Earlier this month, we learned that Django Unchained actor Christoph Waltz had landed a role in the still-untitled Bond 24. At that time, it was anyone’s guess which character the Oscar winner would be playing, but many of us assumed, based on sources that said his character was “extremely cunning,” that he was locked in for the part of the film’s lead antagonist. Now, the Daily Mail has dropped a major bombshell, claiming that Waltz is playing none other than Bond’s most feared adversary: the dastardly Ernst Stavro Blofeld.
According to the publication, which has been right in the past, Eon Productions will announce come December that Waltz is playing “an unknown character called Franz Oberhauser, son of the late Hans Oberhauser, a ski instructor who acted as a father figure to Bond.” However, this announcement is simply a bit of misdirection on the studio’s part. Daily Mail cites an anonymous “Hollywood source” as saying:
“Christoph Waltz is playing Blofeld in the next Bond film. The tone of the 007 films has changed significantly in recent years and the producers have changed the character to fit in with the new-look 007.”
It’s not surprising that Blofeld would need to be workshopped a little before returning to the franchise. In his previous appearances, the baddie was more than a little campy, and the Bond movies have transformed so much so that such a character really has no place anymore. According to the report, “the new Blofeld will be just as sinister as earlier incarnations but will be more sophisticated and less campy.”
Of course, the source’s refusal to reveal its identity sheds some doubt on the report’s validity, but it’s not unheard of for an anonymous source to deliver a massive scoop that turns out to be correct.
Daily Mail also reports that Bond 24 is now able to bring back Blofeld (who was last seen plummeting down a London industrial chimney in 1981’s For Your Eyes Only) because of the settlement of a lengthy legal dispute between Eon Productions and the estate of the late Kevin McClory – a film producer and former friend of Bond author Ian Fleming – over who owns the rights to Blofeld and his evil empire SPECTRE.
Tell us, do you want to see Waltz take on the role of Ernst Stavro Blofeld in Bond 24? Or is bringing back the scenery-chewing baddie a bad idea?