LOS ANGELES, United States (AFP) — Steven Knight, the creator of gritty TV crime series Peaky Blinders , will write the highly anticipated next James Bond movie, studio Amazon MGM announced Thursday.

Knight will work alongside previously announced director Denis Villeneuve (Dune) to bring the world’s most famous fictional spy back to the big screen after a prolonged absence.

Amazon MGM Studios acquired creative control of the 007 movies in February, and has moved quickly to get one of Hollywood’s most valuable franchises back into production.

There has been no new Bond film since 2021’s No Time To Die.

Knight is best known as the mind behind violent British gangster series Peaky Blinders, which was set in industrial England at the turn of the 20th century and became a global hit.

Running for six seasons, and with a Netflix film version currently in the works, Peaky Blinders turbo-charged the careers of leading man Cillian Murphy, alongside a stellar supporting cast including Tom Hardy, Anya Taylor-Joy, and Kingsley Ben-Adir.

In addition to Peaky Blinders, Knight also co-created the wildly popular television quiz show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire and has penned four novels.

The Birmingham, England-based screenwriter, producer and director’s other TV credits include Taboo, See, This Town, and All the Light We Cannot See.

The Bond films, based on Ian Fleming’s novels, have earned more than US$7 billion collectively at the global box office since debuting in 1962.

No release date or title has yet been set for the film franchise’s 26th installment. And, despite frenzied speculation among fans, there has been no announcement on which actor will replace Daniel Craig as the suave British super spy.

Among the actors most discussed to be the next Bond are Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Tom Holland, Harris Dickinson, Jacob Elordi, and Ben-Adir, but Amazon MGM has so far refused to disclose the franchise’s most closely guarded secret.