up to heroes when they have guns pointed at them, is a hugely annoying cliche in general. It happens in far too many films. Steven Seagal’s films are chock full of it.

I love your rewritten version because it shows Safin can be a wonderful foil. Bond learns to forgive those close to him while Safin refuses.

The best way to make a villan in the movie is not to make a villan but an antagonist. Your 'villan' of the story doesnt even have to do anything inherently bad as long as they are the antagonist to the hero (given them and their relationship are compelling enough). In no time to die the writers put too much effort into making the villan 'villanous' or evil than making him a good antagonist

I just watched this film last night, and I can definitely agree that his motives were rather cliche, and nowhere near as compelling as those of the villains from either Casino Royale or Skyfall. However, I found that No Time To Die was far more about Bond’s personal journey rather than his connection to the antagonist so I didn’t mind that Safin was used more as an obstacle to overcome than a truly deep antagonist.

I really like your change for improving the villain and the plot overall. But a simpler change in the plot, without any major changes throughout the script, could be that only a select few leaders of SPECTRE died in Cuba and Safin didn't have enough information about all the members at that point of time. And later he is trying to kill the remaining members all over the world. But since his method can cause a lot of collateral damage to relatively innocent relatives of the SPECTRE people, MI6 and Bond decide to stop him. An additional wrinkle can be added that since he doesn't have enough dna info or whatever, he is doing it a bit too crudely and so even more innocent people are likely to die.

"We're not so different, you and I" is also a 100% valid, in-universe, character-driven thing for a villain to say, almost always. Most people wrapped up in evil are at least kind of aware that it's wrong, so being able to drag someone better than them down to their level, and rob them of their moral high ground, is a satisfying thing if they can pull it off. Even if that's done by telling a lie and counting on it to stick.

I think the problem with the villain's motivation isn't so much that it's too many motivations, it's more that the three motivations have absolutely nothing to do with each other. Like, if he wanted to be an arms dealer, it'd make more sense for him to have extra motivations that connect to that in some way, like for example he could want to help another villain with one of their goals in exchange for some of the villain's supplies to help his arms dealing motivation. Or if he wanted to be with the girl he's in love with, he could have the extra motivation of trying to clean up a certain area of crime and disease and whatnot, so that he could live in peace with the girl and her daughter. You can't just have three motivations that don't connect in any way.

There's an implicit motivation with Safin that I think describing as a "crush" with Madeleine does a disservice to admittedly already poor character. By attempting to be with Madeleine, he's trying to compensate for his loss of family and has a twisted savior complex with her after killing her family. Like him, she's spared -- just as he was. Safin is a psychologically twisted person who's trying to reconcile with his childhood trauma through Madeleine. I don't think it's a coincidence we're reintroduced to Safin when he's being psychoanalyzed by Madeleine. That being said, his character was still written poorly, but I think you missed the only interesting part of his character.

I've always been a lot more interested in character foils; when the hero and villains' differences are highlighted by the narrative rather than their similarities. This makes them even more fun to read and write about, as the villain can master skills that the hero lacks, giving them the advantage until the hero's unique traits gives them the advantage in the final showdown. I've actually come up with a story idea where the villain's differences to the hero make them more successful in their goals. I'm going to put it in a book I'm writing.

I had the idea while watching this film that if Craig's Bond villains were all meant to be something of a reflection of him, starting off we had the criminal, the mastermind, the ex-agent, and the criminal spy master. What do you add to that? How do you top that list? The anti-spy assassin. A child of an assassin family, who trains himself to become an assassin, slowly takes revenge for his family's massacre, and finally decides he can use his skills and knowledge to kill every spy, intelligence organization, and criminal mastermind in the world. I like your idea as well, but I thought I'd share this in case people found it interesting.

Could you do an analysis on Arcane as well? I found Silco and Sevika's struggles definitely atypical amongst villains and, personally, I've found them one of the best villains I've seen in a long time.

10:40 I interpreted it as blofeld rubbing in the fact that he got Bond to ruin his relationship with Madeleine over nothing, like “haha I got you to make yourself miserable for no reason lol”

Please never stop making videos. I really enjoy the quality of your presentations and your very own way of doing so.

Joker also says "You're just a freak. Like me." so it is possible to get the "We're not so different you and I..." line in there without it being cheesy. But its got to be true. The Joker and Batman have a connection whereby something traumatic in their past drove them to become what they are. One is completely incorruptible and believes in justice, the other in pure chaos and anarchy. So they're complete opposites but mirrored in many ways. Bond and Safin aren't remotely similar, other than crushing on the same girl.

WE’RE NOT SO DIFFERENT, YOU AND I! 😂 That made me laugh too much!

I just remember watching this movie and going "but why was he the villain?" and being so disappointed because they 100000% wasted Rami Malek's talent.

You rewrites always make me feel and you just said "This and that could happen" i cant imagine how amazing that would have been in the movie.

I kinda liked Zorin (A View to A Kill) and Sanchez (Licence to Kill) because they were just fairly normal looking psychopaths who were simply driven by greed and not strange looking people who were driven by world domination.

Listening to your revised plot, I hope that someday some big exec watches your videos and realizes how genuinely satisfying your revised plots are. Keep up the good work.

When I saw this movie I seriously thought I missed something about the villain because I couldn’t remember what his motivations were. Glad I wasn’t crazy 😂

This channel is phenomenal. Whether it be for storytellers, story enjoyers or just people who want to be entertained. You make informative and amusing content very consistently. Keep doing what you do my guy 👍

The worst part about the lazy writing is that the movie production was postponed for almost 2 years. The writers definitely had the time to fix the script and improve on it.

"I'm a writer, and you're a stage magician. We're not so different, you and I."

Legit what i thought aswell Such an incredible actor wasted

The thing that No Time To Die lacks is Safin believing he is in the right. The one thing every great villain shares is their perspective on the plot.

Not only how his expression but the music choice in the background! So subtle yet so beautiful.

Having him be Dr. No like everyone theorized would have honestly been preferable to the hot mess we got

Great video but I respectfully disagree with your assessment on the Blofeld scene. The way I interpreted the scene was that Blofeld absolutely wasn’t revealing the truth as an act of kindness, but out of spite. Through the way he delivers his speech and mocks Bond throughout, it’s made fairly clear that, by telling Bond Madeleine was always loyal to him and that Blofeld tricked him, he’s also revealing to Bond that those five years he spend depressed and alone were his own fault for falling for it. We then see with how he snaps and throttles Blofeld that this revelation does some serious physiological damage to him, just as Blofeld had intended. So I don’t think he acts uncharacteristically at all.

“You could replace Safin with Dr. Evil and nothing would change” is absolutely hilarious

Blofeld's actions make sense to me. He thinks it's too late for Bond and Madelene to make up: Bond's reaction to her perceived betrayal hurt her too much for her to forgive him. By telling Bond that she _didn't_ betray him, it removes Bonds hatred for her, but makes him feel deep regret and guilt for pushing her away. The pain you caused to yourself is worse than that inflicted on you by others, Blofeld's reveal makes bond aware that he was the agent of his own unhappiness. So Blofeld is not helping repair the protagonists relationship (which after so many years of mulling over injuries ought to be unrepairable, despite what happens in the plot), but twisting the knife as an act of revenge. A great take on inner turmoil IMO, better portrayed by a villain who delivers it with a sinister smile than one full of rage.

my issue with Safin was that he was the outsider to the Spectre family, which made up Craigbond's antagonists throughout his movies. Chifre, Green, White, Blofeld, all make up this organized faction, while Safin is almost better suited as an antihero to help Bond take them down. Silva was not a part of Spectre, or at all connected, but was interesting and charismatic enough to stand alone. No Time To Die was like the writers had finished the Spectre arc but wanted to squeeze one more story out of it. This was the dregs of Craigbond, no more.

While watching the movie, it felt like they had no dialog for Safin during his monologue and just made Malek improvise incoherently for several takes and just cut the thing together in editing.

"we are not so different you and I" is a phrase that needs to be used with characters that were in the same place but made different decisions or with characters that are so different that they become alike.

Can't believe it took me so long to see this, the villain of this film is such an interesting topic of conversation. I really like Safin up until Spectre is completely wiped out, as you said up until then his character generally made complete sense but after that I genuinely couldn't tell what he wanted to do. I still didn't mind him as a villain after that, he was serviceable at the very least, and I liked all the classic Bond villain aesthetics with the lair, the hazmat suits and the poison garden (which Bond definitely should've thrown him into at the end to kill him, although I did like the bluntness of just unloading the clip into him). Here's my pitch for reworking his motive without too many drastic changes: I think they should've made it clear that after killing Spectre he gets a big ego boost, he's done what no world government was able to do, he wiped out the biggest terrorist organization on the planet and he's not done yet. They should've really leaned into the idea of Safin seeing himself as the hero of the story, scrap him being in love with Madeleine Swann and purely focus on this mindset of the world he has. The opening where he kills Madeleine's mother but when given a chance to kill Madeleine instead chooses to save her could've been used to explore this idea of him seeing himself as a hero. In that scene he's on a mission for revenge against Spectre, to him like many people they're the bad guys, but when he sees this girl helpless under the ice he realizes that whilst yes Spectre is evil it's not enough to wipe them out, there's innocents in the world who are helpless and need protecting (there could probably be more done to flesh that out in the film itself). He has that line about 'wanting to be a bit tidier' which I really think is what they should've solely focused on, have his plan be to send the nanobots around the world, and with his infinite resources he plans to spend the rest of his life studying the population and whenever he deems a person or group to be a threat or a potential future threat he takes them out. He'd be 'playing God' much like Bond says to him in the film, but in Safin's mind he'd be able to justify it. In his eyes who'd be better to protect the world than the one who wiped out Spectre, he could even throw in Bond's face that it was his own government who created it in the first place, which combined with all the atrocities they've done that Bond himself has partaken in over the years, Safin could easily see himself as better than all of them seeing as again, killing Spectre was a greater achievement than anything they've done. I think the aspects like him killing people to protect the world has an interesting parallel to Bond, however unlike Bond Safin knows (in his own twisted way) why he kills every person he kills, Bond just followed orders most of the time, there's something that could be explored there. To me this was a villain with just a few integral ingredients missing, which was frustrating because you could've made it work. Bond villains are known for having motifs or gimmicks, so I really liked Safin having poisonous plants, that's perfect Bond villain material, but there's not a huge amount of focus on it. They really could've given us some fun stuff with that and again, would've made for a grizzly and appropriately ironic death for him if Bond dropped or threw him into them. Plus the whole idea of the film starting with the traditional Bond vs Spectre scenario, then this third party showing up is just really fun and unlike anything we've had before, but that aspect also didn't get much focus.

It's a shame. I absolutely adored Rami in Mr. Robot and he easily became one of my favourite actors. Therefore, I was so excited to see him playing a Bond villain role, it seemed perfect. It's so disappointing they messed up his script.

I think Ernst Stavro with his cat is easily one of the most iconic villains in cinema's history that he becomes an archetypical villain that has been parodied or influenced in pop culture. This leads to where Dr. Evil from _Austin Powers_ and the guy from _Evil Genius_ game took the inspiration from. Ernst is way ahead of his time.

I actually liked Safin. His motivations, his goals, they always stayed quite hidden. He was just danger. There was no higher philosophy to his actions, he just wanted "things", and what those things were, were left in the shimmer light. The thing that struck me as great about No Time To Die was how James Bond couldn't be James Bond. Think about it, in previous movies, James never had something to lose. He was the perfect MI6 assassin. But now James has a family, and it just so happens that Safin not only threatens James's family to make him powerless, he actually has a connection with Madeleine. And that connection is what makes Safin so dangerous. It aren't his actions, or motivations that make him dangerous per sé. It's the fact that he is a threat to James in such a unique way that for the first time ever, Bond couldn't be Bond. James for the first time did not have the better card, the upper hand. He was chased the entire movie and ultimately lost. I also want to point out how it seems as if Safin knew he would lose to James in the end, and just wanted to leave a permanent mark, a bleak eau revoir as his signature. I almost think that Safin's obsession over Doctor Swan made him blind. He conveyed with his final actions the "eye for an eye" philosophy, a quite common one. He would die to James, who would return to his wife the same wife Safin is obsessed by. He can't stand this and rather gives his own life to ensure James will never touch his wife again. To make the nano tech work he had to get up close and personal with Bond, and he knew he would lose the fight, but at least he died knowing James will never be happy, and that almost seemed his single goal in the final half of the movie. (I know it might sound a bit incoherent, but English isn't my first language)

You do the best job with sponsorship ads of anyone I watch. Really considering getting Nebula because of you.

To be fair when i heard his motivation i thought the screenwriter deliberately made his character such a cliche as a some sort of homage to the old Bond villians but yea. The villian wasnt the selling point of NTTD.

Hmm he was a great one to compliment this Bond. But yes *he* was lackluster especially compared to the absolute great villains we previously had in movies/shows.

I’ve been writing a script and you’ve helped me like hell with all these videos

For a villain hell bent on world domination, I expected him to break into a rendition of "Don't Stop Me Now". Not even once. Instead, he was talking from here *points to bum*

Villain appearing at the beginning of the movie: think how it would have ruined Apocalypse Now. There we feel the villain approaching like a malignant force of nature, like a disease. The reveal is perfect. Of course it requires real mastery to pull off, but properly done it's really great.

10:20 Wow, you totally got Blowfeld's motivation wrong. He told Bond he wasn't betrayed by Madeline because he was laughing at him for destroying his own relationship. It's like when Thomas Jane's Punisher was taunting Howard Saint "Made you kill your best friend.. Made you kill your wife..". Blowfeld was taunting James and drinking in the irony that James's inability to trust the love of his life caused him to cast her aside and leave her defenseless and alone.

Didn't expect a surprise Sanderson clip. Been a long time viewer, but I haven't watched a vid of yours in a while, but I'm glad I watched this one, and good to see you're still making good content. :)

'Bloody... Freddy Mercury over there' had me in creases. Well played dude

Absolutely absolutely agree here. I liked his motivations but there was not enough substance to the character. Having him kill one of the bigger villains in the bond franchise was great and help set him up for something greater but at the end there was no true payoff to any of that. You can never call something like this always but the potential was never truly actualized., ✌🏾✌🏾👀

As we speak, I'm writing my third action adventure novel in a series. I want you to know I watch your videos with keen interest because one, you're passionate about storytelling and two, you're right about everything. I'll happily add this to my rewatch list as a friendly reminder to write better villains. Blessings!

The “we’re not so different” line still works for me during the Indy/Belloq bar scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark.

outstanding upload The Closer Look. I crushed that thumbs up on your video. Maintain up the exceptional work.

15:57 To be fair, villains not killing Bond right away when they have the chance is pretty much a James Bond tradition. It happens in Goldeneye, License to Kill, The Spy who Loved me, Moonraker, Live and Let Die and probably more that I haven't thought of.

It’s not just that he is boring. They did nothing to age him. He is supposed to be a lot older than the Bond girl but he looks the same age.

This is really helping me write my book, especially with giving me ideas to connect earlier parts of my plot to my antagonist

I never had any idea what he wanted to do. I thought he'd re-engineered the nanobots with the mind control flower that he said he'd made and he was going to mind control the world or something.

While watching the movie, my family and I realized we didn’t actually know the villain’s name (during the forest chase)! So we named him Max Verstappen since we only sorta heard his name in the film itself

Excellent breakdown, analysis and suggestion. Such a pity that No Time to Day spent months on the shelf before release rather than having that time in pre-production to write a better (shorter) story.

glad that you are back

I didn’t watch the movie, but wouldn’t the superficial similarities be interesting if that’s actually what Saffin believed, but in the final confrontation he actually realised they were nothing alike at all. His motivations were that he sincerely believes he was such a engimatic and impressive person that he’s only a match for the greatest secret agent alive. Only to be dismantled the second Bond actually saw him as a threat. His entire conspiracy falls apart around him because he never truly had any power or influence, he was just a frontman for a large group of cowardly and power hungry villains.

I love your alternate version of Safin! Would have made the movie way better

Wow, you also think the villain in No Time To Die was forgettable? WE'RE NOT SO DIFFERENT, YOU AND I!!!

21:34 Magneto moment (a moment where the hero and villain work together to achieve a common goal because they agree that the threat they face together is bigger than the threats that either of them is to each other) you implemented into this alternative version of the film.

Just wanted to say your videos are amazing and I learn a lot from them! Any chances you'll do a video on Villeneuve's Dune?

In general, most of these new & young aspiring writer do the biggest mistake: Writing characters, that serve the plot. Drinker describes that perfectly, when he says "so that the plot can happen". But its the heroes and villains need & wants, motivations and so that creates these dynamics and the plot...

The recent Dune film did a great job of this with the Baron...we see very little of him in the actual first half of the film, but in the very few glimpses we do get early on his presence is absolutely menacing

Really glad you found your way over to Nebula!!

Dude your videos are fantastic and they get a crazy number of views, how are you not working on 2M subs already?!

I remember getting to the climax of this film and realising I have no idea what this villains name is? His motivation? And his plan? I really enjoyed the opening scene of this film but the rest of it was just so boring

i was under the impression that blofeld's motivation telling bond about madeline was to simply salt the wound a little more; he genuinely thought that bond and madeline were beyond reconciliation, and so he thought he'd twist the knife a little more by making sure bond knew it was him and bond's own paranoia that ended their relationship. really dig into bond's self loathing by further proving that bond can't have anything good in his life without ruining it.

I don't know if you will see this since this video is nearly a month old, but: Thank you so much for making the content you've been putting out. I discovered you only yesterday, but within that time, I watched your videos, leading me to improve my writing skills and insight into storymaking immensely. As a young and inspiring writer, you are doing God's work.

Its crazy how his example of a revised script is similar to the Riddler in the Batman.

Dude.. you missed the name play Safin = "c'est fin" giving meaning like this is the end or finished

And such a good actor too, his performance in Mr. Robot is unforgettable

I love your rewrite of this, would've loved to see that! 🤟

Blofeld's reaction of telling Bond all the truth he knew makes actually a lot more sense than just having him shut up or lie to him when you think about it. So I disagree with what you say about him. Blofeld lost everything in just a fews seconds because of another villain, he has more reason to hate that other villain than Bond. He has every reason to tell Bond the truth and hopefully set him on the path of killing that other villain for him. There is no sympathy building up or forced narrative, it's all meant for his personal gain. And when you think about it, it is actually even the more mature choice to make rather than "I am the villain who hates you so i will tell you nothing because I don't like you"

that hot fuzz cut away was perfect

The funny thing is that this video came before "The Batman" in which there was a line between Batman and the villain "We are not so different" :)

I am taking so many notes buddy this channel is amazing

Yeah, the issue as was pointed out is that Safin gets revenge and his whole motivation sort of changes to world domination, presumably because the writers wanted to raise the stakes and have a bigger climax. The whole 'you and I are not so different' schtick is overused in Bond, but I noticed that Safin also used this line when talking to Madeline (he counters her claim that he's damaged by saying she is too as she had Bond's child... which is completely non-sensical and is in no way comparable to his goals). Could have been interesting to have Bond actively reject this idea perhaps? I mean, I sort of got the sense that Safin was simply trying to justify his horrific actions to himself anyway and is a bit of a gaslighting b*stard, which could have been interesting to see played out. Shame as he could have been a cool, sympathetic villain if fleshed out (I actually like Malek's performance). I liked your rewrite.

I think you should do a deeper analysis into these types of antagonists with "elaborate plans" like Zemo, The Joker, and Lex Luthor. I never thought that Zemo at least ever had a convoluted and elaborately of getting to his goal. His objective was simple; to acquire proof that The Winter Soldier assassinated Stark's parents to divide Steve and Tony and thus the Avengers. When the HYDRA agent died with the proof, he resorted to more violent means and adapted as the circumstances changed accordingly such as seeing the news in the Siberian airport. Maybe you do an essay topic on all three of their plans and see whether any of them are coincidental or just adapting to new circumstances.