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| “ | Blofeld sends his regards. | „ |
| ~ Cyclops to James Bond |
Primo, also known as Cyclops, is the secondary antagonist of the 2021 James Bond film No Time to Die. He is a professional mercenary and former SPECTRE operative who worked for Ernst Stavro Blofeld, but later betrayed him to become the right-hand man of the bioterrorist leader Lyutsifer Safin. He is also known for using a bionic eye as a communication device for Blofeld as the latter is in prison.
He was portrayed by Dali Benssalah.
Biography
Attack at Italy
Several days following Blofeld's arrest for his crimes against humanity, Primo first appeared in Italy, where he led several SPECTRE assassins to confront and take down Blofeld's nemesis James Bond when the latter was visiting Vesper Lynd's grave, which was blown up by the assassins. Engaging into a brief fight with Bond, Primo claims that Madeleine sent him to murder Bond, right before he is knocked out. Bond then escapes with Madeleine after taking down many of the assassins, but a call from Madeleine's phone number implicates her as a traitor, inciting an enraged Bond to sever his relationship with Swann.
Betraying SPECTRE
Five years later, Primo is assigned by Blofeld to lead a new team of SPECTRE assassins to kidnap MI6 scientist Valdo Obruchev, who has created a deadly nanobot bioweapon called Project Heracles. As part of the plan, Primo and the assassins broke into a MI6 laboratory, where they murdered many of the MI6 personnel before taking Obruchev and his bioweapon. CIA agents Felix Leiter and Logan Ash contacted Bond about the situation, stating that they have located Obruchev in Cuba as he is due to attend a SPECTRE meeting. Bond infiltrates the meeting, only to end up being trapped by the SPECTRE members. It later turns out that Blofeld has a bionic eye just like Primo and that he's using Primo's eye as a communication device to lead the meeting while still remaining in prison. Blofeld orders for the nanobots to kill Bond, but the nanobots end up murdering all of the SPECTRE members as Obruchev reprogrammed them to do so under Safin's orders. However, Primo escapes while reclaiming his bionic eye and Ash murders Leiter, revealing himself to be league with Safin as he helps Obruchev escape from custody.
Following Blofeld's death, Q soon learns through several video files recorded from Blofeld's bionic eye that Primo had previously met up Ash, who convinced him to turn against Blofeld in favor of Safin's plan for revenge. This made Q and Bond realize that Primo betrayed Blofeld and SPECTRE and that he deliberately allowed Obruchev to reprogram the nanobots to murder Blofeld and all of the SPECTRE members. Despite having succeeded in wiping out SPECTRE, Safin sends in Ash and several of their men to capture Bond, Swann and their daughter Mathilde. Though Bond manages to kill Ash and several of Safin's men, Safin succeeded in capturing Swann and Mathilde before taking them to his base at an island located between Russia and Japan.
Death
At Safin's base, Safin orders Primo to take Swann to her cell while deciding to keep Mathilde to himself. Primo complies and later tries to force Swann to take a drink, but she splashes the drink in his face and uses the opportunity to escape. Shortly afterwards, Bond and his colleague Nomi infiltrate Safin's fortress and dispatch most of Safin's men. Bond then rescues Swann and Mathilde from captivity while Nomi kills Obruchev by pushing him into a toxic acid pool. Bond then lets Nomi, Swann and Mathilde escape before staying behind to open the island's silo doors, which would enable a missile strike from the British Navy to destroy the nanobots.
Along the way, Bond kills all of Safin's remaining guards before Primo confronts him into another fight. Eventually, Bond uses his watch with an electromagnetic pulse to strike Primo, blowing up his mechanic eye inside his head, killing him instantly for good. After Primo's death, Bond retorts that he "blew his mind" after showing him the watch.
Trivia
- Dali Bensallah is the first Algerian-French actor to be portraying a character from the Bond franchise in general.
- As he is a fan of the Bond franchise itself, Bensallah wanted to portray Bond himself until he was cast as an antagonist.
