Would be fun to see what happens if the deal has to be called off.
“We won’t allow this. They always treated Americans so unfair in those Bond movies, those Limeys always made America look bad. And those old Bond movies are going to get banned in Great Again America unless Jeff “Is his head still in there?” Bezos produces a streaming series that explains how Felix Leiter saved the ass of cry baby James Bond each time, even in the movies he wan’t even in…”
Despite the article mentioning Barbara Broccoli not finding an “obvious candidate” for James Bond #7, I’m not convinced Broccoli/EON would have moved on with a new Bond film–certainly in the near future–even if she’d found one. (cough Henry Cavill cough 
) She was so invested in Daniel Craig and seemed/seems paralyzed to do anything without him. Combine that with Michael G. Wilson’s (at the time) imminent retirement and their total lack of cohesion with Amazon, I think her energies, creativeness, and will for the Bond series was/is gone.
Add to that Gregg Wilson’s supposedly not being ready to help take over producing duties, EON apparently bereft of ideas, and one superfluous lawsuit that popped up about a week before the deal occurred followed by the billion-dollar offer from Amazon to take over, and Broocoli saw the writing on the wall and–rightly or wrongly–threw in the towel. Now she can get on with her life and do what she wants instead of being burdened with carrying on the family legacy.
But I think without Craig and MGW, her heart, and, as a result, EON’s, just wasn’t in Bond anymore.
My favorite baseball team is currently up for sale. The 1st generation of the family that now owns it ran it for a couple decades, during which they won 2 championships.
When that owner died his son took over and, while he ran it fine for about 10 years, he had gotten a reputation of being disinterested in running the team.
A couple of years ago he turned over the team to his nephew who ran it for 2-3 years before announcing the family’s intention to sell a couple months ago.
There’s a theory that family businesses don’t make it past 3 generations because the 3rd generation was born with the money the business created and don’t have much drive to continue the work.
That’s exactly what the whole Amazon/EON situation feels like. I think this happening at this time was always meant to be, honestly.
Looking at the new „Brosnan with the car“-photos I have to say: he really looks his age now. And while he already did look old in „Fast Charlie“, these new pictures indicate that even a limited series with him as Bond would do no one a favor.
Let’s go with a younger Bond who still is not too young. Mid 30‘s would be best.
This, probably. We have to see that BB had practically spent her whole life with this series. With nothing but this series - and if that’s a nice idea for us fans it’s probably closer to a family curse if it happens to you without your say in it.
You could do both with the Pearson book…
Even being burdened by it, that´s why they call it family LEGACY…
Yes, legacy. But that’s also why you can REJECT an inheritance. And it’s not as if Broccoli had done that outright - since 1995 she and her family delivered, often under less-than-ideal conditions. So they certainly tried and gave it the lion’s share of their professional lives. However we feel about the result, we all could have had our seven seasons of ‘007 James Bond - the astonishingly middling Magnum P.I. successor’ right after LICENCE TO KILL already. Followed by a crossover with LETHAL WEAPON IX in a botched attempt to bring the old geezer back on the big screen. All in all, we haven’t been shortchanged, have we?
There is such a thing as misguided entitlement and I’m afraid we as fans often tend to be on the wrong end of it, wielding it in the face of those we feel owe us. But if we’re honest about it, we wouldn’t want to be treated in this way ourselves. Broccoli and her family carried on with a tradition and a business they didn’t initially choose themselves. Admittedly, they made a pretty penny from it, too. But that’s all that is to it, they kept the British end up as good as they knew how. 
You´re right but I still find it sad that Barbara gave up without trying to give it to someone in the family first…
We don’t know this. Who knows how long she have tried…?
It’s a shame, yes. But then again, there’s no saying how long they already tried to make it work. Impossible to judge from outside for us.
Personally, I don’t think they had already made up their minds to sell during NO TIME TO DIE’s production. It’s now a full five years since that production wrapped and holding on so long to me suggests it’s really been a drip-by-drip process, first waiting how Amazon would show up, then hoping, then pushing back. Finally accepting the common basis doesn’t seem to exist anymore. And let’s face it, in the current environment the particular Bond niche in film theatres was always going to be hard to defend, even if Eon had been entirely independent.
Add to it all how we live in volatile times and it’s perhaps understandable how the family preferred to take a backseat (they seem to still retain a share of the profits).
But I agree, it would have been a great thing had the next generation of Broccolis taken over and brought a fresh perspective and inspiration to the table.
Maybe the next generation - like many next generations - just did not want to carry on with Bond films, though.
It does not have to be obligatory to even like the stuff your granddad and parents made their living with.
And if money is not a problem…
On the other hand, it’s James Bond, man!
Any of the three would work for me but if it’ were Craig, I think itheu should wait about 10-15 years. Personally, I would heavily favour a 6-8 episode limited series of about 1 hour each.
Contrary to others, I don’t think we ever got old man Bond. I think we got “middle aged and getting old Bond.’ The trick in doing this would be making it something different. More of a detective Bond with a few splashes of actions appropriate for someone in their 70s.
To some exten , I think Brosnan played the part well inThe November Man.
There’s absolutely no evidence that Barbara didn’t try to keep the franchise in the family or just simply sold it off to Amazon at the first available opportunity. Nobody here knows exactly how “ready” the next generation of the Broccoli/Wilson family actually was, or wasn’t. They may have been completely ready to take over and, for whatever reason, decided not to. They may have wanted nothing more to do with Bond and were looking to move on to other projects or may have been incapable of taking over such a massive responsibility. They may have been in any number of situations between those two ends of the spectrum.
None of us knows what the answer to that question is. If it wasn’t the Broccoli family leading the franchise forward, it was going to be some billionaire studio head that would be deciding the future of the franchise, it just happens to be the billionaire that has his offices at Amazon.
Seems to me that the Broccolis couldn’t win regardless of what they did. Stick around and deal with the increasing headaches of a studio that will actually question how the money is being spent or get out and face the wrath of the fans, as we’ve seen on display ever since the news dropped however long ago it has been now. They should be thanked for their service to the franchise. Michael Wilson had a major hand in several of my absolute favorite films in the franchise. Barbara had the guts to cast Daniel Craig, despite intense public backlash, to take over from the very popular Pierce Brosnan. They should be commended for their efforts and allowed to go off into the sunset of retirement in peace.
To each his own I guess, but I come from a place where you can lend, rent out, lease but never should sell your family business…
I think the problem was Barbara thought she has to make them even better than her Craig Bond films, which for her was absolutely impossible. We Fans I guess would have settled for something in the Dalton/Brosnan range everyday in the last two years…go with a smaller budget, someone cheap like James Norton, A. Taylor-Johnson, Joe Alwyn, Richard Madden or not so cheap Eddie Redmayne, Taron Edgerton, Tom Hiddleston, Nicholas Hoult or obvios Henry Cavill and a little more espionage oriented (FRWL, FYEO, TLD style) and you can make a quarter billion only with product placement…
From “Melville” (1973) by Rui Nogueira–a book-length study of Jean-Pierre Melville in the form of an interview:
“I don’t know what will be left of me fifty years from now. I suspect that all films will have aged terribly and that cinema probably won’t even exist any more. I estimate the final disappearance of cinemas as taking place around the year 2020, so in fifty years time there will be nothing but television. Well, I shall be happy if I have one line devoted to me in the ‘Great Universal Encyclopedia of Cinema’, and I think that’s the sort of ambition every film-maker must have.”
I agree, but this also feels appropriate to the times. The way of things seems to be faded splendour. Bad economies around the world with once bustling malls now empty and haunted places. Childhood heroes either retired or having passed on. Society and the way of things has changed and it’s not going back.
I’m 36 and still can’t wrap my head around that. I occasionally look back at my early years and accept they only exist in photographs and my imagination. It’s a brave new world whether I like it or not. Bond died and the original run of films is over. It’s Amazon’s turn now, and good or bad it’s Bond’s new life. All we can do is hope.
Elisabeth Kübler-Ross would have adored this and adjacent conversations.