Ranking Every James Bond Film - From Worst To Best

8. You Only Live Twice

Containing the Donald Pleasence version of Ernst Stavro Blofeld (the quintessential one), You Only Live Twice is one of the most overtly offensive 007 films (Bond in yellowface), but also one of the most outright entertaining. Taken as a product of its time, its worth examining the latter, and chalking the former down as unfortunate collateral damage. Scripted by Ronald Dahl (really), You Only Live Twice sees Bond tackle SPECTRE in Japan, the culmination of which sees one of the all-time great Bond set-pieces, with Blofeld's volcano lair opening up to let in an army of rappelling ninjas. Never mind the logistics of that construct (how would you hollow out a volcano and dispatch of its lava?), it makes for a thrilling watch, and the final 20 minutes in general are an absolute riot. The sequence of Bond faking a marriage to Kizzy Suzuki (Mie Hama) is tiresome, but the grand finale, Blofeld's reveal, the Little Nellie aircraft passage, and a certain pool of flesh-eating piranha fish more than make up for it.