The shortlist reads like fantasy football for auteurs: Villeneuve, Berger, Edgar Wright, Paul King, Jonathan Nolan. No Cuarón—he's out, quietly. No Steve McQueen (officially, anyway), though his name hangs in the air like a light fog—present, but never quite coalescing into rain.
Bond 26's director search is happening right now, in glass-walled offices where someone (probably Amy Pascal) is sipping coffee that's gone lukewarm. David Heyman and Pascal—two heavyweight producers tasked with breaking the Broccoli dynasty's death grip—are moving fast. The mandate: global, fresh, and oh, please, not boring.
Does anyone care about this more than Denis Villeneuve? I doubt it. Maybe Daniel Craig, but he's locked his pistol in a drawer and, let's be honest, won't open it for less than $50M and a script that makes him immortal. But Villeneuve—this is the guy who called Bond his “dream,” the fanboy who almost did No Time to Die before Dune swept him into worm-filled exile. He's a connoisseur, a romantic, someone who can still talk about Moonraker with a straight face.
“It would be a massive yes,” Villeneuve told the “Happy Sad Confused” podcast, voice trembling somewhere between awe and existential dread. “What Daniel Craig brought to Bond was so unique and strong and probably unmatchable. He's the ultimate James Bond.”
And that's the problem, isn't it? Craig bent 007 so far—vulnerable, brutal, genuinely haunted—that whoever picks up the baton has to risk looking like an imitator or, worse, a relic. (Try topping Casino Royale's ball-busting torture scene, or that shattering final frame in No Time to Die. Good luck.)
Here's something I keep coming back to: Berger has already pitched. Paul King, the Paddington whisperer, might bring a kid's gleam to the edge of that signature Walther PPK. Edgar Wright? He'd make the trailer trend on X within 20 minutes. But Villeneuve… if he has time after Dune: Messiah wraps this December, the stars might finally align.
And yes, Amazon's dream is world domination. Mike Hopkins and Courtenay Valenti want a new Bond locked down by end of summer. Fresher than nori, more global than TikTok. First, the director. Then, the script. Then, the Bond.
Cuarón's exit says something. He had a pitch—and David Heyman knows him well—but dropped out. Artistic clash? Scheduling? Or simply the burden of not wanting to be the guy after Craig? (History's littered with directors who blinked when the shadow was too long.)
Weird detail: Steve McQueen's interest is “great,” sources whisper, though he's not officially listed. Maybe too much of a wild card… or maybe producers are still playing the field. This is that awkward prom phase—everyone's flirting, no one's dancing.
If you're betting, all signs point to Villeneuve. Most qualified, most passionate, most likely to make the Bond franchise sing again. Or explode. Or, hell—maybe both.
Summer's coming. The countdown is real. A name will be chosen, and that's when the story flips, fast, from speculation to legacy-building.
And me? I'm rooting for Villeneuve—loudly, probably obnoxiously. Because this franchise deserves poetry, not just spectacle. Risk, not just resurrection.
Ask me next week and I'll say the same.
