London 2012 Opening Ceremony: The Queen, a Beatle, and Fabulous Fashion

Matt Lauer correctly called it; Queen Elizabeth made the most memorable Olympic Opening Ceremony entrance ever!

In a scene filmed in advance, 007 actor Daniel Craig arrived at Buckingham Palace in a dinner jacket, strode past the palace guards and corgis towards the royal study.

"Good evening Mr Bond," said the Queen, before the pair make their way to the stadium, while back in real time, "the Queen" and "Bond" parachuted from a helicopter towards the arena.

He's Back! 

Other memorable moments included the battle between good and evil as hundreds of Mary Poppins lookalikes took on the Queen of Hearts, Captain Hook, Cruelle de Vil, and Lord Voldermort.

Beatles doppelgagers also made their way through the stands during the Industial Era segment, and hundreds of cute kiddos dawning their PJs sang to the Queen.

But it wasn't just a celebration of Britain's past. It made a quick shift to technology through the boy-meets-girl tale of Frankie and June. Like all great love stories, there's ended with an epic embrace, and projected on the big screens was the most memorable scenes of classic kisses.

Of course the real reasons for the show was the Parade of Nations. 10,000 athletes from more than 200 countries dawned their Olympic kits for the famous march.  Between Greece's Nike knockoffs, and the US Team threads coming from China, the latest and greatest in sportswear was of course on the brain.

Jamaica can thank Puma
for their designer duds. 

No competition, Djibouti wore the best accessories, while Czech athletes sported less attractive bright blue wellies. Germany separated the sexes-boys wore blue and girls pink. And, Belgium and Belize took a page from the past when it came to their headgear. A low point of the evening came when the Independent Athletes made a stupid spectacle of themselves, but India's sweet sarees and Jamica's green and yellow suits quickly made up their competitor's mistakes.  New Zealand's flag bearer must have killed something in the stands because ugly brown feathers donned his shoulders.

If medals were given out for fashion, here'd be my rankings Bronze-Jamaica, Silver-The Queen, and Gold-Djibouti.

As the Parade of Nations came to a close, the torch was brought to its final resting place about 13,000 miles, Sir Paul McCartney wowed the crowd, and a beautiful fireworks display lit up the London skyline.

Sir Paul McCarney closed the ceremony with a rousing performance of "Hey Jude"
with the entire Olympic stadium singing aloud to every word.