It’s a wet, grey, Tuesday afternoon, so I just rewatched Being James Bond, a 45 minute documentary about Daniel Craig’s tenure playing James Bond. I’ve watched it before, of course, but not for a while. Craig is obviously the most recent actor to play Bond, and the documentary makes it clear what an impact he had on the series: when he was first cast, everyone dismissed him as completely unsuitable. As the program shows quite well, however, the doubters were shut up as soon as Casino Royale came out in 2006; and over the next five films, Craig made a deep impact on the role. He made 007 more human, but no less suave, sophisticated and awesome. In fact I’d go as far as to say that Craig left two shoes to fill which are bigger than ever, given the impact his five films made, socially and culturally, on the Bond franchise.

The obvious question that leaves is, how can those shoes be filled? Craig left Bond in a more prominent cultural position than ever; his five films were smash hits, with everyone just about loosing their heads every time a new one came out. Moreover, how can Craig possibly be followed, given the depth and humanity he brought to the role? Here we have an actor who was almost totally unheard of, who everyone completely dismissed when he was first cast, yet who blew everyone out of the park and contributed five of the greatest films of the Bond series. That is not to dismiss the five great actors who preceded Craig, but he secured James Bond films position as a cinematic franchise culturally unlike any other. Whoever is cast their task is going to be impossible given the expectations everyone now has.

Mind you, the fact that it will have been so long since the last film was released won’t help that. No Time To Die hit screens in 2021, and we haven’t heard anything about the future of the franchise or who’ll next play Bond yet, so it will probably be ’25 or ’26 by the next time we see a new Bond film. By then, expectations are going to be almost insurmountable, with everyone remembering the legacy of Craig and expecting something just as good or possibly even greater. Frankly I don’t see how any actor is going to live up to that, which probably explains why the producers are taking so much time in casting someone.

I am still a huge Bond fan, of course. I love the entire series and all six actors to play him. They all brought something slightly different to the role, but as I once wrote here, I think Daniel Craig is my favourite, given he played Bond as the flawed, three dimensional character most akin to the one Ian Fleming created. The problem is, I don’t see where the franchise can be taken from here, the impact Craig had on it was so massive. As I touched upon here a while ago, one option is to take the franchise in a different direction, perhaps by reintroducing a lighter, more comic, Roger Moore-esque tone. Either way Craig has left a huge cultural opening which someone will have to fill. I’m sure it will be, sooner or later – James Bond always returns - but whoever is selected faces a truly unenviable task.