The most successful James Bond movie cemented the franchise's success, but its legal issues would plague the saga in the decades ahead.
The most successful James Bond movie caused major problems for the franchise for decades. The James Bond movie franchise is really the first major blockbuster series, with the original films promising audiences action and adventure on a scale that few other films could deliver. For all the ups and downs the saga has faced over the decades, 007 shows no signs of ever going away. Over the years, the EON series has faced various legal woes that have threatened to derail it, however.
SCREENRANT VIDEO OF THE DAY This includes an attempt by Sony to create a rival 007 franchise of its own during the '90s when they held the rights to the original 007 novel Casino Royale. EON has managed to weather most of those storms, though they've often caused production delays too. The key reason Bond vanished from screens for six years between Licence To Kill and GoldenEye was caused by legal battles between MGM, United Artists, and rights owners Danjaq.
The key issue can be traced back to controversy over Fleming's Thunderball story, which began as a screenplay co-written with Kevin McClory and Jack Whittingham. Fleming grew bored with development on the project and reworked it into a book - without crediting his co-writers. McClory won a lawsuit over the book, and in order to avoid a rival 007 film, EON made a deal with him to produce Thunderball; part of that agreement was also that McClory could make another version after ten years.
The Thunderball Lawsuit Haunted The Series For Decades McClory managed to convince Sean Connery to work on a screenplay for a new Bond adventure dubbed Warhead, and a court ruling declared the producer owned the rights to Blofeld and SPECTRE, meaning EON couldn't use either anymore. This resulted in both being written out of The Spy Who Loved Me, and they didn't officially return until 2015's Daniel Craig outing Spectre.
The Thunderball lawsuit continued to be an ongoing thorn in EON's side even after Never Say Never Again. McClory failed to convince Connery to return for a sequel to the latter, but he still spent years trying to mount another remake, with Timothy Dalton, Liam Neeson and even Pierce Brosnan being approached to star. Sony failed Bond franchise attempt would have seen them partner with McClory also.
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