'No Time to Die represents change': 007 Featurette spotlights the new women of Bond

"No Time to Die represents change," Lashana Lynch declares in a brand-new featurette for Daniel Craig's final big screen outing as MI6 agent, James Bond. "We have so many different examples of women being strong in this movie," she adds.

Lynch (last seen as Carol Danvers' best friend, Monica Rambeau, in 2019's Captain Marvel) takes on the role of Nomi, a 00-agent who helps bring Bong out of retirement when the suave spy decides to give up stressful espionage for a quieter life in Jamaica. It's long been rumored that Nomi takes on the mantle of 007 when James decides to call it quits, but so far, that has yet to confirmed (and the featurette certainly isn't giving up answers that easily).

Bond's other ally in the film is Paloma, a Cuban agent played by Knives Out veteran, Ana de Armas. "She's intense," the actress says in the video. "I had many action scenes. Thank God, I had an amazing stunt team."

Watch the featurette below:

While it may feel instinctive to connect Nomi and Paloma to the title of "Bond Girls," it's a lot more complicated than that. "I don’t even call them 'Bond Girls,'” Craig said last year. “I’m not going to deny it to anybody else. It’s just I can’t have a sensible conversation with somebody if we’re talking about ‘Bond Girls.'"

Discussing his work with de Armas, he continued: “I should always be so lucky to work with a woman like that. This is a movie where there’s a lot of sh** going on, a lot of big acting, myself very much included, but she shines through because she’s the real deal. She’s got very good comic timing and we’re not offering her a huge part. But she came in and just nailed it. She had very little to go on, the scripts are being rewritten, you’re changing things all the time or throwing them at her, and she’s not fazed by it."

Directed and co-written by Cary Joji Fukunaga (True Detective, Maniac), the 25th franchise installment co-stars Rami Malek (Safin), Léa Seydoux (Dr. Madeleine Swann), Christoph Waltz (Blofeld), Ralph Fiennes (M), Naomie Harris (Eve Moneypenny), Rory Kinnear (Bill Tanner), Ben Whishaw (Q), and Billy Magnussen (Logan Ash) co-star.

Fukunaga is the very first American filmmaker to tackle a Bond film within the official Eon canon. Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, and Phoebe Waller-Bridge also share screenplay credit.

After many COVID-related delays, No Time to Die finally hits U.S. theaters everywhere Friday, Oct. 8. The second and third episodes of the movie's tie-in podcast (hosted by James King) are now available to stream.