With the recent Amazon MGM deal, James Bond is in a new kind of peril

The name of James Bond's new home is Prime. Amazon Prime.

Up until now, the fate of the beloved British spy character was up to the descendants of the films' original producer, Albert Broccoli.

After more than 60 years, however, the Broccoli family has handed over creative control of the iconic espionage franchise to Amazon MGM Studios.

While the exact terms of the deal are still unknown, this move means that going forward Amazon will decide who plays Bond, who writes the scripts — and exactly how much content will be rendered from this world.

Today on Commotion, guest host Rad Simonpillai talks to film critics Adam Nayman and Hanna Flint about how the Amazon MGM takeover of the James Bond franchise may change its future, or redefine its legacy.

We've included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, listen and follow Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud on your favourite podcast player.

Rad: Adam, what was your reaction to this news? 

Adam: That we can't have nice things. Or, that Amazon can have nice things. Jeff Bezos can have nice things. We can't have them anymore. You just think about how everything is intellectual property, and you sort of think about the difference between custodians and slumlords, you know? And Amazon are slumlords with stuff like this. So it's not an optimistic feeling seeing this franchise — whatever you think of Bond and how it's been steered over the years, and all the decisions that go into each individual movie, and the character overall — you just don't have a ton of faith that this is a positive move.

Rad: Right, so the most cynical take we could imagine right now. But Hanna, because Bond is arguably the most British of all franchises, the reaction over on your side of the pond to this news is that, like, he's been "lost" to the Americans. It's like James Bond has defected. What's your reaction to that?

Hanna: I mean, over here, it's like Britain's biggest loss to America since 1776, right? It's like, oh my God, we lost the colonies. That's what it feels like over here. There's so much protectiveness….

Rad: What do you think that the Broccoli family did really well by this franchise?

Hanna: I think they understood that whoever they cast as Bond can never be bigger than the brand when they first start out. I mean, I know now it's like Sean Connery! Pierce Brosnan! George Lazenby! I jest. But there was something about picking the character and then also, I think it's understanding the actor and suiting to them. I mean, I always think it's interesting how everyone gets so mad at the idea of changing Bond to a different ethnicity. But Bond in the books wasn't originally Scottish. Ian Fleming changed it once he saw Sean Connery in the role. And I think that's what they've also done in bringing Judi Dench in to take over as M. That wasn't a gendered, feminist [thing]. It was just a "made sense" thing, because it's Dame Judi Dench. Of course she would run the MI6.

And even when they brought in a bit more diversity in certain places — as well, they kind of adapted where the femme fatale wasn't just there to be shagged by Bond. There was a bit more to it. And I think that's what they really understood. It wasn't calcified in this one belief. It was kind of like, how do we recognize not just the geopolitical things, but also the social things going on at the time? What people want to see on screen, and want to see a bit more variety on there to make him still relevant?

Rad: Adam, what do you think is going to be the biggest change now with Bond in the Amazon era?

Adam: It's more of the potential dread, or horror, of expanding this universe. Are they going to give "Moneypenny: The Early Years"? Are they going to do The Penguin, but about Goldfinger? And it sounds dumb to say it, but this is the way that everything bends now, which is bleeding as much as you can from this property. And because of all the control they have top-down — they're a movie studio, they're a broadcaster and they're a streaming company — it becomes about content. And I think that one way to talk about the Bond movies is even if you have a hard time taking them as art, they were never quite "content." And the way that everything now kind of reduces to content and is conceived that way, I guess maybe because Bond resisted it for so long, it feels kind of insulting. 

You think about the major franchises that have moved to the streaming realm, and how their specialness has been just completely dissipated. Like Lord of the Rings, which happens to be on Amazon, or you think about Star Wars where, whatever you think of those shows, there's so many of them now that none of them feel special. So losing that feeling that every five or six years there's going to be a Bond movie, and they've obviously worked on it for a while. It's going to be pretty good. It's going to be worth seeing. That's almost certainly going to disappear. Even if they don't bulldoze it right away, that won't last.

You can listen to the full discussion from today's show on CBC Listen or on our podcast, Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud, available wherever you get your podcasts.

Panel produced by Jess Low.