Denis Villeneuve ushers in the new Bond

Four months after Amazon MGM bought out the Broccoli family, long the cinematic stewards of James Bond, Denis Villeneuve has been announced as the latest director to take on Bond. He will usher in the Amazon era of Bond, whenever he’s done with Dune, that is.

Villeneuve is only the second non-British director to tackle Bond—Cary Joji Fukunaga was the first—and is the first Canadian director to helm the franchise. He will also produce, alongside Tanya Lapointe, his creative partner and wife. With a huge question mark hanging over 007 as to what fully corporate stewardship will look like, hiring Denis Villeneuve is at least a sign that Amazon MGM intends to maintain Bond’s cinematic standard. Especially during Daniel Craig’s run, the Bond films became known for extremely lavish, big-budget productions (that took f-cking forever to complete) with enormous set pieces and at least one practically achieved action bonanza per film. Denis Villeneuve is the kind of filmmaker who can deliver the kind of glossy visuals the franchise is now known for… 

Whenever he gets around to making it. Dune: Messiah is up first, filming this summer—which means double duty for Zendaya between Dune and Spider-Man 4—and currently expected to open in December 2026. It hasn’t been confirmed to be Dune: Messiah, but Warner Brothers dated a “Denis Villeneuve event film” for the 2026 holiday season. Interestingly, Marvel recently pushed Avengers: Doomsday to December 2026. In fact, the untitled Villeneuve film and Doomsday are slated to open on the same day, December 18, 2026. This is completely nonsensical, but I am no longer confident that Barbenheimer didn’t break everyone’s brains and convince studios they can open blockbusters opposite one another and both walk away winners. Part of me now thinks everyone might be dumb enough to pit Dune and Avengers against each other.

But another part of me thinks Marvel wouldn’t have moved Doomsday to that date if they didn’t expect Dune to move. It could be that we don’t see Dune: Messiah until 2027, which means we aren’t seeing a Villeneuve Bond movie until at least 2028. Whatever the exact release date ends up being, Villeneuve has to get through Dune first, so it will be a minute before Villeneuve Bond happens. Hiring a non-British director might open up the odds for a non-British Bond, but I don’t think they’ll rock the boat that hard. Bond will still be a Brit. And just think, we have years more to speculate about who! 

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