Bond ... Vendetta Bond! Together with "You Only Live Twice", I always considered "License to Kill" my favorite James Bond movie. For you see, I rank my Bond movies based on the villains' level of evilness, and the charisma of the actors/actresses depicting them. Donald Pleasance (as Blofeld) and Robert Davi (as Sanchez) are the utmost evilest Bond villains.
And there's another, perhaps even more important reason, why this one is a favorite. In the long list of twenty-four (and counting) James Bond movies, "License to Kill" is a sort of outsider; - an underdog, in fact. I always cheer for the underdog. Bond doesn't work on an assignment for the British Crown here, but goes on an obsessive quest for personal vengeance and even sees his titular license to kill revoked. On the day of his wedding in the Florida Keys, CIA-agent Felix Leiter - with the help of his British buddy James Bond - spectacularly captures the notorious Latin-American drug lord Frank Sanchez. The powerful and extremely corrupt Sanchez promptly escapes again, also quite spectacularly, and demonstrates his dominance by mutilating Leiter and murdering his bride. Needless to say, Bond disobeys M's order to return to Europe and goes after Sanchez and his cartel, with the help of feisty female CIA-informant and a British tourist specialized in gadgetry.
The fact that James Bond is out on a personal vendetta already makes "License to Kill" an underdog in the series, but there's more. Given the subject matter, the film is much less comical/gimmicky, and far more violent than all the other Bonds. Timothy Dalton, in his second and immediately final appearance as 007, depicts him as a cold and relentless killing machine, which is unusual but fantastic! The script is very compelling and intelligent, notably how Sanchez' drug imperium is built up is genius. The film also excels in terms of locations, from the exotic Florida Keys (including the Ernest Hemingway house), over the breath-taking Villa Arabesque in Acapulco, to the Sonoran Desert. The action and excitement highlights are also numerous (like fuel truck chases, shark feedings, death-by-decompression-chamber, ...) and Gladys Knight sings one of the top-three finest title songs. Robert Davi, as Sanchez, has an impressive army of equally immoral henchmen, like a very young Benicio Del Toro, the always-menacing Everett McGill, Milton Crest and Don Stroud.