James Bond: 10 Greatest Henchmen

In anticipation of SPECTRE, FilmDungeon.com editor Jeppe Kleyngeld lists his favourite things about the James Bond series in 12 unique features. Enjoy!

10. Zao
Film: DIE ANOTHER DAY
Played by: Rick Yune
Quote: ‘How’s that for a punch line?’

Why memorable: This Korean version of pinhead has business with 007 for messing up his face. In DIE ANOTHER DAY, he forms a very strong and fierce opponent for Bond. Finally gets impaled by a falling chandelier in the main villain’s ice palace.

9. Gobinda
Film: OCTOPUSSY
Played by: Kabir Bedi
Quote: ‘The Englishman has escaped!’ [he doesn’t talk very much]

Why memorable: A tall, strong and tough, but silent Sikh. He is the loyal servant and assassin of baddie Kamal Khan in OCTOPUSSY. He performs various duties at Khan’s Monsoon palace, as well as dealing with his master’s enemies, including Bond. Not an easy opponent -obviously- due to his sheer strength and brutal personality.

8. Tee Hee
Film: LIVE AND LET DIE
Played by: Julius W. Harris
Quote: ‘There are two ways to disable a crocodile you know. One way is to take a pencil, and jam it into the pressure hole behind his eye. Oh the other’s twice as simple. You just put your hand in his mouth… and pull his teeth out! Heh, heh’

Why memorable: He is two metres tall, smiles a lot, has a hook for hand… Oh, and he is a big crocodile fan. Tee Hee is the perfect bad guy. His hook is unfortunately also his downfall. Bond disables it when Tee Hee attacks him in the train in the final scene and kicks him out of the window.

7. Mr. Kidd and Mr. Wint
Film: DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER
Played by: Putter Smith and Bruce Glover
Quote: Mr. Kidd: ‘If god had wanted man to fly…’ Mr. Wint: ‘…he would have given him wings, Mr. Kidd’

Why memorable: This homosexual couple takes sardonic pleasure at murdering anybody their employer wants dead. Their methods vary from slipping a scorpion down their victim’s neck to blowing their helicopter out of the sky. They get awfully close to killing Bond a few times (especially when they put him in an incinerator), but the problem is they are too sadistic to just simply shoot James, giving him opportunities to escape.

6. Dario
Film: LICENCE TO KILL
Played by: Benicio Del Toro
Quote: ‘Don’t worry. We gave her a nice Honeymooooon…’

Why memorable: Benicio Del Toro, one of the greatest Latino actors around, plays Dario, a real sick puppy who works for drug dealer Sanchez. Dario was with the Contras revolutionaries before finding employment within Sanchez’s cocaine empire, a job that perfectly suits his sadistic needs. Del Toro was only 21 when he portrayed this stiletto wielding sicko. It is a great performance; every line that comes out of his mouth has real venom in it. Dario is a truly scary opponent for 007.

5. Xenia Onatopp
Film: GOLDENEYE
Played by: Famke Janssen
Quote: ‘Enjoy it while it lasts’

Why memorable: Dutch actress Famke Janssen portrays the woman with the meanest thighs in cinema history. She uses them to give opponents of her employer – the Janus Syndicate – the finest death imaginable. Nearly gets an orgasm from shooting a bunch of Russian computer programmers. This tough former fighter pilot is hard to defeat, but eventually gets strangled herself when Bond shoots down the helicopter she is attached to by wire.

4. Fatima Blush
Film: NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN
Played by: Barbara Carrera
Quote: [holding Bond at gun point] ‘You’re quite a man, Mr. James Bond, but I am a superior woman. Guess where you get the first one?’

Why memorable: Femme fatales are pretty rare in the Bond universe and Fatima Blush is a particularly delicious one, so she deserves a strong position here. Fatima dresses in black and red, is sexy and beautiful, keeps a snake for company and is violently and psychotically crazy. Vanity is her fatal flaw; she forces Bond to confess on paper that she gave him the finest sexual experience of his life, providing him with the golden opportunity to kill her.

3. Donald Grant
Film: FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE
Played by: Robert Shaw
Quote: ‘You may know the right wines, but you’re the one on your knees’

Why memorable: Donald Grant, convicted murderer. Escaped Dartmoor Prison in 1960. Recruited by SPECTRE in Tangiers in 1962. Grant is an excellent killer and a worthy opponent for Bond. A real übermensch; blonde, athletic, strong and emotionless. His fatal flaw is talking too much rather than just shooting his target.

2. Oddjob
Film: GOLDFINGER
Played by: Harold Sakata
Quote: ‘Urchhh’

Why memorable: ‘He is an admirable manservant but mute. And not a very good caddy.’ That is Auric Goldfinger’s description of his Korean henchman Oddjob. We would describe him as a near indestructible brute who can wield his razor-sharp hat like a lethal weapon. ‘Remarkable’, says Bond, when Oddjob decapitates a statue at the golf club. ‘But what does the club secretary have to say?’

1. Jaws
Film: THE SPY WHO LOVED ME and MOONRAKER
Played by: Richard Kiel
Quote: ‘Well, here’s to us’ [in MOONRAKER, his only line in the movies.]

Why memorable: Indestructible, steel-mouthed brute who can bite his way through metal as easy as flesh. Works as a hitman for whoever wants to hire him. Basically survives anything, including a dive of a cliff, an explosion and a swim with a lethal shark (he bites the shark to death instead of the other way around). Jaws is the only henchman that appears in more than one movie. Halfway through his second appearance in MOONRAKER, he switches sides when he falls in love with a girl. Still the greatest henchman ever.