We have been expecting you, Mr Fukunaga.

The name may not quite trip off the tongue, not yet anyway.

However, 007 fans the world over will have to get used to the fact that Cary Joji Fukunaga, a Japanese American, is to direct the 25th Bond franchise following Danny Boyle’s decision to step down last month because of “creative differences” with producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli and, perhaps most significantly, with Daniel Craig, who is making his fifth and possibly final appearance as James Bond.

Cary Joji Fukunaga

So who is Cary Joji Fukunaga and can he pull it off?

After 24 Bonds, there was speculation that the franchise, still hugely lucrative, might experiment with a black or even a female Bond. All that will be for another day. It has been reported that Boyle’s disagreement was primarily with Daniel Craig – the film’s star, as well as an executive producer – over the casting of Cold War actor Tomasz Kot as the film’s lead villain.

Thursday’s announcement on the official James Bond Twitter handle was unexpected because there had been no prior speculation about Fukunaga’s name: “Michael G. Wilson, Barbara Broccoli and Daniel Craig announced today that #Bond25 will begin filming at Pinewood Studios on 4 March 2019 under the helm of director, Cary Joji Fukunaga with a worldwide release date of 14 February 2020.”

The statement added: “We are delighted to be working with Cary. His versatility and innovation make him an excellent choice for our next James Bond adventure.”

According to Variety, Fukunaga won acclaim for the 2015 war film, Beasts of No Nation. He also directed Jane Eyre and multiple episodes of True Detective and Maniac on TV, but was not on many – or any – Bond watchers’ radar as Boyle’s replacement.

“Speculation had centred on Bart Layton, director of American Animals; S J Clarkson, who has been chosen to direct the next instalment in the Star Trek franchise; and Yann Demange, the helmer of new release White Boy Rick. Demange had been considered a strong contender during the first round before the job went, temporarily, to Boyle, and again during the new search.

“Production company Eon had little time to pick a new director after Boyle’s August 21 departure to keep the project on schedule. As it is, the new release date of Valentine’s Day 2020 is three months later than the original date of November 8, 2019. Boyle had been set both to direct and to pen the script along with his Trainspotting co-writer, John Hodge, but both men have left the project.”

Fukunaga’s CV says that he was born in Alameda, California, on July 10, 1977. His father, Anthony Shuzo Fukunaga, was a third-generation Japanese-American, born in a Japanese internment camp during World War II. His mother, Gretchen May (Grufman), is Swedish-American, and worked as a dental hygienist, and later as a college history instructor and university assistant professor of history, from whom Cary got his original interest in history. His parents divorced and subsequently remarried.

Fukunaga originally wanted to be a pro snowboarder, but switched to filmmaking in his mid-twenties. He got his start as a camera intern and later applied to film school. He graduated from the University of California, Santa Cruz with a Bachelor of Arts in history in 1999, and attended Institut d'études politiques (IEP) de Grenoble. He enrolled in New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts Graduate Film Programme.

The Telegraph consulted Ajay Chowdhury, co-author of a book on the Bond films and spokesman for the James Bond International Fan Club, who pointed out: “In a surprise announcement, for the first time in history, Albert R Broccoli’s Eon Productions has hired an American, Cary Joji Fukunaga to direct to the 007 film.”

But Chowdhury, who has a scholarly knowledge of Bond filmmaking, said: “With a powerfully artistic track record in independent cinema (Sin Nombre, 2009 and Beasts of No Nation, 2015) and high quality television (2014’s groundbreaking True Detective), the 41-year-old Californian has also shown himself capable of handling British subject matter with his 2011 adaptation of Jane Eyre.”

He went on: “Originally set to go before the cameras in December 2018 for an October 2019 release, Fukunaga will work with 7-time Bond scribes Neal Purvis and Robert Wade to prepare Bond 25 for a February 2020 release. Prior to his hiring, previous director Danny Boyle had collaborated with writer John Hodge on a unique idea. One can only speculate on what the new iteration of Bond will be about.

“The director may at first seem like a left field choice but it is in keeping with the art house, independent sensibility of previously rumoured directors, Yann Demange, Bart Layton, S J Clarkson. Indeed many previous Bond directors had no background in high-budget franchise action cinema, including the departed Danny Boyle, Sam Mendes, Marc Forster, Lee Tamahori.

“Famously, British director Lewis Gilbert, when asked to helm the fifth Bond, You Only Live Twice in 1966, who had only previously done war movies and Michael Caine’s Alfie, initially demurred commenting, ‘It’d be like Elizabeth Taylor’s fifth husband: ‘I’d know what to do but I wouldn’t know how to make it different.’

“For Fukunaga, as for Gilbert then, the answer is simple: the world’s largest audience is waiting with baited breath to see the latest incarnation of the remarkable saga of the James Bond franchise. Fans worldwide need their global fix and all things being equal, in February 2014, Cary Joji Fukunaga and the veteran producing team at Eon Productions will ensure that James Bond will return.”