As the vicious underwater engagement proceeds along the established lines outside, our secondary villain also gets a chance at a slight upgrade into the general direction of James-Bond-worthy villainy.
He does fall somewhat short, but only somewhat. This shortfall works on two levels, actually. It establishes that
Dr. No > Dr. Dutchman Fu
and
Eon Productions > Nobucks Productions.
In both cases it’s only a financial issue, though. While Dr. Dutchman Fu might talk a lot of bird droppings, he doesn’t have a lucrative guano business backing him up, unlike Dr. No.
And while Eon Productions and Nobucks Productions are both in the business of selling … uh, how to put it… a product that might also be likened to bird droppings, to avoid a harsher word…
…and I guess Nobucks’ movies are even slightly more like bird droppings than Eon’s? Anyway, it’s undeniable that Eon is better at selling their shit.
So because of protagonist and productionist both find themselves in the situation of having limited means at their disposal, a large-sized poster print has to stand in for Dr. No’s somewhat more impressive sea window. On the pro side, it’s nearly the same effect for a hugely more affordable price. And you can redecorate a lot more easily! Plus, if the poster gets damaged you can just replace it – when the sea window gets damaged, you have a problem.
(And speaking of saving costs, notice how cleverly Nolan saved money by recycling footage of that Dunkleosteus from the other chapter.)
On a sidenote, Dr. Dutchman Fu might hold some slight misconceptions regarding his nation’s history. Probably because he only flicked through his history books cursorily in school, given how busy he was murdering his classmates and setting the building on fire. Anyway, The Anglo-Dutch wars were not reall a conflict about the shipping fees charges by online retailers, they concerned a slightly different concept of free shipping.
More on Thursday.