The last time we heard anything about Bond 23 was back in June, when EON Productions announced that Peter Morgan (The Last King of Scotland, The Queen, Frost/Nixon) would be writing the screenplay along with Bond franchise regulars Neal Purvis and Robert Wade. Bond website MI6.co.uk (via SlashFilm) has an update from Morgan saying that the screenwriter moved to Vienna, Austria earlier this year to work on the screenplay. All that he would tell them about it is that “it’s a shocking story.” He also added that “Bond creates a hysteria around it” that he hasn’t seen before in which everyone is always asking about Bond 23.

As a diehard James Bond fan, I’ve been trying to think about some possibilities for a “shocking story.” Though I have a good feeling that they might be killing off M. Judi Dench has said she’s returning, but let’s not forget that her version of M in the Daniel Craig movies, in theory, exists before the version of M that Bernard Lee played in the old Sean Connery and Roger Moore Bond movies. We need to get a new M anyway and right now (in the Bond universe where Vesper Lynd was killed) she’s the closest person to Bond and one of the few he can trust. So if she were to get killed, that would definitely shake things up for James Bond.

Of course, there’s no director attached to this yet either, so we don’t know too much about it. According to reports back in 2007, Daniel Craig will still be playing James Bond for at least three more movies. MI6 also states that pre-production on Bond 23 has been put on hold because MGM is still looking for money or a new owner. I’m one of those people who is always looking forward to the next James Bond and it looks like this next one may hit in 2011 as planned. If they can still start shooting late next year, they’ll still make that release date. But who should they get to direct Bond 23? Danny Boyle? Matthew Vaughn? Someone else?

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