007’s Road to a Million: Succession Star Brian Cox Goes Bond Villain

Succession star Brian Cox has been cast as the MC and host of the James Bond-inspired unscripted competition show 007’s Road to a Million for Prime Video. That’s right, Logan Roy is coming to the James Bond universe. Of course, his character won’t be called Logan Roy, but we all know Logan is, at heart, a Bond villain. Consider this the true endgame of the character.

Cox will play ‘The Controller,’ an “enigmatic character who controls the fate of the contestants” as he lurks in the shadows, according to Amazon. He’s billed as “villainous and cultured” and reveling “in the increasingly difficult journeys and questions the contestants must overcome.”

The reality contest show was filmed in many iconic Bond locations, from the Scottish Highlands to Venice and Jamaica, 007s Road to a Million will see contestants in two-person teams tested on intelligence, endurance, and heroism in a bid to win £1 million (US$1.2 million). They must also correctly answer questions hidden in different locations around the world to advance to the next challenge.  Presumably, Cox’ The Controller won’t get to order henchmen to go after the contestants with guns or snare them in death traps involving sharks or lasers, which is a shame. Come on; it’s not a complete James Bond experience without the threat of death on the secret agent wannabes. This is probably a PG show at most, so we won’t even get the pleasure of hearing Cox telling them to fuck off. Not without beeping, anyway.

“I got to see how ordinary people would cope with being on a James Bond adventure,” said Cox. “As they travel the world to some of the most iconic Bond locations, it gets more intense and nail-biting. I enjoyed my role as both villain and tormentor, with license to put the hopeful participants through the mangle.”

007’s Road to a Million is a collaboration between Amazon Studios, EON Productions, 72 Films, and MGM Alternative. It launches exclusively on Prime Video globally later this year, where we’ll get to see gormless real people finding out that being James Bond is really hard, if not outright impossible.