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1* {{Adorkable}}: Unlike his cantankerous predecessors, Whishaw's Q has a polite, quiet demeanour and a preppy fashion sense which make him cute and geeky. It is turned up to eleven in the [[Film/{{Spectre}} next film]] while the InsufferableGenius part is considerably toned down (possibly because of how thoroughly Silva embarrasses him by taking advantage of his arrogance in this film).
2* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation:
3** Is Silva a TragicVillain and WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds, or a [[PsychopathicManchild childish monster]] who is the victim of his own behaviour (since M only sold him out because he was hacking the Chinese without authorization). On the one hand his TraumaCongaLine was pretty nasty involving torture and betrayal; on the other though, he commits a staggering amount of murders and engineers a terrorist campaign solely out of petty revenge against one person, and the OffstageVillainy he alludes to is implied to be even worse, funding a decadent lifestyle via crashing financial markets, orchestrating terrorist attacks or causing and faking disasters.
4** Similarly, there is disagreement about Silva's EvilPlan. While it's obvious he intends to humiliate and then kill M, [[spoiler:did he ''always'' plan on it being a murder-suicide or was killing himself simply the end of his VillainousBSOD, since Bond had foiled his original scheme and then proceeded to kill everyone in his organization, and M had already been fatally wounded by an underling despite his orders (albeit [[VillainBall before he actually issued them]]).]]
5** Bond's response to Silva's seduction. Is Bond bisexual or at least had experimented with it in the past? Or is he just playing it cool to throw Silva off? (Or given where Silva's hand is, referring to what Le Chiffre did to him in ''Film/{{Casino Royale|2006}}''?)
6** When Sévérine is [[spoiler:facing Bond in Silva's twisted shooting contest, is she trying to silently beg him not to kill her, or does she actually want him to put her out of her misery after what appears to have been a savage beating (probably including gang-rape) and trauma at the hands of Silva's henchmen? Did Bond miss because of his injury and his degraded skills, or did he miss because he couldn't bring himself to end her life? A darker interpretation is that he missed so he could get Silva to waste his shot. If that's the case, did Bond willingly sacrifice Sévérine's life or did he believe Silva would shoot the glass.]]
7** For that matter, Bond's "what a waste of good scotch" line after [[spoiler:Silva kills Sévérine. A display of his LackOfEmpathy and desensitization to death, a coping mechanism given his history of the CartwightCurse, or simply a way to throw Silva and his men off guard so he could get the drop on them?]]
8* AndYouThoughtItWouldFail: The [[BrokenBase mixed feelings]] about ''Film/QuantumOfSolace'' led to some pundits and fan circles to claim that Creator/DanielCraig's Bond was already done for at the time, not helped by the 4 years of SequelGap. Then ''Skyfall'' came out, and its smashing success on all fronts proved them wrong.
9* AngstWhatAngst:
10** Bond doesn't seem too concerned [[spoiler:when Sévérine is shot, despite saying he'd protect her. Well, except for the part where he mercilessly slaughtered Silva's men immediately after, but even that's ambiguous]].
11** Bond also doesn't react strongly to the destruction of his childhood home where his parents died. Most jarringly, there's a secret tunnel where young Bond hid for two days after the death of his parents. Not only does Modern Bond enter the tunnel without the slightest hint that it holds any special meaning to him, but he outright states "I always hated this place". The DVDCommentary states that there was too much pain there for him to properly deal with, which is probably Bond invoking this trope.
12** Eve is [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone horrified]] when she initially "kills" Bond. But by the time he comes back from the dead, she seems to have gotten over it. With the time frame between Bond's "death" and return she had proper time to grieve over it and she did mention that she was considering taking a different profession since she still expressed guilt over the incident.
13** All in all, there's an awful lot of typically English StiffUpperLip.
14* AntiClimaxBoss: [[spoiler:All it takes for the confrontation between Bond and Silva to end is for the former to throw a knife at the latter's back.]]
15* AwardSnub:
16** After serious, genuine hype about the possibilities of UsefulNotes/AcademyAward nominations for Creator/JudiDench, Creator/JavierBardem, as well for Best Picture, the film garnered no nominations in any of the big categories. On a more positive note, it received nominations for Best Song (which it won), Best Score, Best Sound Mixing, Best Sound Editing (which it also won) and Best Cinematography for Roger Deakins. It's actually more Oscar nominations for any Bond movie ever -- beating out ''Film/TheSpyWhoLovedMe'' -- and more Oscar ''wins'' than any other in the series -- surpassing both ''Film/{{Goldfinger}}'' and ''Film/{{Thunderball}}''. That said, there were many who found Deakins' loss in the Cinematography category to be a large case of this, given how it was both his ninth nomination without a win and the film lost out to ''Film/LifeOfPi'', which some accused of being less of a feat in photography, given how much of it relied on computer technology.
17** The UsefulNotes/{{BAFTA}}s do a bit better with their Best British Film nomination and includes supporting acting nominations for Dench and Bardem. Creator/SamMendes still gets snubbed. BAFTA has no Best Song award. On the other hand it won the BAFTA for the ''Best British Film'', the first Bond film in 50 years to do so.
18* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic:
19** All of the score; little surprise due to Thomas Newman composing. He deservedly became the second composer to get nominated for Best Original Score, following Marvin Hamlisch for ''Film/TheSpyWhoLovedMe''.
20** Music/{{Adele}}'s theme "[[https://youtube.com/watch?v=DeumyOzKqgI Skyfall]]", which incorporates the James Bond theme and {{foreshadow|ing}}s numerous events in the movie. It became the first Bond theme to win the Oscar for Best Original Song, said Oscar also being the first for the entire franchise since 1966 when ''Film/{{Thunderball}}'' won Best Visual Effects and the first for an actual performance and not a technical award. For bonus points, Adele had only recently recovered from a strained throat that left her unable to speak for months.
21** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLBFeoikELo "Boum!"]] by Charles Trenet, [[spoiler:which is played during Sévérine's execution.]]
22** [[https://youtube.com/watch?v=8dnHUcOkvv8 "Boom Boom"]] by The Animals, [[spoiler:which is played when Silva shows up in the helicopter.]]
23** If you could somehow express the concept of MythologyGag in musical form, you would probably wind up with [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gbyKplerD8 "Breadcrumbs"]].
24* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: Silva's *ahem* ''interest'', in Bond. He starts blatantly coming on to him for a few minutes, then it's right back to the plot as though it never happened.
25* BrokenBase: While the movie was a massive critical and commercial success and beloved in some quarters for its cinematography, darker themes, and grittier feel, ironically some diehard Bond fans frequently hate it. There's a variety of reasons for this (a completely joyless and ineffective Bond, the villain's relatively mundane plan, the child-prostitute turned Bond Girl (and the way Bond lets her die), the destruction of Bond's classic Aston Martin), but most of them contribute to the greater issue that the movie (to some) feels like it's going out of its way to mock and belittle old-school Bond and his fans; in fact, one of the themes of the movie is that Bond himself is an outdated, useless concept... which, sure, could be an interesting idea, but probably less so to people who just paid money to watch a James Bond movie. The other half of the broken base argues that the movie, rather than mocking classic Bond tropes, actually defends them - first stating the case against them, but then tearing it down, ultimately concluding that Bond will always be needed. M's stellar defense of the 00 Section is one of the iconic scenes of the movie, but there's a more subtle cue in the paintings -- after Q likens Bond to a once-grand warship now useful only as scrap, pay attention to the paintings in the new M's offices at the end of the movie. They're of [[spoiler:warships in their prime -- Q was wrong in his assessment of Bond.]]
26* DesignatedHero:
27** James Bond stands by and patiently waits while Patrice kills a politician, puts some incredibly creepy moves on Sévérine and fails to thwart Silva's plan at any step. [[spoiler:Except the part of killing Silva as he attempted an TakingYouWithMe with M. Though M was already injured enough that she dies afterwards, and had stated she preferred for Silva to rot in prison.]] The only thing that it can be said he accomplished is that he survived.
28** M. Too often, she harms the lives of herself and her agents for unnecessary risks rather than trust them to sort the problem out. In the pre-song scene, she orders Eve to shoot, risking Bond's life in the process, even though Bond still has a chance to defeat Patrice. Later, when she is warned of Silva's escape, instead of doing the prudent thing by aborting her hearing, she proceeds with it, like she wants to stand strong, in effect endangering a bunch of top notch Members of Parliament and government officials and God knows how many civilians for her personal pride; if she'd aborted her hearing, all those cops and guards, and other bystanders wouldn't have been shot.
29* EnsembleDarkhorse:
30** Kincade, for being a BraveScot and a BadassBystander.
31** Mallory, who first seems like a typical ObstructiveBureaucrat but later shows himself to be [[BadassBureaucrat so much more]]. He was such a hit with audiences that hardly anyone complained about him [[spoiler:becoming the new M.]]
32* EstrogenBrigade: Aside from [[MrFanservice Bond]], Q also attracted a crop of fangirls after being revamped as a young {{Adorkable}} geeky guy.
33* {{Fanon}}: Silva was a high-ranking field agent, possibly even a 00. Most fans are stunned when you point out that none of this is explicitly mentioned in the film. They take his NotSoDifferentRemark speech very literally. But aside from firing a gun a few times and lobbing a couple of grenades, nothing he does in the film suggests the sort of rough-and-tumble, life-on-the-line sort of career as Bond.
34* GeniusBonus:
35** Right before Bond meets Silva, he's taken to an open-air room with unprotected computer servers in the middle of a dusty, deserted city. Such an environment would make the computers degrade quickly, essentially making the system self-destructing when Silva no longer needs it. Knowing this ahead of time, one soon realizes that [[spoiler:[[BatmanGambit Silva's planning to get captured shortly after this encounter.]]]]
36** In computer security circles, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_and_Bob Mallory]] is often used as a shorthand for a hypothetical adversary. It adds credence to Mallory being a potential bad guy in the movie, although this ultimately turns out to be a RedHerring, and Mallory proves to be a good guy.
37* HarsherInHindsight:
38** After the explosion at MI-6, the news reports "a terrorist attack in the heart of London, leaving 6 dead and many more injured". In March 2017, a terrorist attack in Westminster (just two bridges further) also claimed the lives of 6 (including the perpetrator) and left many more injured.
39** Three scenes become even harsher by ''Film/NoTimeToDie'':
40*** The beginning of the movie has Bond accidentally being sniped by Eve, being presumed dead afterwards. [[spoiler:When he dies two movies later, part of it is due to the main villain shooting him three times]].
41*** Bond answered to Silva's "What's your [hobby]?" question with "Resurrection". [[spoiler:[[TheHeroDies He does not survive his mission to stop Safin.]]]]
42*** As Skyfall Lodge blows up, Bond has to [[OutrunTheFireball outrun an incoming wall of fire]] inside a hidden tunnel. He jumps at a left turn, barely avoiding being singed by the flames. [[spoiler:His real death involves his entire body being incinerated by a barrage of tomahawk missiles, which he chose to not escape due to being infected with a virus that could have killed his girlfriend and daughter]].
43*** At the end of the movie, the new M asks Bond if he's "ready to get back to work" following the previous M's death [[spoiler:In ''No Time to Die'', M gently but firmly declares "Back to work" after the crew drinks a toast to the now equally deceased Bond.]]
44* HilariousInHindsight: WordOfGod said that Silva was inspired in part by Hans Landa from ''Film/InglouriousBasterds''. Creator/ChristophWaltz, who played Landa, was later cast as Franz Oberhauser [[spoiler:aka Ernst Stavro Blofeld]], the BigBad of the next film, ''Film/{{Spectre}}''. [[spoiler:It gets even funnier when Blofeld reveals that he's been behind everything since ''Casino Royale'', so Silva's been inspired by Blofeld in and out of universe.]]
45* IKnewIt: Fans called a number of reveals in the film before it came out, including:
46** Creator/NaomieHarris' character Eve was actually [[spoiler:Moneypenny.]]
47** Creator/RalphFiennes' character Gareth Mallory was [[spoiler:the new M]]
48* ItWasHisSled: [[spoiler:M dies.]]
49* JerkassWoobie: Silva by the later parts of the film. Most notably towards the end when [[spoiler:he cries over M being mortally wounded.]]
50* LikeYouWouldReallyDoIt: Bond "dying" during the opening sequence. The "reveal" that he survived is treated with an offhand casualness that shows the filmmakers were well aware it wouldn't hold any tension. Subverted with [[spoiler:M's death]] in the end.
51* MagnificentBastard: [[FallenHero Tiago Rodriguez]] was once M's finest agent, whom she betrayed to the Chinese where he was tortured to the point of attempting a bungled suicide which left him hideously disfigured. Escaping as "[[PsychopathicManchild Raoul Silva]]", he joined SPECTRE under his new name and became a [[TheCracker cyber-terrorist]] who plays the entirety of UsefulNotes/MI6 perfectly. Using a series of terrorist attacks to lure out Bond, Silva proceeds to play mind games with him from their meetings, and [[CapturedOnPurpose allows his own capture]] so his encrypted laptop allows his men access to [=MI6=]'s systems. Escaping [=MI6=]'s custody, Silva hunts down M with the intention of achieving a mutual suicide with her, to end his pain with hers and secure his revenge against the woman he sees as a mother who betrayed him. One of Bond's most effective and brilliant adversaries, Silva even dies achieving almost everything he sets out to do, with M following him to death moments later.
52* MoralEventHorizon: Silva crosses it before we even know who he is [[spoiler:with his bombing of MI-6]].
53* {{Narm}}:
54** Silva's [[spoiler:gasps at the end of the film after Bond throws a knife into his back]] come off as more of a joke leading into a snide comment, but are meant to be taken seriously.
55** His death is almost identical to that of the bad guy in Enter the Ninja, already considered one of the most Narmtastic movie deaths in history: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=le0HGitpCjI See here]].
56* {{Shipping}}: Kincade and M are friendly to each other when they meet, they both have the ParentalSubstitute thing going on, and their actors are around the same age. [[spoiler:Granted, any possibility of anything going forward is destroyed by the fact that M is six feet under.]]
57* SignatureScene:
58** The fight between Bond and the sniper in the room of the skyscraper.
59** Silva's first on-screen scene, which is him making a speech about rats being pitted against one another.
60** [[spoiler:Silva revealing his melted jawline to M while imprisoned.]]
61* SpecialEffectFailure:
62** The shot of [[spoiler:Bond going over the waterfall]] would be a lot better if it hadn't been so obvious that it was a dummy.
63** Bond staring at the (obviously CG) Komodo dragons in the midst of a fight makes one think he also found them to be absurdly out of proportion.
64** Likewise, the scorpion in the bar scene toward the beginning is poorly composited against Bond's hand.
65* SpoiledByTheFormat: You don't hire Creator/RalphFiennes, give him second billing, and have him play just an ObstructiveBureaucrat.
66* SurprisinglyImprovedSequel: The movie was significantly better received than ''Film/QuantumOfSolace''. Some reviewers have gone so far as to rank ''Skyfall'' among the best of the Bond films.
67* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: Some fans were unhappy about Creator/SamMendes' longtime collaborator Music/ThomasNewman serving as the film's composer instead of regular Bond series composer Music/DavidArnold. This mostly went away once the film was released though.
68%%* TheyCopiedItSoItSucks: Some fans were unhappy about how the second act resorted to copying ''Film/TheDarkKnight'', after setting up a pure, classic Bond thriller in its first act. What's odd is that there are several other works with similar elements to that second act; however, that could just be taken as part of the problem to begin with, since by ''Skyfall'' those elements had become a cliché, as well as the argument that those other movies simply played those elements ''better''.
69* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter: Séverine is presented as a prostitute who has been trapped in the trade since she was a child and Bond rescues her and even develops a slight relationship with her. [[spoiler:Sadly she gets killed off the following morning, and in the second act no less.]] As such we never got to see their relationship and her character as a whole fully developed.
70* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot: Specific mention is made of Mallory [[spoiler:being a captive of the IRA for three months]], but nobody ever draws attention to how [[spoiler:he still serves England and Silva became a FallenHero under similar conditions]]. It's more likely that the comparison was supposed to be between Silva and Bond. Both were sacrificed by M for the sake of a mission. Yet Bond, despite his anger, came back and fought for her (and with her), whereas the embittered Silva plotted her downfall.
71* ToughActToFollow:
72** ''Film/{{Spectre}}'' didn't live up to the great reception of ''Skyfall''. ''Film/NoTimeToDie'' raised the bar again but it doesn't seem like it reached ''Skyfall'''s heights.
73** Music/{{Adele}}'s TitleThemeTune is already touted as arguably the best Bond theme song of the entire Craig-era 007 Movies, if not the whole James Bond franchise, especially after netting its first major Academy Award alongside with a corresponding Grammy Award. It is fair to say that Music/SamSmith's "[[Film/{{Spectre}} Writing's on the Wall]]" and Music/BillieEilish's "Film/NoTimeToDie" have had some very large shoes to fill. That being said, both garnered awards.
74* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: Silva bringing down the Underground train? They actually dropped a train for real.
75* WinBackTheCrowd: The film earned overwhelmingly positive reviews from after the ''extremely'' mixed reception of ''Film/QuantumOfSolace''. It also became the highest grossing ''Film/JamesBond'' film ever, grossing ''$1.11 billion'', ranking as the ''8th highest grossing film of all time'', which includes ''$304.4 million'' in the United States alone. It is also the highest grossing film of ''all time'' in the United Kingdom, earning ''$161.2 million'' there.
76* TheWoobie: Sévérine, so ''very'' much. For starters, it's implied that she's been a SexSlave for most of her life, and has been getting abused for who knows how many years by this point. Then, she finally finds someone like Bond, who can potentially set her free from this life, but shortly after taking him to Silva as requested, [[spoiler:she ultimately gets unceremoniously shot in the head by Silva himself, and Bond is, by now, too desensitized to death to even mourn her.]] The more one thinks about it, the more of a downer it really is. Worse, Silva [[spoiler:planned on getting captured. For that he needed Bond brought to him, meaning Sévérine actually did what her sadistic boss wanted. And still, he shoots her; not because he is thinking "YouHaveFailedMe", but he's just killing her to sell Bond on the idea that she betrayed him.]]

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