Entertainment

What Amazon MGM’s creative control over the James Bond film franchise means for the future of 007

Daniel Craig portrayed James Bond from 2006 to 2021. As Amazon MGM gains control over the franchise, fans speculate on the future direction, potential “woke” storylines, and whether a unified Bond universe akin to Marvel will emerge, involving diverse media.

Published

2 years ago

March 14, 2025

The Conversation

file 20250306 56 sokblg.jpg?ixlib=rb 4.1 — Daniel Craig played James Bond in five films from 2006 to 2021. Greg Williams/Eon Productions via Getty Images

Colin Burnett, Washington University in St. Louis

James Bond was front and center at the 2025 Academy Awards – and in a somewhat curious way.

In a musical number, Lisa of Blackpink, Doja Cat and Raye sang the Bond theme songs “Live and Let Die,” “Diamonds Are Forever” and “Skyfall,” respectively. No Bond films had been nominated for an award, and none of these singers has a connection to the Bond franchise, though they did all recently collaborate on the single “Born Again.”

The strange exercise felt less like a celebration and more like a big flashing question mark for a screen icon whose future has never felt more uncertain.

Since the shocking news dropped on Feb. 20, 2025, that Jeff Bezos’ Amazon MGM Studios would assume creative control over the James Bond film franchise, commentators and fans have wondered why.

Why would the Broccoli family, which has long held the rights to Bond movies through their company, EON, cede control of the film series to a tech partner they’ve been at odds with?

Two possibilities have emerged.

First, EON’s Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, the stepson and daughter of legendary EON producer Albert R. “Cubby” Broccoli, may have reached a point of creative exhaustion. There could be something to this theory. According to Puck’s Matthew Belloni, the 83-year-old Wilson and 64-year-old Broccoli were having difficulty figuring out their next step after 2021’s “No Time to Die.”

A second reason could be Amazon’s impatience with EON. In December 2024, The Wall Street Journal reported that Barbara Broccoli balked when Amazon Studios executive Jennifer Salke proposed several Bond spinoff projects, including a Bond series with a female lead, for Prime Video. Perhaps frustrated with the stalemate, Amazon may have made Wilson and Broccoli an offer they couldn’t refuse to get them out of the way and get production of Bond content rolling.

The speculation is certainly intriguing. But a more central question shouldn’t be overlooked: the “what.”

What, precisely, has Amazon MGM acquired? And what can it actually do with the Bond story?

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Breaking down the Bond rights

In my research on the 007 franchise, I’ve discovered that this property has never been a traditional film series.

Long before “Star Wars” launched in 1976 and the Marvel Cinematic Universe launched in 2008, Bond relied on a range of mediums to tell its story.

The Bond franchise began in 1953, not with a film but with a novel, Ian Fleming’s “Casino Royale.” One year later, “Casino Royale” was adapted for American TV as a live anthology show. Four years after that, in 1958, a popular Bond comic strip made its debut.

It was only in 1962, with “Dr. No,” starring Sean Connery, that the now-iconic film series began.

Since then, James Bond has been spun off into a children’s animated show, choose-your-own-adventure books, a “Young Bond” novel series, video games, a reality show, radio dramas and more.

Here’s what’s crucial: With its new deal, Amazon MGM has a controlling stake only in the rights that EON holds. EON has licensed the right to produce future films and TV shows from Fleming since 1961. EON secured worldwide merchandising rights in 1964 and production rights to video games in the early 1990s.

Other 007 media – the literary, comic and audio series – are managed by the Fleming Estate and Ian Fleming Publications.

Screen grab of a young woman stiting in a car, with a bullet hole in the glass and blood trickling down her face. — EON produced most of the James Bond films, such as 1969’s ‘On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.’ EON/United Artists

The James Bond media franchise is what I call a shared rights and licensing network.

No one company controls all of the Bond rights, and no one company produces all of Bond media. Though this arrangement is a complicated one, the sharing and licensing of rights has allowed Bond to emerge as a lucrative and fecund product line. According to my calculations, it now boasts over 330 original stories in 72 years of media production.

In other words, Bond is much more than the 25 films released by EON.

James Bond’s many lives

Until now, rights sharing and licensing have ensured that the Bond franchise remains creatively distinct from “Star Wars” and Marvel.

The companies that produce these series – LucasFilm and Marvel Studios – are owned by The Walt Disney Company. With their rights pooled under one corporate entity that also oversees all production, “Star Wars” and Marvel have been able to drive toward high levels of creative consistency and unity among their stories. Across films, TV, comics and video games, “Star Wars” and Marvel aspire to what media specialists call “transmedia storytelling.”

By sharing rights, the Bond franchise has arrived at a very different type of storytelling, one that fragments the story and multiplies the James Bonds to be experienced across distinct media. The effect isn’t transmedia storytelling, or even a Marvel-style multiverse. In Bond, characters can’t cross over to alternate realities and meet other versions of themselves.

James Bond exists in many different worlds and leads many different lives.

A book cover that features a balloon with a skull on it. — The James Bond in Ian Fleming’s novels has a biography that differs from the version of Bond who appears in other media. Jim/flickr, CC BY-NC-SA

To name a few: There’s the Bond of Fleming’s 1950s and 1960s novels, who loses his first love, Vesper Lynd, and hunts down her killers, who are members of SMERSH, the assassination arm of Soviet intelligence agencies. Fleming’s Bond also lives on in the novels of Kingsley Amis and John Gardner, which were published in the 1970s and 1980s.

There’s EON’s silver screen Bond, who, from 1962 to 2002, never falls in love with Vesper, but loses his wife, Tracy di Vicenzo, to the crime syndicate SPECTRE and remains scarred by the loss. And in the modern era, there’s the Bond who appears in author Samantha Weinberg’s “Moneypenny Diaries.” Published from 2005 to 2008, the series depicts a version of Bond who has retired to a small Scottish isle with his lover, MI6’s Miss Moneypenny.

The effect of Bond’s shared structure is what I dub “threaded storytelling.” The novels present various versions of Bond’s life, at different points in history. The film series creates two of its own. The comic series offers yet more lives of 007.

Each version of Bond runs alongside the others in the market, focusing on a Bond character who exists only within his unique story world. This gives fans an unpredictable, ever-expanding canon of stories to follow and even compare, like one grand spot-the-difference game in time.

Where next for Bond?

The deal between Amazon MGM and EON awaits regulatory approval in the U.S. and U.K.

If it goes through, Amazon MGM will have a strong property on its hands. Over the decades, EON has reinforced certain elements to the character and the story: James Bond is a debonair hitman. MI6 chief M gives him high-stakes missions. MI6 armorer Q fits him with the latest gadgets. And Bond lives large, enjoying beautiful women, fine dining, Savile Row fashions and Omega timepieces.

Amazon MGM is unlikely to tinker with these Bondian elements. They’re also likely to preserve the movies’ “Bond formula” – the gun barrel visual that kicks off each film, elaborately designed credit sequences, film-specific theme songs, and the closing title card that reads, “James Bond Will Return.”

Yet some fans fear that Amazon MGM will develop “woke” storylines. Others foresee the product being diluted with countless streaming spinoff series.

To me, the more intriguing possibility is whether Amazon will try to create a more unified Bond universe, akin to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Yes, the Fleming Estate will continue to manage the novels, comics and radio. But with creative control over EON’s rights, Amazon MGM could, in theory, develop an elaborate transmedia strategy never before explored in this franchise.

A relaunched film series, perhaps serving as Amazon MGM’s “mothership,” would feed into satellite series in video games and streaming shows. These games and shows, in turn, would tie into and expand the universe of the films.

Were that to happen, the Bond franchise would truly enter a new phase and risk losing much of the creative flexibility it’s possessed in the past.

Colin Burnett, Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies, Washington University in St. Louis

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Sports

Chili’s Takes the ‘19th Hole’ Literally With Golf Course Pop-Up

Chili’s took the 19th-hole tradition to a new level with a limited-time golf course pop-up in Burbank featuring food, specialty margaritas and exclusive golf apparel.

Published

6 days ago

September 8, 2026

Charles Elliot, Daily News Staff

Chili s x Rhoback KV2 — Chili’s is celebrating the everyday golfer — the ones who love this game the most, occasionally play it the worst and have the best time doing it

BURBANK, Calif. — Chili’s Grill & Bar took its casual-dining game onto the golf course with a limited-time experience celebrating one of golf’s favorite traditions: the 19th hole.

The restaurant chain transformed the clubhouse at DeBell Golf Club in Burbank, California, into the Chili’s Golf Club, a two-day pop-up held Aug. 28–29. The event welcomed golfers and fans to enjoy Chili’s favorites, specialty drinks and a golf-inspired apparel collaboration.

The concept played off the traditional “19th hole” — the post-round gathering spot where golfers grab food and drinks, talk about the day’s round and, perhaps, make those missed putts sound a little closer than they actually were.

The Chili’s Golf Club | Chili’s x Rhoback

Chili’s Meets the Golf Course

Guests at DeBell could stop by after playing 18 holes — or simply visit the clubhouse — for Chili’s menu favorites such as the Triple Dipper. The pop-up also featured golf-themed drinks including the Transfusion Marg and Tee Time Marg, created specifically for the Chili’s Golf Club experience.

The promotion also teamed Chili’s with active-lifestyle apparel brand Rhoback for a limited-edition Rhoback X Chili’scollection featuring the Chili’s Golf Club crest. The lineup included performance polos, hoodies, quarter-zips, crewnecks and golf hats.

“Chili’s is the people’s clubhouse, so it only made sense to bring that spirit to the course,” George Felix, chief marketing officer and executive vice president of Brinker International, said in announcing the campaign.

Food, Golf and Entertainment Collide

Chili’s extended the promotion beyond the course with a campaign film celebrating everyday golfers — particularly those whose enthusiasm for the game may be considerably stronger than their scorecards.

The film featured appearances by Wesley Bryan, Caleb Pressley, Jena Sims Koepka, Chaz Bowker, Josh Kelley and JaNa Craig, bringing together golf, entertainment, food and lifestyle culture around the familiar 19th-hole tradition.

Although the Burbank pop-up lasted only two days, the campaign offers another example of restaurant brands looking beyond the dining room to connect food with sports, entertainment and fan culture.

For Chili’s, that meant finding a place where burgers, margaritas, golf stories and questionable scorecards already seemed like a natural fit.