In The Spy Who Loved Me, Karl Stromberg is almost giddy as he shows Bond his plans for thermonuclear genocide and his grand scheme to replace humanity with a civilization built in his own image. There’s something especially disturbing about how casually Stromberg discusses the destruction of billions of people, as though he is presenting Bond with a particularly ambitious architectural project. His description of the modern world as “corrupt and decadent” is less a neutral observation and more a convenient justification for purification via mass murder and the establishment of his underwater civilization.

Even the word “Armageddon” feels deliberately self-important, suggesting that Stromberg sees himself not as nefarious and more as some kind of divine instrument correcting humanity’s mistakes. There’s an obvious distinctly psychopathic detachment to Stromberg’s worldview, particularly in his perceived lack of remorse for the innocent lives his plan would erase. He’s not merely trying to conquer the world, but calmly planning to destroy it and rebuild it according to his own twisted specifications, which makes his dinner-table presentation to Bond all the more terrifying.

I’ve always viewed Stromberg as one of Bond’s most sophisticated villains, but also as one of the most unhinged.