The Resilient Agent: James Bond, ‘nostalgic geopolitics’ and Skyfall (2012)

Skyfall is unusual, in a strictly geographical sense, because much of the action is situated in the United Kingdom, specifically London and Bond’s ancestral home in Scotland. While London-based MI6 has borne the brunt of attack and mayhem before (The World is Not Enough, 1999), Skyfall is far more introspective as Bond’s races to save both M and restore himself after a near fatal shooting in Turkey. Bond’s resurrection and resilience occupies centre stage in an analysis that uncovers why that matters and the implications that follow for the reproduction of ‘nostalgic geopolitics’ - decidedly backward-looking, resolutely embodied and overtly nationalistic. This appears to call into question what the lone field agent can do in a world defined by mass surveillance, network warfare, permeable boundaries and ubiquitous danger. Since his initiation as a 00, Craig’s Bond and his boss M have struggled to reconcile the growing public demands for public accountability and executive auditing with the diffuse nature of the threat facing MI6 and by extension the UK – transnational, digital, networked – and difficult to trace and respond to where embodied. In both Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace, M and Bond find themselves outwitted and even mocked by adversaries that are masters of the double-cross, high level infiltration and disguise. The gritty, morally ambivalent, and flawed character of Craig’s Bond is a far cry from the escapist, exotic, wise-cracking and laconic incarnations of earlier screen 007s.