Dalton brings ability, but not much charisma, to the role. Dalton is much improved here from The Living Daylights, although there are still occasions when he reminds the viewer of George Lazenby. Dalton's 007 is angry and focused, and this portrayal is, at times, very like that of Connery at the beginning of Diamonds are Forever (where Bond was hunting down Blofeld to avenge his wife's death). This is an edgy movie, almost completely lacking in humor or flippancy. The dark, almost-ominous tone of Licence to Kill is unprecedented. It's this brutal attack on Leiter and his wife (Priscilla Barnes) by drug kingpin Sanchez (Robert Davi) that leads to Bond's abrupt resignation from MI6 so he can carry out a personal plan of revenge. Another returning character is Felix Leiter (David Hedison, the only man to play the part twice), who loses his leg to a shark. While taking a vacation, he seeks out Bond in South America and offers his help. Paradoxically, while there are almost no gadgets in this film, the "gadget man" himself, Q (Desmond Llewelyn), has his biggest role to date. In fact, he's acting on a vendetta and the British government is trying to capture him and bring him back to London. The villain is not a megalomaniac, but a drug lord, and Bond's mission has nothing to do with Her Majesty's Secret Service. No has 007 been so cool and ruthless, and never has a plot been this close to realistic plausibility. Licence to Kill, Timothy Dalton's second and final outing as the superspy (and the sixteenth overall in the series), is a most atypical Bond adventure. The result was a staggeringly poor box office showing that (along with certain legal problems) led to a six-year layoff and lead actor change. Audiences seemed less inclined to see the latest adventures of a twenty-five year old cinematic legend than those of Arnold Schwarzenegger or Sylvester Stallone. With so many higher-profile contenders (like Batman) in the arena, 007's popularity hit an all-time low. By 1989 and the release of Licence to Kill, James Bond had a lot of competition in the action genre.
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