James Bond has reportedly taken on one of his toughest missions to date — fatherhood.
The upcoming “No Time To Die” is expected to introduce the most important Bond Girl in the movie’s almost 60-year history — 007’s five-year-old daughter, according to the Mail today.
“Yes, it’s true. Bond is a dad,” a movie insider told the paper. “It’s the one thing fans would never expect.”
In Daniel Craig’s last turn as the big screen’s most famous spy, he plays a doting dad to Mathilde, a daughter with Dr Madeleine Swann, played by French actress Lea Seydoux.
It is just one of the shock twists in the flick said to be “very timely” because it involves Bond saving the world from a biological pandemic that is “not quite COVID-19, but it’s similar,” the insider said.
The fatherhood storyline — first revealed in a leaked script being sold on eBay — is said to be one of many “woke” elements brought in for the old-fashioned character by Fleabag creator Phoebe Waller-Bridge.
“Bond has always managed to charm his way into the hearts and beds of hundreds of beautiful women, seemingly without any consequences,” the insider told the paper.
“Making him a father opens up a whole new world in terms of drama and story development,” the source said.
“Bond finding out he is a father is integral to the plot.”
It is just one shock in a movie “filled with twists,” the insider said.
“Bond appears to be happy in his new domestic life but then, of course, he gets dragged back in to save the world.”
A film insider last night said: ‘Yes, it’s true. Bond is a dad. Daniel wanted to make this Bond film the most surprising and entertaining yet. Daniel is older and his Bond is maturing and looking at life through the prism of fatherhood. But there’s a lot more to it than that.’
Fleabag creator Phoebe Waller-Bridge was brought in to rewrite the script after original director Danny Boyle was replaced by Cary Joji Fukunaga.
No Time To Die is set five years after the last Bond film, Spectre, which saw the secret agent fall in love with Dr Swann, a French psychologist.
Spectre ends with Bond driving off with her into the sunset in his old Aston Martin DB5.
The movie, the franchise’s 25th, was due in cinemas in April but was pushed back to November because of the coronavirus pandemic.
In a more immediate context, a very important question is just when Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson, the producers running the James Bond franchise, will officially announce Daniel Craig’s successor. Surely, it’ll be sometime after No Time To Die is released, which will only extend Craig’s record-setting run as the actor officially attached to the role. If you want movies like James bond follow see here.