Is Aaron Taylor-Johnson the Next James Bond?!

Picture this: as the suave Cockney assassin in "Bullet Train" graced the screen, I found myself whispering to my significant other, "There's the next James Bond." 

Fast forward to today's chat, where we're abuzz with the possibility of Aaron Taylor-Johnson donning the legendary 007 tux. Join me on a cinematic journey through Taylor-Johnson's versatile career, from his teenage roles to his superhero sprint as Quicksilver, and why his standout performances signify he could be the one to step into those polished Oxfords.

Whether you're a die-hard Bond fan or just love a good film debate, this episode's tailored for a thrilling look at the exciting prospects of cinema's favourite secret agent.

Enjoy!

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Hello tailoring talkers, a quick impromptu episode. This week the news has been buzzing with the rumours surrounding Aaron Taylor Johnson being offered the role of 007 James Bond. We have speculated just a tiny bit on the Bondathon over the course of the last couple of years. But I have to say, if this does happen, if Aaron Taylor Johnson is offered the role of James Bond, I absolutely called it. The moment he stepped onto the screen as the Cockney assassin tangerine in Brad Pitt's Bullet Train, I called it. I turned around to my wife and I said that's our next James Bond. He just looked the part in that royal blue stripe three piece suit with the swagger, with the build. He just looked like a killer. And the other thing I love about Aaron Taylor Johnson is he is such a chameleon. Some of you won't even know who he is. I know that a lot of my clients this week when I've said, oh, what do you think about Aaron Taylor Johnson as James Bond, they're like who are you talking about? And then when I mentioned his filmography, then they realise that they've seen him. He is such a chameleon.

Speaker 1: 1:28

I remember watching Tenet for the third time and it was only on that third watch that I realised that spoiler alert the soldier who rescues the protagonist is Aaron Taylor Johnson. I was like oh my God, is that him? And I had to watch the credits just to confirm. But he really does go under the radar. I think the first film he'd done a lot of films when he was younger, as a teenager and Angus Thongs and Perfect Was it, perfect snogging. Angesthongs and perfect snogging was like the first sort of mainstream film that I think people might remember, even if they don't remember him. And then the following year so that was 2008 and then in 2009 he starred in Kickass, which was Matthew Vaughn's absolutely brilliant take on the comic book about a awkward teenager who basically becomes a vigilante because he's tired of being pushed around and so on. I actually haven't seen that film for a little while, but I was a massive fan of it and I'm definitely going to revisit it this weekend and after that. You know he's done some brilliant work. He was absolutely killer in Nocturnal Animals I mentioned Tenet just now and he also has done some more superhero work.

Speaker 1: 2:57

He starred as Quicksilver in a couple of the Avengers movies Age of Ultron and he was in Captain America and Winter Soldier, which, for my money, is still one of the best MCU films ever. And then more recently, bullock Train, and he's going to be in the Fall Guy remake with Emily Blunt and Ryan Gosling, which comes out really soon. I'm really excited to see that movie. I was a massive fan of the TV show because it used to rerun when I was a little kid in the 1980s. But yeah, back to Aaron Taylor Johnson as James Bond. So the rumors are that he has been offered the contract and he has screen tested. Now I did hear from a pretty reliable source that he had screen tested, so I can pretty much be confident in that piece of news. But as to whether he's actually been offered a contract or not remains to be seen because there's still nothing formally announced and we know that Eon like to hold their cards quite close to their chest. But I've got a really, really good feeling about this one.

Speaker 1: 4:05

I think Aaron Taylor Johnson is going to be our next 007, and at the age of 34, that makes it really, really exciting. He's about the same age as Sean Connery was when Sean took on the role in Doctor no back in 1962, and there's a couple of ways that this could go. They could either be looking at going back in time because, don't forget, 007 got killed in no Time to Die. I'm going to have to definitely put a spoiler alert thing on, just in case there are people watching this that haven't seen these movies and might see them in future. But he was killed at the end of no Time to Die.

Speaker 1: 4:49

Now, if we go down the theory that 007 is the same person and has been throughout the movies because, don't forget, on Her Majesty's Secret Service, he gets married, his wife gets assassinated, killed at the end, and then she is mentioned in at least one, if not two, of the Roger Moore movies, and she's also hinted at or mentioned again in one of the Brosnan movies, in Golden Eye, in fact so, and actually in the Timothy Dalton films as well, I'm pretty sure. So we can kind of safely assume that the bond we've seen, as in the character from Doctor no all the way through to no Time to Die, is the same person, although there are some loopholes in that as well, in the logic and everything. But anyway, just go with me. Which means if age ATJ I'm going to call him age AT rolls off the tongue a lot better, but anyway, atj, if ATJ is 007, the age that he's had makes it really exciting because they could actually go back in time and we could see maybe a Cold War era young Bond properly getting his wings and everything. Or they could go down the route that. 007 is a moniker that is given to any secret agent and, given that the previous 007 is now deceased, we could be seeing modern day set Bond new agent stepping up into the role, because they did hint at that in no time to die, when you know Bond was out of action and 007 was the T-shirt. I can't remember her name, but anyway you know what I mean. So yeah, so we could get a modern day set Bond new agent given the 007 handle and then we get a whole new set of adventures. But anyway, I think Aaron Taylor Johnson will nail it. I think, as long as he's supported by a great script, he could in years to come be seen as one of the better Bonds as well.

Speaker 1: 7:13

Not that any of the five or six actors that have played Bond so far have been bad. Sean Connery was absolutely brilliant. Now that we've done the Bondathon and I've seen the Connery films for the first time ever because Roger Moore was kind of more sort of the Bond I was aware of when I was a little child and then Brosnan was my actual Bond, as in the one whose movies that I went to see at the cinema and so on. But Sean Connery absolutely brilliant, and I can see why so many people of that really strongly held opinion that Sean is the best Bond and that there will never be anyone better. He was fantastic.

Speaker 1: 7:56

Roger Moore brought some levity to the role. He had his moments as well. He wasn't like completely comical because he did have his moments and he brought a much lighter side to the character overall. Then we had Dalton, who took it from the Roger Moore era and just sort of grabbed the role by the scruff of the neck and sort of went back to the source material because Dalton Shakespearean actor and all of that he didn't want to do Bond unless he was able to put what he thought the character should be into it. And then from the Dalton era oh, I forgot Lazenby. Everyone does that as well. Like George, poor George Lazenby had his one shot with On Her Majesty's Secret Service and we've talked on the Bondophon about all the problems with George Lazenby and the fact that he could have carried on. But I think there was a bit of arrogance on his part. But here's one stint as Bond. I think for someone who had no acting experience whatsoever he did a really, really good job. Then we went from Dalton to Brosnan and again Brosnan was just the combination of, like the best bits of Sean Connery, that sort of rough edge, the levity of Roger Moore and the intensity of Timothy Dalton. He combined all three of those aspects and certainly his first two Bond adventures were absolutely fantastic.

Speaker 1: 9:27

Films. The world is not enough was okay, it was pretty good, and then Die Another Day. We're about to do that one for the Bondophon. I'm hoping that my opinion of it will be better than it has been. You know it's not a film that I've ever revisited because I just didn't like it. And then we had Daniel Craig, who some people call emo Bond, but he was a Bond for the modern day and the brief and the producers was that they wanted, they wanted Daniel Craig's bond to be what Christian Bell was to the Dark Knight, to Batman, with what Christopher Nolan did with those first three movies. So yeah, I think Aaron Taylor Johnson will obviously bring his own thing to the role and I can't wait to see what he does because I just love him as an actor. He's just so cool.

Speaker 1: 10:28

And speaking of Christopher Nolan, the other rumor going is that Christopher Nolan is going to be offered a three-picture deal to direct the next three and I'll be honest, I love Christopher Nolan as a director. He is getting a bit irritating with that whole not re-recording the dialogue of his actors and leaving the kind of natural sound, because I swear to God that last movie Oppenheimer I couldn't understand a word anyone was saying in that. And if he's going to do Bond, that would be exciting if I kind of got a guarantee that he wasn't going to do any of that nonsense, you know, with the audio and the dialogue and stuff. So you know, really my instinct is I don't want Christopher Nolan anywhere near it, the same as I wouldn't want Danny Villeneuve, as big a fan as I am of his work. I also I think he's better with sci-fi and fantasy and stuff. I wouldn't really want him anywhere near, although Danny Villeneuve did Sicario and Sicario was brilliant. But anyway, there we go. So, aaron Taylor Johnson, we may be close to having our new 007, which is very, very exciting news.

Speaker 1: 11:40

The world of Bond is very interlinked with both. You know myself growing up a massive fan of the books and of the films and and obviously GoldenEye the game on the N64, one of the greatest games of all time. It influences a lot of what I do as a bespoke tailor and designer, you know, especially when I'm dressing greens and C-suite executives and so on, that confidence, that swagger of 007. Everybody wants to just capture a little bit of that and bottle it up for themselves. So it's important. And also we fund memories of working on the promotion stuff, campaigns and everything for Skyfall. We created that amazing coat and we did a lot of work with the marketing teams behind Heineken and so on, with a lot of the experience, days and things that were all part of the promotion for that film 12 years ago.

Speaker 1: 12:44

So, yeah, bond, very, very dear to my heart and yeah, I just can't wait for them just to announce this now and for them to get on with it. And we should all just ignore the haters, because I think people like Eamon Holmes and people like that like you know, tv presenters and stuff have already been sort of slagging him off, saying you'll need to get a haircut and so on. I mean, come on, when Daniel Craig was announced as Bond. He, you know, he practically had shoulder length hair. Of course, he's going to get tailored and made over before he actually steps in front of a camera, so, yeah, so I really hope he doesn't get any hate, I hope that he doesn't get anyone piling on him if he is announced and I hope that everyone gives him a chance to show us what he can do, because I think it's really really exciting. So there we go. We're going to keep an eye on what happens in the news over the coming days, once it is made official or if it's not and I've got it completely wrong and everybody else has got it completely wrong and Eamon throw us a curveball. Whatever happens, we will be covering it on the Roberto Ravilla London blog, on the YouTube channel at Roberto Ravilla London, and obviously we will be talking about it throughout the Bondathon and I'm going to get together with, probably with John and Alex, just to maybe do some bonus episodes and talk about what's going on in the real world with what's going to happen in the future of the 007 franchise.

Speaker 1: 14:20

Thanks very much for watching. If you enjoyed this, if you're listening to the audio, please hit subscribe. Give the podcast a rating and a review, because the algorithms have changed and now Apple and Spotify etc. Are pushing the podcast. Who get the freshest review? So I really, really appreciate that and if you're watching this on the YouTube channel. Thank you so much for your time, thanks for lending me your eyes and ears. And again, hit that subscribe button, if you haven't already, and give the video a like, and also let me know in the comments who your favorite Bond is and if you're excited to see Aaron Taylor Johnson in the role, or if you're skeptical, and why. There's no right or wrong. Everybody's entitled to their own opinion. I think it's a really, really interesting conversation and I can't wait to to to sort of have this dialogue with as many of you as I can take care. Thanks very much for listening or watching, or both, and I'll see you on the next one.