Every James Bond Actor, Ranked By Number Of Movies

George Lazenby starred in just one James Bond movie, Roger Moore starred in seven, and the rest all place somewhere in between.

Last year, Daniel Craig wrapped up the most recent incarnation of the James Bond franchise with No Time to Die, a bittersweet finale in which 007 takes stock of the most meaningful parts of his life and ultimately sacrifices himself in a nuclear strike to save the world from yet another diabolical megalomanic. With five Bond movies under his belt, Craig spent longer in the role than most of his peers.

George Lazenby starred in just one James Bond movie, Roger Moore starred in a whopping seven, and the rest of the Bond actors all place somewhere in between.

6 George Lazenby (1)

When Sean Connery ducked out of the follow-up to You Only Live Twice, Eon cast a wide net to find his replacement. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service ended up starring George Lazenby, who was a controversial casting choice for 007 because he was neither British nor an actor; he was an Australian model.

Lazenby only filled in for one movie before Connery returned to star in Diamonds Are Forever. Lazenby ultimately did a fine job with the role and On Her Majesty’s Secret Service has stood the test of time as arguably the best-crafted and most cinematic Bond film of all.

5 Timothy Dalton (2)

When Roger Moore stepped down from the role of Bond, he was replaced by Timothy Dalton, who took the character in a significantly darker direction. Introduced in The Living Daylights, Dalton’s 007 was praised for capturing the dark, brooding, complicated government-sanctioned killer from Ian Fleming’s source material. Dalton came a lot closer to embodying a faithful adaptation of Bond than Moore ever did.

After The Living Daylights, Dalton starred in just one more Bond film before being replaced by Pierce Brosnan. His second and last Bond movie, License to Kill, was even darker and edgier than his first. It’s a brutal revenge story in which Bond abandons his official MI6 mission to pursue a personal vendetta against a drug lord. This is the only Bond film to earn a 15 rating in the UK.

4 Pierce Brosnan (4)

Dalton’s successor, Pierce Brosnan, made his debut in GoldenEye. This reboot significantly lightened up the tone from the Dalton films, but didn’t succumb to the eyeroll-inducing silliness of the Roger Moore films. GoldenEye finds a nice balance between indulging in goofy spy caper fun and exploring 007’s darker side. The result was a crowd-pleasing action blockbuster that successfully reinvented the franchise for the modern day.

Brosnan’s next three Bond films received increasingly harsh reviews from critics. Tomorrow Never Dies was criticized for its heavy-handed satire of the mass media, while The World is Not Enough was criticized for its predictable twist. The final film in the Brosnan era, Die Another Day, is frequently ranked as the worst movie in the franchise (although it has its moments).

3 Daniel Craig (5)

After the disappointment of Die Another Day, GoldenEye director Martin Campbell was brought back to revamp the franchise with a gritty, realistic, Batman Begins-esque reboot. Casino Royale introduced Daniel Craig’s Bond with an origin story detailing how he earned his 00 status and his license to kill. After Casino Royale earned some of the series’ best reviews in years, Quantum of Solace was met with some of its worst. Sam Mendes found a nice middle ground between the gritty realism of Casino Royale and the classical absurdity of the franchise’s lore in Skyfall, then fell into the pitfalls of aimless Marvel-style worldbuilding in Spectre.

After Spectre let down fans, Cary Joji Fukunaga managed to stick the landing with the moving finality of No Time to Die. This made Craig the first Bond whose stint in the role has a definitive end. Bond actors usually retire with their most critically panned movie, but Craig got to go out on his own terms with a heartbreaking, unprecedented death scene.

2 Sean Connery (6)

Sean Connery nailed Bond’s characterization out of the gate in the very first movie, Dr. No. Throughout the next three movies – From Russia with Love, Goldfinger, and Thunderball – Connery’s 007 built up a contentious relationship with SPECTRE in anticipation of his showdown with their leader, Blofeld, in You Only Live Twice.

Connery took a break from the role after You Only Live Twice. He came back after George Lazenby played Bond in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service to star in Diamonds Are Forever, then appeared in the unofficial non-Eon production Never Say Never Again over a decade later.

1 Roger Moore (7)

Roger Moore took over from Sean Connery after Diamonds Are Forever. Moore’s Bond films were defined by their lighter tone, utilizing wacky one-liners and slapstick humor. They also followed the contemporary genre trends: Live and Let Die is a blaxploitation movie, The Man with the Golden Gun is a kung fu movie, and Moonraker is a sci-fi movie. The Spy Who Loved Me is arguably the perfect Bond movie, and after Moonraker took Bond to space, For Your Eyes Only went back to the series’ roots with a grounded revenge story.

Moore’s tenure ended with two universally panned (yet still pretty entertaining) installments: Octopussy and A View to a Kill. Moore was 57 when he finally retired from the role of Bond. Based on the slow-moving action scenes of his later adventures and the increasingly inappropriate age gaps between the actor and his female co-stars, some critics felt that he should’ve given it up a few movies earlier.

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