Bond, James Bond.

1966 Somportex

The 1966 Somportex James Bond Thunderball set is the U.K. answer to the U.S. Topps/Glidrose set made for the same movie. There are 72 cards, they are smaller than standard trading card size, on thinner paper (almost like cards meant to be pasted in an album), and came in crimped paper packets rather than wax packs. One of the most interesting aspects of this set, is that several of the cards were replaced after the initial run and so alternate versions of the same cards exist. The most notorious of these is card #24 which originally was titled "That's No Lady" and pictured James Bond punching what appeared to be a lady (although in actuality, it was a Spectre agent). After public outcry, the card was replaced with a new version of #24 titled "Searching Through The Junkanoo". Another example is card #15 "Tread Softly Bond!" which was replaced with new #15 "Junkanoo".

Thanks to advanced collector Steven Thirlwall for contributing the following: "Thunderball has 8 cards with variations - #1,3,5,15,19,51, and 71. Then you have the withdrawn card #24, 'Thats No Lady', replaced with 'Searching Through The Junkanoo'. I have also seen a misprint of card #3 with the photo from card #1 on it. A full set is 72+8 cards."

The text on the back of card #12 outlines a classic scene from the movie ... "Bond has his secret weapons provided by Q Branch. He has wonderful guns - and his remarkable marksmanship is kept up to standard by constant practice. But he often has to face death in hand-to-hand struggles with really strong men. Here in the wheelhouse of the 'Disco Volante', the pirate ship, 007 comes to grips wiht a powerful engineer - who knows it's life, or death, for only one of them..."

From Wikipedia: "Thunderball (1965) is the fourth spy film in the James Bond series [ following Dr. No (1962), From Russia With Love (1963) and Goldfinger (1964)] and the fourth to star Sean Connery as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. It is an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Ian Fleming, which in turn was based on an original screenplay by Jack Whittingham. It was directed by Terence Young with screenplay by Richard Maibaum and John Hopkins. The film follows Bond's mission to find two NATO nuclear bombs stolen by SPECTRE, who holds the world to ransom for £100 million in diamonds, in exchange for not destroying an unspecified major city in either England or the United States (later revealed to be Miami). The search leads Bond to the Bahamas, where he encounters Emilio Largo, the card-playing, eye-patch wearing SPECTRE Number Two. Backed by the CIA and Largo's mistress, Bond's search culminates into an underwater battle with Largo's henchmen. Thunderball was associated with a legal dispute in 1961 when former Ian Fleming collaborators Kevin McClory and Jack Whittingham sued him shortly after the 1961 publication of the Thunderball novel, claiming he based it upon the screenplay the trio had earlier written in a failed cinematic translation of James Bond. The lawsuit was settled out of court and Broccoli and Saltzman fearing a rival McClory film allowed him to retain certain screen rights to the novel's story, plot, and characters. The film had a complex production, with four different units and about a quarter of the film consisting of underwater scenes. The film was a success, earning a total of $141.2 million worldwide, exceeding the earnings of the three previous Bond films and breaking box office records on the first weekend of opening in France and Italy. The film won an Academy Award for Best Effects, Special Visual Effects awarded to John Stears in 1966 and Ken Adam the production designer was also nominated for a BAFTA award. Thunderball is to date, the most financially successful movie of the series and adjusting for inflation made the equivalent of $966.4 million in 2008 currency. Although a commercial success, Thunderball received mixed reviews from critics. Some critics and viewers showered praise on the film and branded it as a welcome addition to the series, while others complained of the repetitively monotonous aquatic action and prolonged show duration."

The following are sample scans from this set, in PSA holders!