I'm surprised Silver has been getting so much praise though, I've seen comparisons to Ledger's Joker (and there is a big Nolan Batman vibe throughout- the burning of Stately Bond Manor, the old villain gets captured on purpose scam, the first real focus on Bond as an orphan in the films and the revelation the fist thing he did after he parents died was go into the caves beneath his house. Of course, as Nolan has cheerfully been making Bond films with Batman in that's probably fair exchange) but he was more the new David Walliams.
A bit of self aware camp is fine, but the whole "Ping ping cooo-eyy I'm bonkers me" stuff was way too OTT. And the attempts to try and create a Goldeney style parallel between him and Bond didn't work as a result. You needed someone who would feel like Bond gone evil and what we got was more someone who'd been rejected from children's TV for being too zany.
He was also a bit crap. Despite all the general chaos he caused, his one and only goal throughout the film was to kill one pensioner and (it turns out) himself. He winds up being incredibly inept at this and only winds up winning by freak events (Despite his "She's mine!" protestations it's one of his henchmen who delivers the killer shot to M). So we end up in the weird position where the film ends with the villain achieving him ends, but still a failure.
They again, we're talking about someone who, when they want to have someone killed in Singapore, they set up an overly elaborate "Lure him into a room to look at a piece of art and have him shoot from the next building" plot rather than just having one of the other people in the room- who are all in on it- shoot him themselves. He'd have saved four million Euros that way.
But despite his ineptitude at his actual plan, the set pieces he put into play as part of his failure were all very well done, the whole underground cross London chase being especially a highlight. The climax of the film was more Home Alone With Your Granny than Bond but still with a lot of pace and excitement to it. The poor old DB5
As a final thought on the villain... He's apolitical and will do any nefarious scheme for left or right for the money. So basically exactly like Quantum. He could have been the head of that organisation with almost no changes to the script, the fact he wasn't I think shows what Eon really think of that side diversion despite their claims they might revisit those plot threads in future.
Craig was great, even if it was odd to have the film dealing with Bond as old and past his best so soon after the relaunch and with more Craig to come.
The new supporting cast are great as well. Yes Ralph might as well have been wearing a "I'm the new M" t-shirt but Bond's boss as more than a contemporary to him is an interesting one and he managed to remain likeable even at his most sarcastic to old M.
And that was actually one of the things I really liked about the film. Dench's M has been basically incompetent since The World Is Not Enough (and of course, the NuDench M of the reboot doesn't have the strong showing of the first two Brosnan's to her credit).
Constantly making poor judgement calls, she's managed to get MI6 blown up twice and has hired at least one traitor a film, culminating in her own bodyguard trying to kill her. She's also basically entirely dependant on Bond for everything she does to not be a complete disaster (she's also a borderline alcoholic far more than Bond is, generally if she stands still for more than 30 seconds she'll break out a glass of the hard stuff). If not Dench being so good we'd all find her completely useless.
So for this to finally come back and bite her on the arse was long overdue. Dench has been great, but with the return of the "Classic" supporting characters and office set we'll once again see an MI6 where Bond may well be the best but everyone else isn't useless and/or evil.
And despite one of the trailers blowing its appearance (in fact, a surprising amount from close to the end of the movie is in the trailers) I squeeed when Bond walked into that office.
