Daniel Craig Dives Into Why ‘Quantum of Solace’ Was a ‘S—Show’ After ‘Casino Royale’ Success

Ahead of the No Time to Die theater release, the latest film in the James Bond collection, its titular character Daniel Craig is looking back on his other films in the franchise. Craig appeared on The Empire Film Podcast, where he revealed he doesn’t look back on his time making Quantum of Solace fondly –– calling the experience a “s–– show.” The 2008 film was the second of his five Bond movies.  

“I would sort of yearn [for] the person I was when I did Casino. Too much knowledge sometimes is not a good thing. I was sort of in the dark about a lot of things, about how things worked, the mechanics of it, how the world really viewed Bond — all of those things. I just didn’t understand them,” he said.

He continued: “Then I started to understand them, the weight of it sort of bore down. The trouble with [Quantum of Solace], it was a bit of a shit-show, to say the least, the full weight of it was there I kind of think that made me probably lock up. Thankfully, for me, it’s been about loosening it and loosening it and trying to get back to that feeling of Casino, which was ‘It’s James Bond, come on, enjoy yourself. Let’s have a good time.’”

On his first Bond film Casino Royale, Craig only had nice things to say about the job. “I remember [shooting Casino Royale] with massive fondness. And all this other shit was going on around it, which was meaningless at the time because I knew we had a good film, I knew Casino was good. You kind of go, ‘Wait and see, it’s going to be great, don’t worry,’” he said.

He also thanked MGM and Universal for keeping his new film to a theatrical release as opposed to the current trend of streaming releases. “Thankfully, [MGM and Universal] were incredibly brave and said ‘We want to put this in the cinemas, let’s wait.’ Cause I’m sure the rumors going around were it could get streamed, it could get sold to a streaming service, and that would be… That felt wrong,” Craig said. No Time to Die will be released in theaters on Oct. 8.