Daniel Craig bids adieu to the tux in the gutsy, lumbering No Time to Die

After a decade-and-a-half and five films, Daniel Craig’s tenure in 007’s tuxedo is coming to an end. With No Time to Die, franchise newcomer Cary Joji Fukunaga bids farewell to the latest iteration of James Bond with a stylish, overstuffed finale. It’s a gorgeously realized endcap with hard-hitting action and some gutsy, emotional choices, but the shadow of Spectre - the worst of the Craig Bonds - and a weak villain hamstring the film. Minor spoilers ahead…

“So you want me to be half-monk, half-hitman.” Early in 2006’s Casino Royale, Daniel Craig’s James Bond bristles against Judi Dench’s M as she dresses him down for his ruthlessly cavalier execution of a mission. Along with its gritty cold open and white-knuckle prologue, Martin Campbell’s reboot of the perennial spy franchise seemed dead-set to say: “This ain’t your daddy’s Bond.” Jettisoning the super-agent of yore’s suave and dandy, Craig’s 007 barreled through drywall, flouted diplomacy, and didn’t give a shit how his vodka martinis were prepared. And through a series of five films which range from unforgettable (Skyfall), to forgettable (Quantum of Solace), to fetid (Spectre), the granite-faced Craig charted Bond’s accelerated path from brutish novice to old dog, all the while twisting 007 convention.

The Craig era of Bond is defined as a series of firsts. It’s the first iteration to drag the character from the 20th Century into the 21st - a departure from a character that was slowly becoming a heavy-drinking, womanizing relic. For the first time, the series’ women were more than just playthings to be discarded; Casino Royale would see the introduction of Eva Green’s tremendous Vesper Lynd, a barb-tongued even match for Bond who would continue to haunt Bond well after her tragic death. And along with Vesper’s lingering influence, this was also the first version of the character to play with heavier serialization, an attempt to tell a complete saga with story beats that would carry through and directly impact future installments. And now, with No Time to Die, director Cary Joji Fukunaga has given James Bond another first: the first of the franchise to provide closure and finality when such concepts seemed to fly directly against tradition and studio mandate.

In many ways, No Time to Die is a perfect microcosm of the Craig films: parts of it are undeniably great, but it’s also wildly uneven and frustratingly tepid in places. Continuity remains the biggest albatross hanging around the neck of these movies, which didn’t really become much of an issue until 2016’s undercooked and widely-derided Spectre, arguably the worst of the series. Spectre put the entirety of Craig’s 007 under its botched umbrella, bafflingly tying all the events of Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, and Skyfall to Christoph Waltz’s Christmas ham of an overlord villain, Ernst Stavro Blofeld. At one point, he even sneers: “It was all me, James. It's always been me. The author of all your pain.” No Time to Die, in its most ill-advised move, leans heavily upon Spectre, even bringing back Lea Seydoux’s Madeleine Swann as Bond’s love interest. The multiple hands on the screenplay, including new addition Phoebe Waller-Bridge, massively upgrade Swann’s languid chemistry with Bond from Spectre into something that’s at least palpable, but it’s still impossible to buy her as the love of his life. Waltz also returns as Blofeld, pitted against the new big bad Lyutsifer Safin (Rami Malek), but the drama behind his glorified cameo is rendered utterly meaningless after the forgettable Spectre.

No Time to Die reaches back into the past beyond Spectre as well, and it doesn’t really fare better in that regard, either. There’s more than an inkling that Bond is still hung up on Vesper, a beat that has been revisited multiple times, each time less effective than the last, and even the impetus for this final installment - Bond’s reemergence from retirement - is something that was tackled with more elegance and aplomb in Skyfall. The toll of these redundancies also seep through Craig’s performance: he’s still physically game and emotionally capable of delivering the narrative’s big moments - which are largely excellent - but for the first time, it’s a little difficult to discern Bond’s weathered and enervated spirit from Craig’s own.

“**[Rami] Malek, whistling through his lines with a thick layer of artifice, leaves little impression…”**

No Time to Die centers around a viral threat, embodied by Rami Malek’s nominally threatening, idiosyncratic Lyutsifer Safin. Armed with a DNA targeting nano-virus, Safin carries out his vendetta against Spectre, the organization that murdered his entire family. It’s a fascinating twist on villainy that aligns his goals with the film’s heroes, but No Time to Die fizzles the angle remarkably quickly to refocus on yet another flavorless, world-ending scheme. Malek, whistling through his lines with a thick layer of artifice, leaves little impression, and he never lives up to the menace displayed in the intense and frightening cold open.

But despite all the ways No Time to Die doesn’t really work, the film - under Cary Joji Fukunaga deft direction - does deliver the goods when it counts. While Skyfall still remains the series’ most visually stunning entry, No Time to Die finds the best equilibrium between form, function, and aesthetics. This is a beautifully shot movie; DP Linus Sandgren translates breathtaking vistas, brutalist architecture, and a keen eye for spectacular action into visual adrenaline. For a series that never got a handle on its car chases, No Time to Die finally gives us one for the ages, and later on in the final act, a meticulous one-man siege by Bond, filmed in a single take, adds a healthy dose of stylish spice. Sprinting, ducking, and shooting through insurmountable obstacles, Craig’s physicality can’t be interrogated, no matter how emotionally sapped he might be.

**“[Ana] de Armas, in particular, comes close to stealing the entire show in the single, brief scene she has.”**

Bond’s supporting cast, of course, makes a welcome return. Ralph Fiennes’ M hangs out at MI-6 with a portrait of Judi Dench in his office, and Moneypenny (Naomie Harris), Q (Ben Whishaw), and American ally Felix Leiter (Jeffrey Wright) all come back for one last hurrah. No Time to Die also takes the opportunity to subvert the “Bond Girl” trope one final time with a new, cheeky 007 (Lashana Lynch) and the charming Paloma (Ana de Armas), a CIA operative. And even though they’re mostly sidelined in favor of Daniel Craig’s swan song, Lynch and de Armas are bright, light touches in a heavy narrative - de Armas, in particular, comes close to stealing the entire show in her single, brief appearance.

The biggest weapon in No Time to Die’s arsenal, however, is its guts. Daring to end a Bond tenure in a way never before seen in its 58-year run, Fukunaga’s lone entry hits emotional bedrock with a well-earned goodbye. Just when you think it’s really getting away from itself, the film delivers a finale that unleashes Craig at his most desperate and powerful. Daniel Craig’s Bond films - no matter how inconsistent - have always worked because - not in spite - of him. A reconfigured Bond for the new millennium, there’s a reason that Craig is the formative 007 super-spy for many. In the middle of the film, Bond bids adieu to Ana de Armas’ Paloma: “You were excellent.” Paloma - clearly ringing through as audience surrogate - replies: “You too.” You were excellent, Daniel Craig, and you will be missed.