Bond 25 title: What's the next James Bond film going to be called?

We have a cast – Daniel Craig is back as 007, Bohemian Rhapsody's Oscar winner Rami Malek will be “making sure Mr Bond doesn’t have an easy ride”, Jeffery Wright returns as CIA man Felix Leiter, British breakthrough star Lashana Lynch will play a character called Nomi and Ana de Armas stars as Paloma.

We have locations – Bond has retired to Jamaica, where much of the action takes place, while Italy, Norway and London (of course) will also feature.

After a bit of chopping and changing, we even have a release date – 3rd April 2020 in the UK and 8th April in the US.

The only thing we don't have is an official title.

What we do have, though, are a string of rumours, all with a degree of evidence to back them up...

Is the Bond 25 title... Shatterhand?

Back in February it emerged that, among a list of forthcoming movies in film industry publication Production Weekly, Bond 25 was being referred to as Shatterhand.

James Bond films have a long history of one-word titles –think Goldfinger, Thunderball, GoldenEye and the last two Bond films, Skyfall and Spectre, which both also happen to begin with the letter S.

And Shatterhand has strong Bond credentials itself – not only is Dr Guntram Shatterhand an alias of Bond's arch-nemesis Ernst Stavro Blofeld, it's also the name of the estate where Blofeld dies in Ian Fleming's original 007 books.

Given that Blofeld has been an increasing presence in the most recent Bond films, and that Daniel Craig is likely to hang up his holster after this film, it could have made sense that Shatterhand completes a kind of Bond trilogy with Skyfall and Spectre and that it potentially sees the criminal mastermind meet his end.

However, Shatterhand was clearly listed in Production Weekly as a working title – which could still hint at the plot but would mean the name of the film would be very much open to change – and since then other sources have suggested Bond co-producer Barbara Broccoli has quashed the rumour completely.

Signing a piece of fan art featuring the word Shatterhand, Broccoli apparently added an arrow pointing to the supposed title and the words “It’s not”.

Is the Bond 25 title... Eclipse?

Next up – and continuing the one-word theme – came Eclipse, which looks as if it may have been another working title for Bond 25 (it's almost as if the producers are deliberately setting up red herrings for us to find).

Eclipse appeared as a project linked to B25 Productions – one of the companies set up around the movie by producers EON pictures – as part of an entry on the online profile of a costume artist who is apparently working on the film. The reference was removed soon after it was made public.

There's been no official comment on this one but our feeling is that it's a little wishy-washy for 007 – especially since it's already the name of one of the Twilight films.

Is the Bond 25 title... A Reason To Die?

This certainly sounds more Bondy than Eclipse or Shatterhand – after all, it would be the fourth 007 film to feature the word "Die" following Roger Moore's debut Live and Let Die and Pierce Brosnan's Tomorrow Never Dies and Die Another Day.

A Reason To Die also fits with the rumour that original Bond 25 director Danny Boyle left the production because he was against plans for Daniel Craig's Bond to be killed off at the end of his final outing.

However, Bond insiders MI6 HQ reckon that while A Reason To Die was being initially considered for Bond 25, producers later rejected it for being "not Bond enough".

Watch this space for further Bond 25 title rumours as we receive information from our sources in the field...

Bond 25 will be released in cinemas on 3rd April, 2020 in the UK.