The Rundown: The Case For Letting Walton Goggins Be The Next James Bond

The Rundown is a weekly column that highlights some of the biggest, weirdest, and most notable events of the week in entertainment. The number of items could vary, as could the subject matter. It will not always make a ton of sense. Some items might not even be about entertainment, to be honest, or from this week. The important thing is that it’s Friday, and we are here to have some fun.

Daniel Craig’s run as James Bond comes to an end with the release of No Time to Die next week. This means, according to the rules set forth in The Discourse, that we all need to start — or continue — fighting about who gets to fill the role next. Some people got a head start on this by yelling about Idris Elba a few years ago. Daniel Craig himself waded into it last week by saying he doesn’t think Bond should be played by a woman or person of color, only because there should be more and better original roles written for them. Lots of outlets took that quote and ran with headlines like “Daniel Craig: Bond Should NEVER Be Played By A Woman,” because, again, The Discourse.

Luckily, I have a solution here that can save us all some headaches. We can settle this sucker right now, in the next few paragraphs, and move right along. Are you ready Are you ready for my great idea Wait. Dammit, you read the headline already. You know where I’m headed with this. Hmm. Kind of takes the punch out of it, but still. It’s a good idea. Here we go: We should let Walton Goggins play James Bond.

My case for Goggins as Bond rests on three pillars. A tripod of a case. Stable. Strong. No wobbles anywhere.

PILLAR ONE: It would be fun

It would be so much fun. Walton Goggins is always great. He was great as Boyd Crowder on Justified and he was great as Baby Billy on The Righteous Gemstones and he’s been great in everything else. He carries himself with this aura of like mischief and menace, which is why he often gets slipped into projects as the villain. But he also has an underlying confidence in his performances, an unflappable vibe, that would work so well as James Bond. Picture him walking into a casino in a tuxedo. Picture him plopping $25,000 on the table and saying, “I’m seeing red tonight.” I need it.

So it would be fun in that way. It would also be, like, fun, full-stop, which, all due respect to Daniel Craig and the people who made the last few Bond movies, is a quality that’s been missing a bit. Bond has gotten emotional and sad lately. That’s fine, I guess, but it’s probably time for a course correction. Let Bond be fun and a little goofy again. I can think of no better way to accomplish this than by strapping a jetpack to Walton Goggins and having him thwart a madman who is trying to melt the polar ice caps with a space laser.

The people need this. I need this. Which brings me to…

PILLAR TWO: I would like it

I would like it very much. I like the Bond movies and I like Walton Goggins. I think they are a great match. For me. More decisions should be made with this in mind. “What would Brian like” is an example of a question they could ask in a pitch meeting. And then, before they sign the contracts, “Are we sure Brian will like this” You know, to be thorough.

But this one No doubt about it. I would definitely like this. I mean, look at this…

… and this…

No flaws detected in any of this. Actually, wait. There is one small issue I should address. Meet me in…

PILLAR THREE: Whatever, British people play Batman and Spider-man sometimes

Walton Goggins is not, in the most technical sense of the term, British. He could not be less British, actually. He’s American Southern down to his bones. I suspect this will upset a sizable chunk of Bond purists. To that I say:

It’s a good idea. Think about it for a while this weekend. Let Walton Goggins play James Bond.

After weeks of speculation about who may or may not be leaving, with open questions about the majority of the female cast (Strong, McKinnon, Bryant, etc.), the cast for the rapidly approaching new season of SNL was announced this week and the only major loss was Beck Bennett. That’s a bummer because Beck Bennett is an awesome sketch performer, kind of in the way Phil Hartman was. He was the binding element to a lot of stuff, often as a dad or a boss or some other authority figure. You need those people to make things work, to make them run smoothly. I’m kind of bummed out.

Luckily, that’s all balanced out by some good news: new cast members are a-comin’. Via the New York Times:

“S.N.L.” is also adding three new featured players for the coming season: Aristotle Athari, a member of the sketch group Goatface; James Austin Johnson, who has acted in shows like “Tuca & Bertie” and in the film “Hail, Caesar!”, and has a viral series of Donald Trump impressions; and Sarah Sherman, who has worked on “The Eric Andre Show.”

While this paragraph appears to be accurate in all the important ways, it does make one big omission. It lists the big credits for James Austin Johnson and mentions his excellent Trump impression, but it leaves out the part where he also stars in the “Fireworks Illegal in Pasadena” tweet. You’ve seen this tweet. You’ve watched the video. TELL ME YOU’VE SEEN THE TWEET AND WATCHED THE VIDEO.

You know what Let’s be safe. Let’s post it right after this sentence, both to be sure you’ve seen it and because I stopped typing the last paragraph to go watch it again and I still have the tab open.

— James Austin Johnson (@shrimpJAJ) June 4, 2021

It’s beautiful. It’s perfect, basically. It makes me very happy and I’ve watched it hundreds of times and whooooooops I stopped typing this paragraph to watch it again just now. I have no further analysis here, honestly. I hope it works out for everyone and I hope they all become big stars. Beck Bennett, too. But mostly I just wanted to post that video again. Thank you for allowing me to do that, Lorne.

An incomplete list of things that happened in the first episode of La Brea, a real show that premiered on NBC this week:

You get it. It’s all fine and something you’ve seen before plenty of times. It’s like Lost and Manifest and a sinkhole rolled into a big ball. Again, fine. The tricky thing is that it’s going to need to move out of this unremarkable middle area fast if it wants to keep me around (their primary concern, I’m sure), and there are really only two ways they can go about doing that. Back to the bullet points:

Definitely too soon to tell right now. A lot can still happen. They’re off to a promising start, though, both because of all the things in those bullet points and because of, well, this…

More shows should end episodes on sabertooth tiger cliffhangers. This is something I have always said. Do not look it up, though. Just trust me.