December Monthly Chat!
Dec. 4th, 2015 09:00 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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mi6_cafeNOTE – THE WEEKLY CHAT IS NOT THE PLACE TO DISCUSS SPECTRE SPOILERS! If you want to squee about Spectre there is a dedicated post that can be found in the sidebar links that will house all the chat, squee and excitement about Spectre. THE WEEKLY CHAT IS FREE OF SPECTRE SPOILERS.
We're making a number of changes to the Comm behind the scenes, starting with a new Monthly chat! This post will be pinned at the top of the comm for all your chatting and getting to know each other needs!
Anon commenting is on so you don’t need an account to join in the fun! If you are using anon comments, if you could put your name/handle in the subject line/body of the comments that would be fab (just so everyone knows who they are talking to!)
Weekly Recs
We're not having a weekly rec this month, as we're changing the system! We will be releasing a survey at the end of the week where you get to tell us how you want the comm to look like!!
Spectre Prompt Fest!
For those of you who are still taking part in the Spectre prompt fest, here is the prompt table in all of its glorious entirety:
You can post your fills anywhere you like – tumblr, in the comments section of the weekly chat, to your own LJ! Feel free to link your fills in the chat, and don’t forget to tag your prompt fills with #mi6cafeprompt so everyone can share the 00Q love!
There is now an A03 collection that you can post your fills to! See the link in the sidebar for more information
MI6 Café Book + Film Club
Our next book for book club is From Russia with Love. Those eagle eyed members might have noticed we have 'TBD' next to the next book club date. That is becase, we're busy behind the scenes drafting up what we can do for you guys over the next year! This includes when we do the book clubs, and how we schedule posts.
In film club will be watching Thunderball on December 5. Please see the schedules for more information on times!
This month’s questions
We're making a number of changes to the Comm behind the scenes, starting with a new Monthly chat! This post will be pinned at the top of the comm for all your chatting and getting to know each other needs!
Anon commenting is on so you don’t need an account to join in the fun! If you are using anon comments, if you could put your name/handle in the subject line/body of the comments that would be fab (just so everyone knows who they are talking to!)
Weekly Recs
We're not having a weekly rec this month, as we're changing the system! We will be releasing a survey at the end of the week where you get to tell us how you want the comm to look like!!
Spectre Prompt Fest!
For those of you who are still taking part in the Spectre prompt fest, here is the prompt table in all of its glorious entirety:
| Exploding Objects | Love doesn’t solve everything | Broken | Health and Safety | Possession |
| Never say Never | “Make me disappear” | “No.” | The past has come back to haunt me | Suit up |
| Starlight | Red | “I was taking some overdue holiday” | Flowers | “I won’t give up on you” |
| “Give me tea or bad things will happen” | Platonic | Nightmares | Anticipation | Forever |
You can post your fills anywhere you like – tumblr, in the comments section of the weekly chat, to your own LJ! Feel free to link your fills in the chat, and don’t forget to tag your prompt fills with #mi6cafeprompt so everyone can share the 00Q love!
There is now an A03 collection that you can post your fills to! See the link in the sidebar for more information
MI6 Café Book + Film Club
Our next book for book club is From Russia with Love. Those eagle eyed members might have noticed we have 'TBD' next to the next book club date. That is becase, we're busy behind the scenes drafting up what we can do for you guys over the next year! This includes when we do the book clubs, and how we schedule posts.
In film club will be watching Thunderball on December 5. Please see the schedules for more information on times!
This month’s questions
If they both had to retire permanently somewhere, where would they choose?
What’s something from canon that you’ve always been confused/wondered about?
If you could ask any of the writers, actors or directors one question, what would it be?
Do you have any headcanons about the MI6 squad?
- What’s a crossover you’d really like to see?
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Castillon
Date: 2015-12-11 04:38 pm (UTC)Q would stay in England, probably working on gadgets on a commission basis, with some time also set aside to do advanced online coding seminars or coach up-and-coming talent. I think he'd even stay in London, though perhaps in a different flat or house; he's already figured out things he likes in the city and doesn't see the sense in changing too much.
2) Every card game in the books ever? I'm always just taking Fleming's word that "OOH THIS CARD PLAY IS SO DRAMATIC." To be fair, he sells it well. Uhh, what else... When Skyfall takes place, month-of-the-year-wise. How long Bond spends drinking himself to death in that scorpion-beach-not-retirement place. Why Bond had to make that stupid-ass quip after Severine's death ("waste of a good scotch"). Why anyone thought the "architect of all your pain" thing in Spectre was a good idea and could be carried off successfully--but Spectre talk is for the Spectre chat!
3) Ooh, this is a good one. I guess I'd like to ask the writers what the general process of writing a Bond movie looks like. How do you go about the initial script, what's the drafting process like, and that kind of thing.
4) Damn, not really, just that they're all bamfs who are also secretly giant nerds about something. Bond: car nerd and gourmet nerd. Tanner: golf nerd. Q: likes lots of nerd stuff, but for the sake of brevity we'll go with computers and sci-fi. Eve: Doctor Who nerd, shoe nerd. Whenever Bond hears some golf-related news he makes a mental note of it so he and Tanner can talk about it over lunch, and they basically all do something similar for each other (ask Bond's opinion about a new Michelin-starred restaurant, comment on/weaponize Eve's new heels or combat boots, ask Q questions about gadgets and sci-fi series, etc). They are all united by a love of guns/weapons and Strong Opinions about various tactical scenarios.
5) Will do later!
Re: Castillon
Date: 2015-12-13 12:58 am (UTC)It might also be fun to have my Leverage OT3, including hacker Alec Hardison, doing something like "The MI6 Job," where they try to right some kind of corporate wrong only to realize that the corporation is a front for either 1) the bad kind of international criminals or 2) MI6, and cross paths with Bond and Q while trying to run their con. (The reason I mention Hardison is because he and Q would totally geek out at each other and it would be adorable.) (Also, if Bond was like, "It's THE Eliot Spencer and THE Parker!" and Eliot Spencer was like "It's THE James Bond!" then that would be fun. A thousand million bonus points if Parker lifts Bond's keys and ends up being the one driving the Aston Martin in the inevitable car chase while Bond is in the passenger seat shooting out the window and realizing something about what Q might feel like re: having a skilled but unconventional/daring driver behind the wheel of his precious baby.)
Re: Castillon
Date: 2015-12-13 02:05 am (UTC)Re: Castillon
Date: 2015-12-23 04:00 am (UTC)-Castillon
Re: Castillon
Date: 2015-12-13 06:22 am (UTC)Re: Castillon
Date: 2015-12-23 04:07 am (UTC)It's just so frickin' petty. It feels like it reduces an entire series--an entire potentially threatening criminal enterprise--to petty sibling rivalry. At least with Hydra they had some kind of motivation aside from "fuck with Captain American"--they were trying to achieve the new world order or whatever. IDK. I still need to think about all my feelings on Blofeld and Spectre.
-Castillon
Re: Castillon
Date: 2015-12-23 05:40 am (UTC)Re: Castillon
Date: 2015-12-19 05:58 pm (UTC)part one
Date: 2015-12-13 02:00 am (UTC)James would probably be torn between somewhere in the Mediterranean and somewhere in England. Either way, probably an older house with a garden, on the outskirts of a city - he wouldn't want to live in the middle of nowhere because he'd go stark raving mad.
Q would want to stay in London - it's where he grew up and where he'll die, if he has any say in it. He likes living in a flat, he likes the bustle of the city, etc etc
if they were retiring together, they'd have to compromise - somewhere in London, probably on the outskirts, so they can have a house with a yard. the outside of the house would be maybe edwardian (??) but the inside would have been gutted and mostly modern. mostly
What’s something from canon that you’ve always been confused/wondered about?
why the hell is M following James around in CR and QoS??? She has all of MI6 to run? and even if they thought the only person Bond would listen to was her and they didn't want him to hang up on her so she had to go, why bring Tanner? he runs the day to day stuff of MI6, so wouldn't he be in charge if M was away? who's running MI6 while they're in South America?
If you could ask any of the writers, actors or directors one question, what would it be?
I want to know what everyone's favourite Bond book is, because if any of them say Moonraker I would be over the moon and immediately suggest they make a proper Moonraker movie. I will write the script. I will lend them my house, they can film at the local park, I don't care, I need it. Also I just want to know what everyone's favourite book is because I like the books.
What’s a crossover you’d really like to see?
Bond/Marvel crossovers don't turn up as much as I always thought they should, because Bond must have run into some SHIELD operatives at some point or other. I really need to rectify that, tbh.
Also, Harry Potter? there aren't as many of them as I thought there would be, either. The fact that I'm not a huge fan of Hogwarts AUs might be why I haven't read many of the fics that are on ao3
Re: part one (Castillon)
Date: 2015-12-23 06:49 am (UTC)2) The sacrifices of logic that are necessary in order to lay the MI6 Squad foundations... *mourns* I think it's mostly because if you had Judi Dench and Rory Kinnear as actors, you'd want to include her in every scene possible.
3) YOU should just write the actual Moonraker story!
4) Yeah, Bond running into... Harry? Hermione? Tonks? Kingsley? would be cool! Who do you imagine interacting when you're thinking of the HP crossover of your dreams?
Re: part one (Castillon)
Date: 2015-12-23 09:26 pm (UTC)4) Bond running into some wizard criminals on assignment and foiling them because they don't know what guns are and assume he's harmless because he's a muggle is probably one of my favourite ideas to fiddle around with. that would probably lead to a very weird conversation with someone from magical law enforcement...
part two
Date: 2015-12-13 02:01 am (UTC)oh man, so many
Tanner: He's a year older than Bond (I know, I know, Rory Kinnear is younger than Daniel Craig, but he's balding. also, he's Chief of Staff, which is more or less second in charge of MI6, I can't imagine he got to that position overnight...), married to a woman called Mary (I have a rule that if there is a Bill or a Mary in one of my fics and they're dating someone of the opposite gender, the partner has to be called the other name. it's a long story...) and they have two sons, the eldest was doing his A Levels during Skyfall. Everything non-MI6 in his life is very average, but then MI6 is a big part of his life... He also recruited Bond
and Alecfrom the Special Boat Service to come work for MI6 and was a bit of a mentor, even though their ages are very similar. I like his canon background - Army sapper - although the only reason book!canon Tanner has such a high rank (Lieutenant colonel) at such a young age is WW2, I think. Also in Skyfall they gave that rank to Mallory so some fudging would have to be done. He possibly could have been a Major or Captain? Not sure. He, like Bond, plays golf. He's also sharp as a knife, but you don't really see that in the movies because he's Mr Exposition a lot of the time.Eve: Started her career as a police officer, but didn't like it as much as she thought she would so applied to join MI6 and never looked back. She (and Q, and Fields) joined in early 2006. She misses working in the field, but her desk job is just as interesting, so she manages just fine. Her older brother is a Detective Inspector married to another Detective Inspector for the Met, and they have a young son and daughter that Eve dotes on. She speaks Turkish, Arabic and Spanish, and is working on Greek in her spare time. Slowly. She collects vinyl records. Eve is also gay, and not out to a lot of people. Keeping it hidden from her co-workers in something she spends a lot of time on, because she's a very private person. That's part of the reason she flirts with Bond and any other good looking male agent - it's a disguise, of sorts. Also, dickish older men who think she's just a secretary also think she must be desperate to sleep with them, so she can use the stereotypes and assumptions as tools/weapons
Mallory: He married very young, and devoted so much of his life to the military that when he finally retired he realised he and his first wife barely knew each other. He got married for a second time a year before Skyfall. Has a stepson, but no biological children. He smokes cigars.
Mansfield: She was happily married with 3 children - no one at MI6 ever meet any of her family, because she kept her two lives as separate as possible. Mansfield is the same M as Brosnan's M, so is still the Evil Queen of Numbers - she started her MI6 career as a analyst before working her way up to eventually running the Hong Kong station.
Q: I've waxed poetically about Q's very big, very Italian extended family, so I won't go into that again BUT: Q is not as much of a tea snob as everyone thinks he is. He and Eve have been best friends since they met in an orientation lecture-thing in 2006. Q’s cats live in Q Branch because he’s not home enough anymore to look after them properly. He has the best trained cats in the world because they have to be trusted not to mess up the million pound equipment Q Branch is filled with. Q started his MI6 career by hacking into their system for a laugh, noticing how easy it was, writing a big list of the issues and how to fix them, and printing it out on a Q Branch printer with his resume and a cover letter and forms and shit. The old Q was so delighted by his cheek and by the fact that his first thought was to help MI6 instead of sending everything to wikileaks that he championed whishaw!Q with M and the rest of the MI6 executives. The first time Q ever blew something up in a lab he did the most obvious crazy professor thing - he burnt his eyebrows off.
Re: part two
Date: 2015-12-13 02:01 am (UTC)- part of the reason Mallory and Mansfield didn't get on is that, despite their different viewpoints, they're very similar people
- Everyone loves Tanner
- Eve and Q have been close friends the whole time they've been working for MI6
- Eve is Mallory's eyes and ears around MI6 and also outside, representing MI6 if there's a meeting M or Tanner can't make. She takes advantage of the fact that everyone outside MI6 thinks she's just a secretary and ignore/underestimate her to spy for Mallory
Re: part two (Castillon)
Date: 2015-12-23 08:21 am (UTC)(One day someone just needs to write a fic that is just like "Tanner's Very Bad Day That Never Happened" where everyone in Tanner's life pulls out all the stops to prevent shit from interfering with his life so he can make it to some kind of school event that his children are doing. The 00s loom menacingly at anyone who presents a possible threat to his free evening and then fade into the background by flirting with willing accomplices; Eve smooths out his paperwork and deals with Troublesome Asshat Bureaucrat who always tries to make Tanner stay late in order to listen to his asinine opinions; M bullies Tanner out of work at a reasonable hour. Everyone breathes a sigh of relief, only to find out that Enemy Hitman is in town and has targeted Tanner for whatever reason! Bond is dispatched to deal with the sudden threat to Tanner's life and Q does eleventh-hour shenanigans at the school to delay the performance for the crucial minutes it takes Tanner to recover from the assault and get to the school. Tanner gets to make the appropriate proud father noises for his kids and he doesn't get an emergency phone call ONCE that night.)
(Seriously I just want everyone being like "PROTECT TANNER AT ALL COSTS BECAUSE WE LOVE HIM" so much.)
Re: part two (Castillon)
Date: 2015-12-23 09:26 pm (UTC)Re: part two (Castillon)
Date: 2015-12-26 04:28 am (UTC)-Castillon
Re: part two
Date: 2015-12-19 05:56 pm (UTC)Re: part two
Date: 2015-12-23 05:48 am (UTC)I think most field agents need to speak a few different languages, it comes with the territory - Bond speaks so many