9 Movie Franchises That Literally Do The Same Thing Repeatedly

The James Bond franchise is bursting at the seams with overused tropes - Bond treating women poorly and then getting them killed, villains too stupid to just shoot him in the face when they capture him, several tiresome catchphrases... the list is endless. Over the last decade or so, a lot of these clichés have been stamped out in order to tell more mature stories with less problematic elements, but funnily enough, there's one that seems to have become more prevalent than ever.

Beginning with Ernst Stavro Blofeld's first on-screen appearance in 1967's You Only Live Twice, the facial scar has been a recurring piece of visual shorthand for an especially evil villain. The trope was memorably revisited with Goldeneye's Alec Trevelyan (though this was ultimately Bond's fault) and used to silly effect with diamond-studded goon Zao in Die Another Day.

However during the modern, allegedly more mature Daniel Craig era, every primary villain bar Quantum Of Solace's Dominic Greene has been graphically disfigured: from Casino Royale's eye-bleeding Le Chiffre, through Raoul Silva's cyanide-melted features in Skyfall to Blofeld getting his trademark scar in Spectre. No Time To Die has already touted not one, but two disfigured villains. Just stop. It's lazy and reductive.