Ok, so my boss insists that James Bond had another number besides 007. She’s thinking it may have been 7777, but can’t remember exactly.
I don’t even begin to have a clue, and I’ve searched all over the web with no luck. This would be a magnificent brown-nosing opportunity for me. Can anyone help? I promise to give the SDMB full credit.
Nope. 007 is it. All the agent numbers in his section were 00, which designated ‘license to kill’. Presumably agents not 00 could only rough you up.
I have all the books, reread numerous times, and have seen all the movies.
NB: As the movies progressed, they departed further and further from the story lines of the books. I believe this is called ‘poetic license’, and seemed to accelerate after Ian Fleming died.
Trivia: He also wrote Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang.
VB
Remember, you can tune a piano, but you can’t tuna fish!
What Blue said.
Your boss is out to lunch.
And when you relay the results of your quest to her, use exactly those words.
Ok, she may well be out to lunch, I have to admit, but sincerely, she thinks that he was given another number in “You Only Live Twice” because they had to pretend to kill him off, and he couldn’t use 007 while he was “dead”.
Oh well. Thanks anyway.
While we’re on the subject, a friend of mine insists there was a “triple 0” who was THE top agent. I can’t find mention of him/her/it anywhere and I think he’s making it up. . . anyone help me out?
– Sylence
I don’t have an evil side. Just a really, really apathetic one.
Agent 008 and 009 were briefly mentioned in a couple of the books, but there is no hint that there was a “Top Agent” in the 00 section.
Wally, wasn’t it 008 and 0012 in the books?From what I remember, Fleming’s “License to Kill” didn’t mean just shooting someone but cold-blooded homicide in the line of duty; Bond’s were sniping a Hungarian in an office in New York and garrotting a Russian (?)scientist in his (the Russians) home.
(all this is based on knowledge garnered from six novels 4 weeks ago, so, don’t quote me.)
–John
Ha! You’re not telling me what to do, Johnny Boy.
Coldfire
"You know how complex women are"
- Neil Peart, Rush (1993)
Absynthetic–Bond was given another name and a makeover, but continued to use the 007 code-name. He disguised himself as the husband of a Japanese pearl diver.
The other double-00s were other agents. They were mentioned in The Man With the Golden Gun (Scaramanga killed 002), A View to a Kill (003 killed), Goldeneye (006 turns bad, tries to kill Bond), The Living Daylights (004 killed by an assassin), Goldfinger (Bond sez he’ll be replaced by 008), Octopussy (009 killed while dressed as a clown).
Man, those 00 agents have as much a hard time as the red shirt ensigns in Star Trek.
Does any 00 agent ever appear who doesn’t get killed?
I can just a imagine a 01 agent up for promotion. Congratulations agent 015, we are moving you to the 00 division. You will be 0017. 015 - “No, please, not that. I’ll take any other assignment, just don’t transfer me to the 00 division. Them guys is dropping like flies.”
In the book by Ian Fleming, You Only Live Twice, Bond was temporarily given another number.
His wife had been killed at the end of the prior book On Her Majesty’s Secret Service by the archfiend Blofeld. The beginning of You Only Live Twice has Bond despondent and depressed and in psychotherapy. Between books, he has blown a couple of assignments on account of the depression. M has a conversation with the Secret Service Therapist, and they agree that the only way to snap Bond out of the depression is a really engaging assignment.
Bond is called into talk with M. Bond figures he’s going to get sacked. M tells him that he’s being moved out of the double-0 section for a special assignment in Japan. Bond says that he’d rather resign than suffer such indignity. M gets very testy and says something like, what the hell is wrong with you? This is a promotion… to the diplomatic side of the secret service, a four-digit number (which happens to be 7777).
And that’s how James Bond temporarily has a four digit number.
Plot spoiler: Of course, in Japan, Bond stumbles onto Blofeld and… well, read the book.
The movies, of course, do not ever come close to having this depth of character for Bond… Fleming tried on several occasions to make Bond more human, less super-hero.
BTW, for those of you on AOL who are Bond fans, there’s a James Bond chat in the MYSTERY section every Monday night at 9 PM EST.
The TRIPLE-Oh agents were enabled not only to kill you, but to bring you back from the dead.
Uke
CKDextHavn - Thanks so much! I promise to say very complimentary things about you to the boss-lady.
In the James Bond Roleplaying Game, 7777 would be the number of a rookie agent fresh out of spy school.
“Age is mind over matter; if you don’t mind, it don’t matter.” -Leroy “Satchel” Paige
Does anyone else think it’s way cool that John Cleese is the new Q (well, R)? We’ll miss Q, of course. But Cleese is so damn cool!
Though I’ve only seen the movie, in YOLT 007 is refer to as “zero-zero” by Tanaga on the little video thingee.
I’m really sticking my neck out here but I could swear I remember a reference in one of the novels to one of Bond’s earlier positions (before he got promoted to the 00’s). Something like 015 with a license to make smart remarks and goose people at parties.
JB
Lex Non Favet Delicatorum Votis
<< In the James Bond Roleplaying Game, 7777 would be the number of a rookie agent fresh out of spy school. >>
Sheeeeeeesh. Sounds like the James Bond Roleplaying game didn’t pay much attention to the secret service that Ian Fleming devised. But, heck, who cares about accuracy when you can sell little action figures that come with their own little knives and guns and neat stuff like that… oh, yeah, and you can sell the plots for games, too.