This James Bond Star’s Other Spy Thriller Is Taking Over Streaming

Published Oct 3, 2026, 7:54 AM EDT

In 1995, Pierce Brosnan stepped into the tuxedo of James Bond in GoldenEye, a blockbuster hit that revamped 007 as he headed toward the 21^st Century. Despite cultivating a long and varied career after hanging up his Walther PPK in 2002, it’s a role that has defined Brosnan in many ways, and something that every subsequent performance has been compared to. Some actors would push against that, but 12 years on from leaving the franchise, Brosnan confronted it head-on in 2014 action thriller The November Man, a movie that understood how you saw its star, and subverted it. And audiences are responding — it has been among Paramount+'s most-streamed films for several weeks.

‘The November Man’ Sees a Former James Bond Protect a Former Bond Girl

Brosnan plays Peter Devereaux, a legendary former CIA assassin nicknamed "The November Man," because “after you pass through, nothing lives.” He is brought out of retirement to rescue someone from his past, who has information linked to the war crimes of a Russian presidential candidate. When the mission goes awry, he must protect a valuable witness, Alice (Olga Kurylenko), who is the key to untangling a web of conspiracies. To do that, he has to outsmart his protégé, David Mason (Luke Bracey), who has become more ruthless than Devereaux ever intended.

The tense action thriller sees Brosnan reunite with director Roger Donaldson, whom he worked with on the 1997 disaster movie Dante’s Peak. There is also a connection with his co-star, Kurylenko, as the pair are both part of the James Bond franchise. The Ukrainian star rose to prominence by playing Camille Montes in Quantum of Solace (2008), the second Daniel Craig Bond movie. On the surface, this may seem like an attempt to cash in on old roles, but it’s the differences, rather than the similarities between Devereaux and Bond that make the character interesting.

Pierce Brosnan Plays a More Vulnerable Take on a Secret Agent

Image via Relativity Media

Brosnan’s take on James Bond came somewhere between the two most iconic actors to play the role. There was a hint of Roger Moore’s playfulness in the way that he infused knowing humor into his performances, but he could also show the grit of Sean Connery in the many action scenes he delivered. What was consistent in his performance, however, was that Bond was unflappable. Nothing could shake him, or lead him to make a mistake. With Devereaux, however, the weight of a life of bloodshed informed who he was.

Brosnan portrays him as a man filled with regret, someone who lived by a code and walked away when he saw Mason break it. In one nail-biting moment, he holds someone close to Mason at gunpoint, in an apparent act of brutality revealed to be a lesson. “You can be a human, or a killer of humans, but not both,” he tells his former student. “Eventually one of those people will extinguish the other one.” Devereaux is a man who has done terrible things trying to reclaim his humanity, and displays a weariness that 007 could never afford to reveal.

‘The November Man’ Shows There was More to Brosnan Than Bond

While he will always be known as a former 007, the Bond franchise only accounts for seven years in a four-decade career. Some of those roles have been far from the suave persona he is known for, such as the musical love interest of Meryl Streep in Mamma Mia!, Black Adam’s Doctor Fate, or TV hit MobLand’s ruthless gangster Conrad Harrigan. For more than 20 years, he has shown a versatility beyond his most famous role, but in The November Man, he had the chance to confront it, and subvert expectations.

While a sequel would ultimately be shelved, The November Man proved Pierce Brosnan could go back into the spy movie space without imitating what came before. Brittle, brutal, and battle-tested, Peter Devereaux turned what might have been an average espionage thriller into a meditation on how every Bond actor grapples with their legacy, even years after their final mission.

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  Pierce Brosnan

  Peter H. Devereaux

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  David Mason

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  Alice Fournier