Goldfinger/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Complete Monster: Goldfinger. Murders his employees and associates in gruesome ways for minor transgressions. Tries to kill Bond by sawing him in half with a laser. Plots the deaths of thousands of people and shrugs it off with reference to deaths caused by motorists. Tries to cripple the global economy to make himself richer. And cheats at card games and golf, the bastard.
  • Crowning Music of Awesome: GOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLD-FINNNNNN-GAAAAAAAAAAH!
  • Designated Hero: If you analyze well, apart from "converting" Pussy Galore and killing Oddjob, Bond's actions aren't really that effective.
  • Ensemble Darkhorse: Oddjob. Probably the most copied and parodied Bond villain of all time, and even got his own Vicks 44 commercial.
    • Not just copies and parodies, but homages too. Kung Lao, we're looking at you!
    • Goldfinger himself is a good example. He's easily the most famous Big Bad from the film series, even over Blofeld.
  • Fridge Logic: So why did Oddjob crush the Lincoln Continental? The gangster was already dead. He could have just drove it back.
  • Growing the Beard: While Dr. No and From Russia with Love are still well thought of it was Goldfinger that was the first Bond to be a huge hit at the box office, establish most of the tropes common to the series and show how flat out awesome Bond could be.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight: "That's as bad as listening to The Beatles without earmuffs." Guess who recorded the theme to Live and Let Die?
    • And guess who would later do a spoken word cover of "In My Life"?
    • In all fairness however, this line may have been a take that aimed not at the Beatles themselves, but rather the hordes of screaming fangirls at their concerts and shows. Seeing as this film was released in 1964, Beatlemania was in full effect...
    • Also, Ringo Starr married a Bond girl (Barbara Bach from The Spy Who Loved Me).
  • Memetic Mutation: The crotch laser scene along with the line "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to DIE!"
  • Sequel Displacement: Many people start the Bond series with this one. Or think this is the best, among 22.
  • Uncanny Valley: Goldfinger in the book. However, the effect comes across from the odd combination of his appearance and his dress sense: in the golf scene, Bond notes that Goldfinger looks like he went to a costume designer and asked, "what do people wear when they go to play golf?" The result was unsettling to look at because it didn't look natural at all.
  • Values Dissonance: James forcing a kiss on Pussy Galore and her falling into his arms is often misconstrued as 'Rape as Love' rather the aggressive courting it was meant to be.