Bond over the limit

The James Bond film franchise is hugely successful with the entire franchise over 50 years, allowing for inflation, having made around $12 billion. The central figure of the franchise is of course Bond himself; the agile, witty, suave, womanising, spy. Bond lives a life that defies expectation and it also defies reality. New research has found one particular aspect of Bond’s life would make all other aspects practically impossible.

Researchers analysed every Bond novel by Ian Fleming and noted his alcohol consumption. When the amount he drank was not specifically mentioned they estimated it. They also allowed for times when he could not drink at all, such as when he was imprisoned for example.

The results showed that Bond consumed between 65 and 92 standard UK drinks (in the UK there is 10 millilitres of alcohol in one standard drink, in Australia there is 12.7 millilitres of alcohol per standard drink) per week. That means between nine and 13 drinks a day. That is at least four times the recommended amount. On one day measured Bond consumed 49.8 standard drinks.

Based on his alcohol consumption Bond was achieving what Dr No and Octopussy tried to achieve but failed; Bond’s early death. Long before he died though he would have been experiencing hand tremors that would have made it difficult to hold a gun, let alone aim one. His calm, fast-thinking, urbane persona would also have been replaced by a stumbling, bumbling, slow-witted mess.

It seems M would have been better asking Bond to cut down on his drinking instead of worrying about his womanising, at least as far as his job performance was concerned. In reality too, instead of “My name’s Bond, James Bond”, the super-spy’s catch-phrase could more realistically have been, ”My name ish….wha’s my name again? Oh, right, my name ish Bond, um, James Bond…I think. [falls face first into his martini]”