For all the James Bond films in the franchise, there are only a few villains that truly stand out from the pack, like Auric Goldfinger, Jaws, Le Chiffre, and Francisco Scaramanga. But there’s only one Bond baddy that 007 has faced multiple times: Ernst Stavro Blofeld. From his first appearance in From Russia with Love, where only the lower part of his body—and his trademark white cat—are visible, to his final pre-Daniel Craig-era appearance in the non-canon entry Never Say Never Again, he’s top of the heap. So, when Christoph Waltz was announced as the antagonist in Spectre, the word around town was that the actor would be the next in a long line of actors to bring the iconic villain to life. Only he wasn’t, but would rather be playing the villainous Franz Oberhauser. Definitely not Blofeld. Until he was Blofeld. It should have been a big moment in the Daniel Craig era… and they blew it.
The Legacy of Ernst Stavro Blofeld Haunts ‘Spectre’

The first two appearances of Blofeld in Bond films are anti-climactic, but the producers of You Only Live Twice nailed it with the character’s full reveal by bringing in Donald Pleasance. He is the definitive version of the character—a menacing, legitimately scary (and a hint of camp) anti-Bond, with the distinctive facial scar—willing to use whatever instruments he has at his disposal to see his evil plans to fruition. It would be Pleasance’s iteration of the character to inspire Mike Myers’ Dr. Evil, The Simpsons’ Mister Burns, and Inspector Gadget’s Dr. Claw.
Pleasance would be a one-and-done with the character, and Blofeld’s next four appearances in the Bond films would each be played by different actors, most notably Max von Sydow and Telly Savalas. Each actor brought a different look to the character, playing into Ian Fleming’s depiction of Blofeld as a supervillain who regularly changes his appearance to remain an enigma. Blofeld stands as Bond’s most devious—and dangerous—archrival throughout the franchise, and even though 1983 was the last time he was seen, Blofeld was never forgotten.
Daniel Craig’s Bond Films Drop the Ball With Ernst Stavro Blofeld

More specifically, Donald Pleasance’s Blofeld wasn’t forgotten and cast a long shadow. But if anyone could redefine the character for a new generation, it would be the talented Christoph Waltz. He had already proven his penchant for deliciously evil villainy with his legendary portrayal of Austrian SS officer Hans Landa in Inglorious Basterds. And if, despite the assertions otherwise, he was playing Blofeld, it would be an undeniable slam dunk. A classic Bond villain revived by an actor that could go toe-to-toe with Daniel Craig’s reinvigorated 007.
Yet, unfortunately, it doesn’t work. For starters, the denial before the release of Spectre that Waltz was indeed playing Blofeld dampened the moment. It was a badly kept secret anyway, so producers would have been better off by introducing Waltz as Blofeld from the beginning, stoking excitement for the film, instead of the anti-climactic reveal within the context of the film itself. But even then, the reveal could have worked, but then they fall prey to the “villains need a backstory” trope.

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Blofeld couldn’t just be evil for the sake of being evil, pulling the strings to turn Quantum into Spectre. Instead, he’s given a backstory where his family cared for Bond after the death of his parents, leading to the two becoming adoptive brothers. But the perception that his father loved Bond more than him was too much, so Oberhauser killed his father and staged his own death, after which he adopted the Ernst Stavro Blofeld moniker and founded Spectre, bent on targeting Bond. It was ridiculous and unnecessary, as was the need to show how Blofeld receives his iconic facial scar in its lackluster finale. They had a golden opportunity to turn away from the stereotype of the physically disfigured Bond villain but embraced it instead.
But at least he had screen time in Spectre. In No Time to Die, Blofeld, imprisoned, barely reveals that he’s the mastermind behind all of Bond’s heartbreak from the events of Casino Royale before he’s killed by nanobots. The iconic Bond villain, only revealed as such in the back half of Spectre, comes to a disappointing end after five minutes of screen time in its follow-up. To his credit, the failure of Blofeld in the Daniel Craig films doesn’t lie with Waltz, who delivers an excellent performance in both films, but rather with those that could have reinvented Blofeld the way they reinvented Bond. You Only Live Twice, as they say, but here’s hoping that Bond’s best baddy gets a third.

Spectre

Release Date

November 6, 2015

Runtime

158 Minutes

Writers

John Logan, Robert Wade, Neal Purvis