20 Things You Didn't Know About SPECTRE (2015)

20. "Its Name Is SPECTRE."

When Ian Fleming’s planed to make a James Bond film with Irish filmmaker, Kevin McClory; screenwriter, Jack Whittingham; Ivar Bryce, and Bryce’s friend, Ernest Cuneo fell through, he turned the script into the 1961 novel, Thunderball, using its creations, including SPECTRE and its leader, Ernst Stavro Blofeld. Sadly, this led to a copyright case, which Fleming ultimately lost.

Eon Productions did not wish to be caught up in litigation, so it licensed the use of SPECTRE and its characters from McClory until 1975. When the license expired, McClory not only planned a rival film featuring SPECTRE and Blofeld, but also claimed to have created the onscreen personality of James Bond. Whilst MGM/UA and Eon Productions blocked this latter assertion, McClory disputed their rights to use certain plot points in their films.

McClory realised his plan for a non-Eon Bond film in Never Say Never Again (1983), which starred Sir Sean Connery as the titular spy and, even though the filmmaker was limited to remaking Thunderball (1965), he then tried to make a rival Bond film with Sony. However, Sony collaborated on Daniel Craig’s first four Bond films with Eon Productions instead and McClory passed away in 2006.

MGM and Eon Productions’ parent company, Danjaq, LLC ultimately secured the film rights to SPECTRE and its characters from McClory’s Estate in November 2013, allowing the organisation and Blofeld to be reintroduced in the official Bond films.