I have to say you have excelled yourself. In what passes for my heart, I thought I’d never drive another car that suited my temperament as much as the dear old Bentley I owned when my creator first invented me, but I must concede that you have achieved that with this Aston Martin.
Were you actually thinking of me when you designed it rather than that scoundrel 009, I might even have been touched. Or as much as a fictional paid assassin might allow himself to be touched.
Even so, the balance between Classical Aestheticism on the one hand and fingernail-ripping aggression on the other has been pleasingly realised. When I think back to some of the rubbish I’ve had to put up with in the past from your department – a four-cylinder BMW Z3?
Really? – the DB10 shows that at least there is someone within MI6 who still appreciates that there’s more to this mindless killing lark than mindless killing. If you’re not going to carry it off with a certain elan, you’re not worthy of a Walther, let alone a bespoke Aston Martin.
On that subject, and it pains me to do so as it does, I must also applaud the new initiative to design one-off creations for the 00 programme. When I was banned from smoking my specially formulated triple-band Morland cigarettes in the DB5 (apparently some paper-pusher on the fifth floor has deemed it a place of work) I feared the worst, and the only reason I am able to retain the services of my tailor in Jermyn Street is I told M that in my book the very mention of the phrase ‘off-the-peg’ merited a .32 calibre bullet between the brows.
I’m not sure what services 009 has been able to render to precipitate so comprehensive a volte face, but I am confident it has nothing whatever to do with her being the first female 00 in the history of the service.
As for the engineering side, I was if not disgruntled then far from actually gruntled to discover a sub-optimal number of cylinders beneath that rather elegant and vast front clamshell. (You might want to let the design chaps at Aston know the world’s least secret agent reckons that’s a keeper for future road cars.) All my recent Astons have had the full complement of connecting rods, so why not this one?
On further reflection, however, I have concluded that it was, in fact, the right choice all along. Never let it be said that 007 is a caveman in a sharp suit lacking all capacity for mental elasticity.
