Without Tom Holland and his charming relationship with the higher-ups at Sony, Spider-Man: No Way Home may have never happened, with the world losing out on the current cinematic juggernaut that’s in circulation. However, even when those charms don’t work as they’re intended, the results can still be a net positive. No story points this out better than the time Holland tried to be a young James Bond, but ended up becoming a young Nathan Drake in the Uncharted prequel.
How James Bond Helped Tom Holland Land His Uncharted Lead
As he discussed his upcoming video game adaptation with Total Film, the current Spider-Man revealed that he made a confident, but failed pitch to put his own spin on 007. While that suggestion didn’t work out, it did help his studio partner crack just how to approach the film adaptation of the Playstation best seller. After years of development hell, Uncharted finally had its way forward, as described by Mr. Holland below:
The idea of a young Bond film sparked this idea, in turn, that you could do a Nathan Drake story as an origin story, rather than as an addition to the games. And that opened a conversation.
As his drunken phone call that saved the Spider-Man franchise proved, Tom Holland has a way with helping smooth over difficult situations. Uncharted’s history of stumbling blocks counts as another one of those cases, with the actor unintentionally providing a novel solution that solved the problem. Director Ruben Fleischer’s would-be February blockbuster wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for Holland’s “young Bond” pitch, which in itself is another intriguing story to be told.
Why Tom Holland’s Young Bond Pitch Didn’t Work Out
Though he’ll be playing Nathan Drake to Mark Wahlberg’s Victor Sullivan in his next big screen adventure, Tom Holland was trying to approach a role that any actor would be crazy not to pursue. Rather than put himself up as the successor to Daniel Craig’s run as James Bond, Holland's idea was a bit more avant garde. The finer details of his Bond pitch are all you need to see why this idea never got off the ground:
I had a meeting, after or during [Spider-Man: Far From Home], with Sony to pitch this idea of a young Bond film that I’d come up with. It was the origin story of James Bond. It didn’t really make sense. It didn’t work. It was the dream of a young kid, and I don’t think the Bond estate were particularly interested.
A “young Bond” reboot might seem like a solution for the future of EON Productions’ historic film franchise. Since the Craig era ended with 007’s death, an optimal window for a fresh start has presented itself, and there’s no telling what will happen in the next chapter to come. Though that knowledge wasn’t public around the time that Tom Holland cast his hat into the ring, the idea runs contrary to what Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson feel is the right course of action for the Bond series.
Plenty of spinoffs and parallel franchises have been suggested in the world of James Bond, but Broccoli and Wilson have always been focused on keeping one cinematic franchise up and running. For Tom Holland’s idea to work, it almost sounds like a new series would have to be created; one in which we’d see 007’s life at a younger point than we’ve ever seen cinematically. Between a potential for conflicting brands and a lack of interest in developing any characters outside of the mainline series entries, Holland’s idea was never going to work.
Big ideas can sometimes peter out when they’re discussed in a room, but as we’ve seen above, they can lead to large happenings of their own. Tom Holland's aspirations of being a young Bond may be dashed for now, but the actor did see a huge swing in his odds to become the next official James Bond. So there's could be another conversation in the near future that once again gives him an upper hand he never intended to be dealt.
Thanks to Mr. Holland’s proposal for a young Bond origin story, the Uncharted prequel will finally bring Nathan Drake’s world to the big screen for the first time. You can catch the finished product, only in theaters, on February 18th; provided there isn't a release date change up on the horizon. For now, you can definitely see Tom Holland on the big screen in Spider-Man: No Way Home.
