Just as an update on an issue I touched upon two or three  weeks ago, I just came across this beeb piece on whether James Bond could ever be portrayed as a female. It’s quite a thorny, complex question: by all means, modernise the character. Bond  has always changed to reflect contemporary attitudes, with each of the franchise’s six  actors bringing something new  to the role. Yet they all play Bond within parameters defined by Ian Fleming; stray too far beyond  those parameters, and he stops being 007. The question therefore becomes exactly what those parameters are and whether they include 007’s gender.

I’m not sure what  to think. As much as I love  the franchise, I think perhaps it is time it was opened up to fresh ideas and new directions. All art should always be open to new ways of seeing things. Then again, I need hardly say that such experiments have in the past been known to backfire catastrophically. This is a very old, well loved  franchise which viewers expect certain things from. Change it too much and you start to loose their interest and affection. At the end of the day, the only way  to see whether a female Bond would work would be to get a woman to play 007.