Netflix have made huge gains over the last few months when it comes to rivalling the major Hollywood studios in terms of blockbuster action movies. Their first attempt with David Ayer’s Bright may have quickly faded from memory, but the streaming service has since released a slew of in-house originals ripe with franchise potential including 6 Underground, Extraction, The Old Guard and Project Power.
The hot streak looks set to continue with Dwayne Johnson’s Red Notice scheduled to resume shooting in a matter of weeks, while they’ll also be re-teaming with Charlize Theron for Atomic Blonde 2 and the Russo brothers have signed up to helm $200 million espionage thriller The Gray Man with Chris Evans and Ryan Gosling in the lead roles. Of course, Netflix still have plenty of pre-existing content to keep their subscribers occupied and today they’ve added two huge action movies, one of which is widely regarded as a modern classic of the genre, along with its inferior but still enjoyable sequel.
First up, Casino Royale marked a brave new era for the Bond franchise, stripping things back to tell the more grounded and gritty story of Daniel Craig’s unproven 007 that looked to demonstrate that cinema’s most famous secret agent could not only survive but thrive in a world where Jack Bauer and Jason Bourne were threatening to steal his crown.
It marked a second successful relaunch under the eye of director Martin Campbell following Pierce Brosnan’s debut in Goldeneye a decade previously, but follow-up Quantum of Solace, which is also now on Netflix, was less enthusiastically received. Marc Forster was the wrong choice for a $200 million action epic, and the writer’s strike hardly helped matters, resulting in a muddled and disjointed story.
Daniel Craig has done more than enough to put himself in the conversation about the best Bond ever, and fans that can’t wait for his final outing in No Time to Die can finally check out his first two efforts under the tux at the push of a button as Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace are now available to stream on Netflix.