As James Bond fans get ready to watch the franchise's first ever reality TV spin-off, it has been confirmed that the competition series originally had no association to Bond at all.
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Speaking at the launch for 007: Road to a Million, executive producer David Glover explained that the original pilot episode did not contain any Bond elements and was simply "a game show where people have to go on an adventure".
"I took it in to Dan Grabiner [Amazon Studios' Head of Originals for the UK and Northern Europe] and he said, 'It's a great show, but it needs another level, it needs something to kind of connect an audience to it.' And he said, 'Maybe we should hook up with some kind of IP or something.'
"I said, 'Well, the ultimate thing to hook it up to would be the James Bond franchise, because we talked about James Bond movies when we were thinking about it originally'."
He continued: "Dan sent the pilot to Barbara Broccoli, who I think watched it out of politeness, because she'd seen hundreds of these kinds of pilots and never wanted to do one and was expecting to turn it down, but [she] really liked it."
Meanwhile, James Bond producer Gregg Wilson added: "We get a lot of not very good proposals, which are often about emulating the character of Bond.
"This was a really refreshingly original take, which had real people but [gave] the opportunity to put them into a very heightened, James Bond-type experience. It just felt like a really fun premise."
Joseph Bone and James Bone in 007: Road to a Million. Jemma Cox/Prime Video
The series stars Brian Cox as The Controller, who sets contestants that are hoping to win £1 million a host of super-spy related challenges.
Beyond this, fans shouldn't necessarily expect further Bond spin-offs - Wilson said at the launch that he doesn't think it will "usher in a new era of Bond spin-offs", but added that "if audiences like this as much as we think they will, we're excited to get cracking on season 2".
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James Hibbs is a Drama Writer for Radio Times, covering programmes across both streaming platforms and linear channels. He previously worked in PR, first for a B2B agency and subsequently for international TV production company Fremantle. He possesses a BA in English and Theatre Studies and an NCTJ Level 5 Diploma in Journalism.
