Cary Fukunaga pitched a version of No Time To Die inside Bond’s head

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Over the years, James Bond has gotten himself into some pretty strange situations, but there was a chance that the twenty-fifth film in the franchise could have taken place entirely inside the secret agent's head. Huh? While speaking with Interview Magazine, NO TIME TO DIE director/co-writer Cary Fukunaga revealed that he originally had an idea that NO TIME TO DIE, and much of the previous film, would be an elaborate fantasy created by James Bond's imagination.

Miranda, I swear to god, I had an idea that this movie could all be taking place inside the villain’s lair from the last film. There’s this scene where a needle goes into James Bond’s head, which is supposed to make him forget everything, and then he miraculously escapes by a watch bomb. And then he and Léa blow up the place, and go on to save the day. I was like, “What if everything up until the end of act two is all inside his head?”

Whether this was just a fleeting thought or something which was actually given consideration is unknown, but I can't imagine that a "it's all in his head" twist would be embraced by Bond fans. Thankfully, this scenario doesn't seem like something we'll have to deal with in NO TIME TO DIE, which looks as though it's shaping up to be a worthy finale to Daniel Craig's tenure as James Bond. Fukunaga also revealed that although he was pretty well-versed in Bond-lore but that he didn't become a big fan of the franchise until CASINO ROYALE, "prior to that, my only in-depth James Bond experience was at my cousin's house playing Golden Eye," Fukunaga said. Ah, those were the days.

Although COVID-19 forced Eon Productions to push the release of NO TIME TO DIE from April to November, Cary Fukunaga has previously said that the film is already done and the extra time won't be used for further tweaking. "Although more time would have been lovely, we had to put our pencils down when we finished our post-production window," Fukunaga said. NO TIME TO DIE will continue on where SPECTRE left off, with James Bond having left active service to begin a new life with Dr. Swann (Léa Seydoux), but Bond is soon brought back into action when Felix Leiter (Jeffrey Wright) comes calling to enlist his help in searching for a missing scientist. When it becomes apparent that the scientist was abducted, Bond must confront a danger the likes of which the world has never seen before in a villain armed with dangerous new technology.

NO TIME TO DIE will debut in the U.K. on November 12, 2020 and on November 25, 2020 in the U.S.