Although the story follows the same general storyline, there are some changes: the film shows Dr. No to be an operative of SPECTRE and his island fortress is nuclear powered ; No is killed not by the mountain of guano, but by drowning in reactor coolant.

SPECTRE ( SPecial Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion ) is a fictional global terrorist organisation featured in the James Bond novels by Ian Fleming, the films based on those novels, and James Bond video games.

SPECTRE is not aligned to any nation or political ideology, enabling the later Bond books and Bond films to be regarded as apolitical.

In Ian Fleming's novels, SPECTRE is a commercial enterprise led by Blofeld.

SPECTRE is headed by the supervillain Ernst Stavro Blofeld who usually appears accompanied by a white Persian cat in the movies, but not in the books.

Apparently disbanded afterwards, SPECTRE is said to be active again in the next book, The Spy Who Loved Me, although the organisation is not involved in the plot.

In On Her Majesty's Secret Service, the second chapter of what is known as the " Blofeld Trilogy ", Blofeld has revived SPECTRE, and Blofeld's final appearance, sans SPECTRE, is in the final novel of the trilogy, You Only Live Twice.

In the films, SPECTRE usually replaced SMERSH as the main villains, although there is a brief reference to SMERSH in the second Eon Bond film, From Russia with Love.

After being absent from Goldfinger, SPECTRE returns in Thunderball and subsequently is featured in the following films You Only Live Twice, On Her Majesty's Secret Service and Diamonds Are Forever.

It is interesting to note that in the Bulgarian subtitles of Quantum of Solace, the name Quantum was translated as SPECTRE, with the title changed to " Spectre of Solace " (" Спектър на утехата ").

SPECTRE is shown, but never mentioned by name, in the game GoldenEye: Rogue Agent.

In the first book to include SPECTRE, " Thunderball ", it is stated that the numbers of each member changes periodically ( it " advances round a rota by two digits at midnight on the first of every month ") to avoid detection and Blofeld is in fact number 2.

Blofeld is head of the global criminal organisation SPECTRE and is commonly referred to as Number 1, an official numerical position given to members of SPECTRE.

Blofeld is absent from the next book, The Spy Who Loved Me, though its events take place while Bond is battling SPECTRE in North America.

While attending prep school at Warfield Academy, James Bond Jr. with the help of his friends IQ ( the hitherto unmentioned grandson of Q ), and Gordo Leiter ( the son of Felix Leiter, also not previously established ), fights against the evil terrorist organization SCUM ( Saboteurs and Criminals United in Mayhem, which is an offshoot of organizations like SPECTRE ).

On Her Majesty's Secret Service is the second book in what is called " the Blofeld trilogy ", sitting between Thunderball, where SPECTRE is introduced and You Only Live Twice, where Blofeld is finally killed by Bond.

He first appears in a minor role as the leader of SPECTRE in the 1961 novel Thunderball.

Academic Christoph Linder sees Thunderball as part of the second wave of Bond villains: the first wave consisted of SMERSH, the second of Blofeld and SPECTRE, undertaken because of the thawing of relations between East and West, although the cold war heated up again shortly afterwards, with the Bay of Pigs Invasion, the construction of the Berlin Wall and the Cuban Missile Crisis all occurring in an eighteen month period from April 1961 – November 1962.

In the film series, Bond's archenemy became SPECTRE, which first appeared in Fleming's novel Thunderball ( 1961 ).

Although twice referred to, SMERSH never appears in the official film series ; first, in From Russia with Love ( 1963 ), Bond initially thinks he is fighting SMERSH, only to learn that the villains are from SPECTRE, including villainess Rosa Klebb, the former head of SMERSH who has secretly defected to SPECTRE.

Largo was referred to as " Number Two ," in the film, indicating his rank as the second highest ranking official in SPECTRE.

The film version contained some changes to the novel, with the leading villains switching from SMERSH to SPECTRE, a fictional terrorist organisation.

Blofeld's SPECTRE volcano base complete with spacecraft-swallowing rocket shuttle, helipad and attack helicopter, and command center in the 1967 film You Only Live Twice ( film ) | You Only Live Twice.

The film retells the story of Thunderball and reintroduces both SPECTRE and Blofeld.

Although the From Russia with Love video game mirrors much of the plot of the eponymous film, it uses an organisation called OCTOPUS rather than SPECTRE to avoid copyright issues.

SPECTRE and its characters have been at the centre of long-standing litigation starting in 1961 between Kevin McClory and Ian Fleming over the film rights to Thunderball and the ownership of the organisation and its characters.

In 1963, Fleming settled out of court with McClory, which awarded McClory the film rights to Thunderball, although literary rights would stay with Fleming and thus allow continuation author John Gardner to use SPECTRE in a number of his novels.

* In the 1965 James Bond film Thunderball, a SPECTRE officer states that the criminal organization earned £ 250, 000 as a consultation fee for the robbery.

* In the James Bond film Thunderball ( 1965 ), French NATO pilot François Derval is murdered by Angelo, a SPECTRE henchman who has been surgically altered to match Derval's appearance.

In the film, Klebb ( Lotte Lenya ), defected from SMERSH to SPECTRE.

In the film From Russia with Love, working under Rosa Klebb makes him a SPECTRE agent.

In the film, Kronsteen ( Vladek Sheybal ), works for SPECTRE, and is tasked with planning Bond's killing and disgrace for killing Dr. Julius No. Ultimately, he fails and is murdered at Ernst Stavro Blofeld's behest.

At one point the villain of the film was to be Ernst Stavro Blofeld and his organization SPECTRE ; however, this was changed to avoid a possible lawsuit over the rights to this character, which originated from the novel Thunderball.

Simmons also had a role as SPECTRE agent Jacques Bouvar in the pre-title sequence of the fourth film, Thunderball.

* In the 1965 James Bond film Thunderball, Ernst Stavro Blofeld in a disguised voice sends an ultimatum to NATO demanding that they pay SPECTRE a ransom of white flawless diamonds worth £ 100 million to be deposited in the Mergui Archipelago off the coast of Burma.

In the film, Klebb is depicted as a former SMERSH agent who has defected to become a member of SPECTRE ( Blofeld refers to her as " No. 3 ").

Casino Royale also takes credit for the greatest number of actors in a Bond film either to have appeared or to go on to appear in the rest of the Eon series — besides Ursula Andress in Dr. No, Vladek Sheybal appeared as Kronsteen in From Russia with Love, Burt Kwouk featured as Mr. Ling in Goldfinger and an unnamed SPECTRE operative in You Only Live Twice, Jeanne Roland plays a masseuse in You Only Live Twice, and Angela Scoular appeared as Ruby Bartlett in On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

In the Eon Productions James Bond series, which began in 1962 with Dr. No, SPECTRE plays a more prominent role.

Dr. No and Auric Goldfinger appear as SPECTRE members, with Dr. No "...( Doctor Julius No ) having broken ranks with our organisation.

Connors is employed by a SPECTRE type organization named ERIS led by Dr. Brinkman ( Ian McShane ), and his henchman, François Molay ( Arnold Vosloo ).

The Austin Powers character was a parody of the SPECTRE Command Structure.

SPECTRE began in the novels as a small group of criminals but became a vast international organisation with its own SPECTRE Island training base in the films, to replace the Soviet SMERSH.

Blofeld, with a weakened SPECTRE would appear for the final time in You Only Live Twice.

The goal of world domination was only ever stated in You Only Live Twice, and SPECTRE was working not for itself but for an unnamed Asian government whose two representatives Blofeld speaks to during the movie ; perhaps Red China, who earlier backed Goldfinger.

SPECTRE thus works with both sides of the Cold War.

Fleming's SPECTRE has elements inspired by mafia syndicates and organised crime rings that were actively hunted by law enforcement in the 1950s.

The SPECTRE cabinet had a total of 21 members.

In the novel, SPECTRE, headed by Blofeld, attempts to conduct nuclear blackmail against NATO.

Later, the John Gardner Bond novel, For Special Services introduces a revived SPECTRE led by Blofeld's daughter, Nena Bismaquer.

Although Bond ultimately prevents SPECTRE from reforming, it continued, under the leadership of Tamil Rahani, to play a part in Role of Honour and Nobody Lives For Ever.