James Bond last hit our screens in 2021, but fans are set to wait longer than they bargained for to see him in action again.
Daniel Craig stepped down from the film franchise after supping his last “shaken, not stirred” martini in No Time To Die, with speculation currently mounting as to who will succeed him as the next 007.
However, it seems that is still quite some way off, as producer Barbara Broccoli said there is “a big road ahead” before the character is “reinvented for the next chapter”.
Speaking to The Guardian, Barbara added that executives “haven’t even begun” the process of modernising the franchise – something they have been doing in the two decades since Daniel was confirmed as the sixth 007.
“I go back to Golden Eye when everyone was saying, ‘The cold war is over, the wall is over, Bond is dead, no need for Bond, the whole world’s at peace and now there’s no villains’ – and boy was that wrong!” she said.
Barbara also reflected on how it was crucial for writers to make Daniel’s Bond into a more modern man, as they “wanted to focus on what a 21st-century hero would look like”.
“Daniel gave us the ability to mine the emotional life of the character… and also the world was ready for it,” Barbara added. “I think these movies reflect the time they are in, and there’s a big, big road ahead reinventing it for the next chapter and we haven’t even begun with that.”
There are currently a few big names in the frame to replace Daniel as the British spy, and rumours have so far seen Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Regé-Jean Page and Henry Golding all linked to the role.
Daniel first starred as Bond in Casino Royale in 2006, and went on to play the famous spy in Quantum of Solace, Skyfall and Spectre before his last appearance in No Time To Die two years ago.
And while we’re all concerned with who will be filling Daniel’s huge boots, last year, Barbara told The Hollywood Reporter that the team were more interested in figuring out who their next villain will be.
With Rami Malek, Christoph Waltz and Javier Bardem all doing stellar jobs as the bad guy in recent films, Barbara explained: “We always sit down with our writers, and we start by thinking about, ‘What is the world afraid of?’ We start by thinking about, ‘Who’s the Bond villain?’ We try to focus on that as the sort of uber story.
“And then we want to also look at Bond’s emotional life, and what he’ll be facing personally that he hasn’t had to deal with before. So he has two big issues in the films — one is the geopolitical one and the other is the personal one.”