'No Time to Die': Daniel Craig and the Filmmakers Discuss the Shocking Ending

Editor’s note: The below article contains spoilers for No Time to Die.During an interview with Variety, James Bond actor Daniel Craig, director Cary Joji Fukunaga, and producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson spoke about the ending for the latest movie in the 007 franchise, No Time to Die. During this interview, they spoke about the ending for the latest movie, and how they came to the decision to make it.

To recap the ending of No Time to Die, the movie’s villain Lyutsifer Safin (Rami Malek), took control of a virus known as Hercules, and infected himself and Bond with a specific variant of it that will kill his love Madeleine Swann (Léa Seydoux), and anyone who is related to her, including her and Bond’s daughter Mathilde (Lisa-Dorah Sonnet). To prevent this from happening, Bond ultimately decides to stay on the island, dying when a missile strike destroys it.

The interview begins with Variety asking if the team behind the movie always planned to kill off Bond, which is the first time that has ever happened in the franchise. Craig then recalls a story from back in 2006, when Casino Royale was first premiering, and he was having a conversation with Broccoli. During this conversation, he asked her how many movies he’s been in, and then asked her if they could “kill him off in the last one?” to which she said “yes,” and they stuck to it since. Wilson added on, saying that the decision was actually denied up until the fourth movie was being made. Once they started thinking about how to end it, Wilson said that he thought that “it’s the fitting way to deal with a situation where a person is risking their life all the time.”

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When asked about how the audience might react to Bond’s sacrifice, Craig and Wilson jokingly answer, with Craig saying that the credits definitely say “James Bond will return.” Wilson points out that “Bond does save the day. He does do that.” While Broccoli praises the audience for keeping it a secret and not spoiling it for fans that didn’t see the movie.

Finally, they ask Fukunaga if the death was already set in place when she came on to direct the movie, to which she replies that while the death was set in place already, the specifics on how it would happen were not. She mentioned that at one point, they had the idea of just killing him with an anonymous bullet, but felt that Bond’s death would have to be “something even beyond that — like the impossible, impossible situation.” Craig added that the death had to involve Bond sacrificing himself for something and that it had to have weight to it, so they ultimately came to the conclusion that Savin’s weapon was the reason that it happens, and that he chooses to save his family.

No Time to Die is available now on 4k, Blu-Ray, and DVD formats. It is the fourth movie in Craig’s run as the titular character, and serves as his final movie playing the role.

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