Christian Blauvelt

6 Star Wars parodies that riff on the Force

Lightsaber in Star Wars (1977)

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Box Office: TBD

Director: Sam Mendes

Theme Song Performed By: Sam Smith

Fun Fact: With its many nods to previous 007 outings, adversaries, and gadgets (an Aston Martin fitted with an ejector seat), it’s no surprise that the name of Lea Seydoux’s character, Dr. Madeleine Swann, is a double reference to Remembrance of Things Past author Marcel Proust.

Plot: With MI6’s future in doubt (again), Bond goes rogue (again). Acting on a scrap of beyond-the-grave intel from the late M (Judi Dench), 007 hopscotches the globe working his way up the ladder of a shadowy criminal organization called Spectre – the many-tentacled employer of his most nefarious past foes – headed by a bonkers baddie in a Dr. No Nehru jacket named Franz Overhauser (Christoph Waltz). The film wants to be the unifying culmination of all of Daniel Craig’s license-to-kill missions, but it squaders the Big Payoff it sets up. B-

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We learn for the first time how an MI6 agent earns 00-status. A neophyte James Bond shoots the corrupt Prague station chief who is selling British secrets and half-drowns his contact in a bathroom sink before shooting him too (all shot in glorious black and white). With two kills under his belt, 007 is born, and the franchise begins anew.

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