Is Tom Mankiewicz an asset to the Bond series

Tom Mankiewicz was the screenwriter on Diamonds Are Forever, Live And Let Die and The Man With The Golden Gun. I can't help feeling that his Bond films contained a formula, silliness and self-parody that I don't miss. I like parts of each of these films but it feel like there's plenty of daft bits that are there only to link a succession of researched stunts together.

I know all these things can be found elsewhere in the series so I'm not accusing his scripts of being unique. But they're just that bit tackier and 'played for laughs' to me.

Before his tenure, the sixties Bonds were more dramatic to me, particularly ending with OHMSS. After his stretch, they went more fantastic with The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker but were more dramatic again. After that, you get to John Glen and thence to the 80's-glossy silliness of Octopussy and A View To A Kill, so there's plenty else around for these things to be found in.

However, I think stupid women characters are used to drive the plot far more in his stories than any others: Tiffany Case, Rosie Carver, Mary Goodnight. 'She's stupid so she's funny so she's plausible' has dated fast because it was never pleasant then or before, only put up with by audiences.

And I could do without seeing Blofeld dressed in drag, a daft agent pushing a switch with her bum and being too daft to notice or a bleedin' slidey-whistle while a crew watches a stunt guy risk his life in a very dangerous trick. I know it's far from just him, they're committee films. But a lot of it is him, unfortunately.

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