When you're dealing with a rumor mill that contains next to no confirmed information, some echoes tend to slip in there. Case in point: in today's Daily Mail story about Naomie Harris meeting with Bond 23 director Sam Mendes to become the new Bond girl, they also state as fact that she'll be joining "Daniel Craig, Javier Bardem, Ralph Fiennes and Judi Dench when filming begins later this year."

Now, of course Craig and Dench are confirmed, as the constant forces of the revamped Bond series. And we've written already about both Fiennes and Bardem being part of the film, back in February, though at the time both were either rumors or offers that were nowhere near confirmed. It's unclear if Daily Mail writer Baz Bamigboye-- who, to be fair, tends to actually know what's going on-- is simply operating off those old rumors, or if he now knows them to be fact.

The story also says that Harris won't be playing a typical Bond girl exactly-- usually a new character who is mysteriously absent by the next adventure-- but M's assistant Moneypenny, who hasn't appeared at all in the Craig-starring Bond films, and last appeared opposite Pierce Brosnan in Die Another Day, as played by Samantha Bond. Not to deny the fine work done by Olga Kurylenko and especially Eva Green in their two outings as Bond girls, but Moneypenny sounds like it could be a far more interesting role for Harris, who has appeared in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End and 28 Days Later, but has yet to get a big starring role in a major hit film.

As for Fiennes and Bardem, we didn't learn much about the roles either of them would play when we first reported on it-- Fiennes's character was described as "a darkly complex character," but that's pretty much it. If shooting is indeed set to start in the fall, though, we should expect at least a little bit of confirmation coming down the pipeline shortly.