This Month In Bond (June 2025)

A Bond For Tomorrow

Just when things were starting to quiet again, Bond 26 news exploded into life last week when French-Canadian director Denis Villeneuve was confirmed to helm the next big-screen adventure. His name had been considered before, for the film that ultimately became No Time To Die, so he has been stewing on his Bond idea for a number of years now. It is quite a different mission, though, to start a new era than to end one. What direction will Villeneuve take the seventh iteration of James Bond for the silver screen? We may have an idea, and it echoes what the Broccoli’s always said when rebooting 007…

Sharper, Slower, Deadlier: A Bond For Tomorrow

It is a curious thing, the way James Bond endures. He has been the subject of over a dozen novels by Ian Fleming, of countless imitators, of twenty-five official films, and now - in the hands of Denis Villeneuve - a twenty-sixth. Here we are again, the Walther PPK freshly oiled, the martini perfectly measured, the past trailing behind like smoke. And this time, something is different. This time, Bond is in the hands of a director not known for spectacle or sentiment, but for silence, precision, and menace. A man from Quebec who has made his mark in the deserts of Arrakis, the tangled frontiers of Juarez, and the rain-drenched neon of a future that never quite arrives.

Denis Villeneuve is directing the next James Bond film, and those who have followed Bond must now reckon with what this means. Because Villeneuve is not in the business of making thrill rides. He is in the business of building ruins. Beautiful ones.

Let us begin with atmosphere. Villeneuve does not create settings; he sculpts them. From the sterile bureaucratic dread of Arrival to the toxic melancholy of Blade Runner 2049, every frame he shoots contains an emotional geography. So too did Fleming. Consider the moonlit fear of the Jamaican coast in Live and Let Die, the sickening hush of the Royale-les-Eaux casino in Casino Royale, the crumbling opulence of Dr. No’s lair. Fleming knew that place is mood, and mood is story. Villeneuve understands this as few directors do. One imagines a Bond world under his direction not as a travelogue, but as a dream - or a nightmare. No second-unit postcard shots. No sped-up chases. Just sand, sea, smoke, silence.

Now to Bond himself. In recent years he has become, in turns, an action figure, a tragic hero, a relic of masculinity in flux. But Fleming's Bond was always something more brittle. The man had edges. He was bored. He killed without pleasure. He drank too much and loved too hard and trusted no one. Villeneuve, whose characters are often men adrift in systems beyond their understanding, will find him easily. Bond is not Jason Bourne or Ethan Hunt. He is a civil servant with a death warrant. And Villeneuve, with his unflinching eye, could give us that Bond: solitary, tired, dangerous not because he wants to kill, but because he’s so very good at it.

Villeneuve also has a gift for time. His stories move with the patience of inevitability. Where others cut, he lingers. Where others score, he silences. There will be no frenetic montage under his direction. Imagine instead the baccarat game in Casino Royale stretched over ten unbearable minutes. Bond's breathing audible. Le Chiffre's finger tapping. Villeneuve understands that tension is not speed, but dread. Fleming did too. Bond's encounters with death were never rushed. They uncoiled slowly, like snakes under a sunlamp.

And what of the women? Fleming was not of our age, but his best female characters were vivid, flawed, alive. Vesper Lynd, Tatiana Romanova, Domino Vitali… They were more than conquests. They were stories. Villeneuve, who has brought gravitas to his heroines - Amy Adams in Arrival, Rebecca Ferguson in Dune - will do the same. There is unlikely to be a woman written to die at the end of Act Two. She will matter.

The villain will matter too. Villeneuve has no use for moustache-twirlers. His antagonists are forces. Think of the Harkonnens. Think of Alejandro in Sicario. These are not men with plans; they are philosophies. Bond’s adversary, under Villeneuve, may be terrifying not for what he does, but for what he believes. That is where Fleming's best villains lived - in ideas, not just lairs.

There will be those who complain. Who say this is not what Bond is meant to be. That a spy should charm, that a gun should flash, that a film should entertain. But there will also be those who remember Fleming's Bond. The man who considered suicide in Moonraker, who wept for Vesper in Casino Royale, who went mad in You Only Live Twice. That Bond was not always fun. He was not always right. But he was real.

And Villeneuve could make him real again. He will strip away the debris of decades. The cars, the quips, the tropes. He could give us Bond as he was written: a blunt instrument, a silhouette in the fog, a man who knows he is dying a little every day.

This is not nostalgia. This is restoration. Bond will be back. But this time, he will be walking through Villeneuve's world. And it will be darker, sharper, and more beautiful than ever before.

Watch

You can start to better understand Villeneuve’s approach to filmmaking by watching this compilation of writing and directing tips from the man himself.

Gaming

IO Interactive finally lifted the lid on their Project 007 which has been in development for almost five years. Now titles ‘First Light,’ the adventure will be focussed on a James Bond who is relatively new to the secret service. You can check out more images and the trailer here. The game arrives sometime next year.

IO Interactive also revealed that they have lured Mads Mikkelsen back to reprise his role as Le Chiffre from 'Casino Royale' in a special 'Banker' expansion pack for their iconic game 'Hitman.'

Literary

Raymond Benson is a familiar name to Bond aficionados, not only for his 'The James Bond Bedside Companion', but also for the novels and short stories he has written continuing the James Bond series. To date, he has written more Bond continuation novels than anyone except John Gardner. This month we caught up with him to talk about ‘The Hook and the Eye’ - his new Felix Leiter novel.

Ian Fleming Publications also announced a new project focussing on younger readers. 'James Bond and the Secret Agent Academy,' by bestselling crime writer M.W. Craven. will be released inJune 2026 and will kick-off an action-packed new series for readers aged 8-12.

Exit Through The Gift Shop

The new season of MI6 Confidential magazine starts this week! We will be launching the next issue and this year’s subscription shortly. If you have not already renewed, you can do so via this link.

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