I'll give the bad news first: Quantum of Solace isn't as good as Casino Royale. While action is what most of us came for, in Quantum it pretty much takes over, leaving little room for the more character-centered storyline that gave its predecessor much of its strength. Although Quantum of Solace does contain its own share of twists, turns, and revelations, its more formulaic tale of simple government/corporate conspiracy does not exactly stand out amidst similar others. And even though Quantum of Solace does deliver adrenaline-pumping chase and fight scenes of almost every sort, with a rapid-fire editing style more akin to the Bourne franchise than Bond, a part of me missed the smoother, more fluid style that has always been classic 007.

That said, Quantum of Solace is still a good movie. As number two in what is expected to be at least a four-film run with Daniel Craig in its title role, its existence as more of a follow-up to the first and a bridge to the next is understandable. While it did take me a few beats to get up to speed with its rapid-fire action, that action still kept my heart pumping (in a good way) for most of the film's running time. And while both the film's espionage plot and character development are decidedly less engaging than in the first, they both still manage to pull you into their world and carry you along for the ride.

In more ways than just style, the journey that Bond takes in Quantum of Solace actually resembles that of Bourne quite a bit (minus the amnesia, that is). Sure, Bond spends much of the movie chasing after the unknown evil empire conspiring to take over the world through the underhanded control of natural resources. At the end of the movie, his actions save the world (or at least part of it). But as Bond says to M (Judy Dench), "This isn't about oil; this is about trust." And as he continues to deal with the loss and potential betrayal of Vespa, the woman he loved, like Bourne's, Bond's own globe-traipsing adventures are also driven more by his own personal need to deal with his loss, to make sense of his world, and to bring to justice whomever is responsible for the whole thing.

As Mathis (Giancarlo Giannini), an MI6 agent wrongly accused of being a traitor in Casino Royale, tells Bond, wrong and right aren't so easily differentiated. "As one gets older, it becomes more difficult," he says. "The heroes and the villains get all mixed up." And in Quantum of Solace, that very problem is central to both its story and the journeys of almost every one of its characters.

In the larger espionage plot, the confusion between wrong and right and friend and foe arises in the maddening reality that the conspiracy that Bond is trying to unravel actually involves the cooperation of both the United States and British governments. Sure, there may be some shady activities going on, but it's for the greater good. As the British foreign minister says to M, "If we refuse to do business with villains, we'd have no one to trade with." With bad guys working for good guys and good guys working for bad guys, the question then becomes: Who can you trust? If there is no right and no wrong and everyone is simply out for his own gain, how do you know you are actually on the same team as your allies?

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