![]() ![]() ![]() Spectre Headquarters in the James Bond film Thunderball (1965) (1964-8), before such organisations were spoofed with KAOS in tv’s Get Smart (1965-70). Another popular evil organisation was T.H.R.U.S.H. The most well-known of these was S.P.E.C.T.R.E in the James Bond films Thunderball (1965) and You Only Live Twice (1967) and to a lesser extent On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) and Spectre (2015). Spy Films are rife with the nefarious schemings of organisations with colourful acronyms for names. Joe: The Rise of the Cobra (2009) and sequels, Hydra in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Court of Owls in Batman vs Robin (2015), The Assassins and Templars in Assassin’s Creed (2016), The Twelve in tv’s Killing Eve (2018-22), Etreon in Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw (2019), the Ten Rings in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021) and Leviathan in Catwoman: Hunted (2022). In a number of films, secret societies are frequently seen as organising criminal activities – examples might include the title organisations is Les Vampires (1915) and The Spiders (1919), The Praetorians in The Net (1995), The Sheng Brotherhood in The Phantom (1996), The League of Assassins in Batman Begins (2005), The Hand in Elektra (2005) and tv’s Daredevil (2015-8), The Fraternity in Wanted (2008), The Cobra Organisation in G.I. In the tv series Nowhere Man (1995-6), Bruce Greenwood is a photographer who has his entire identity erased and is forced to go on the run by a secret organisation who seems to extend their reach everywhere he goes. The tv series Rubicon (2010) has an intelligence analyst uncovering a web of connected real world conspiracies that lead to a secretive organisation. ![]() Meanwhile, The Freemasons cover up the real reasons for the Jack the Ripper killings in Murder by Decree (1979). Of existing secret societies, The Illuminati appear in Razor Blade Smile (1998), Lara Croft, Tomb Raider (2001) and Trump vs The Illuminati (2020), are supposedly behind the creation of the Frankenstein monster in The Frankenstein Theory (2013) and sort of appear in Angels & Demons (2009). On screen and in fiction, such secret societies are frequently ascribed to running vast criminal networks, searching for magical/occult artifacts or running secret gladiatorial games. In some cases, these are real organisations whose existence or at least influence has been greatly inflated by conspiratorial imagination more so than there is ever any reliably documented evidence of their sinister activities. In real world conspiracy theories, it is frequently believed that secret societies are manipulating world events from behind the scenes – see the frequency of mention of organisations such as The Freemasons, The Illuminati or The Deep State, among others. Such societies are always believed to be highly secretive about their existence and more often than not will kill those who betray their code or eliminate evidence of their existence. In their depiction on screen, these are usually seen as organisations of considerable power and their influence is almost always malign. Secret Societies refer to organisations who keep their existence hidden from the rest of the world. ![]()
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