 |
| Tom Cruise as ETHAN HUNT, Hayley Atwell as GRACE |
Since 1996, fans of the Mission Impossible franchise have been flocking to theaters to see if Ethan Hunt and a conveyor belt of accomplices would choose to accept a mission – knowing he (and, by default, they) would always say yes. Almost 30 years later, the supposed final chapter of this empire has arrived with Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning. Expectations run high for one last ride with Tom Cruise delivering ever-more-impressive gravity-defying stunts. When Nicole Kidman purrs, "We come to this place for magic, " I think of Cruise running across the top of a building or hanging from a rock face with one chiseled arm. But somehow, against all odds, the final reckoning almost flubs the ending. So what went wrong?
In The Final Reckoning, Ethan continues to match wits with the AI known as the Entity. The President wants Ethan to return to HQ and bring the two-part cruciform key that will allow the USA to exert some control over the Entity. Ethan refuses to turn the key over, believing this power is too much for anyone. Instead, he pursues Gabriel and searches for the Sevastopol, the submarine that sank at the beginning of Dead Reckoning. The cat-and-mouse game continues between Gabriel and Ethan with a ragtag group of assistants and detractors along the way. The conversations and plots involving world powers, nuclear warfare, and artificial intelligence create higher stakes and contemplations regarding the state of the world.
 |
| Ving Rhames as LUTHER |
At their best, the Mission Impossible films boast jaw-dropping stunts, fast-paced action, witty wisecracks, and clever heists. As befitting an adrenaline-pumping thriller, character development plays a backseat to these elements. Like the suave James Bond or the more guarded Jason Bourne, the screenplay may refer to vague details about an action heroe's backstory, but this never takes center stage. To do so requires a genre shift and normally a tonal shift. The genre might change to gritty crime fiction or psychological suspense. By necessity, the action slows down and the plot needs more weight. This is the shift the Reckoning films attempt in the last two chapters of the series. And while the star power and devotion of Tom Cruise to authenticity in stunt-making kept the train on the rails, it was a bumpy ride to the finish line.
After four films in the franchise came and went with different directors, the reins were handed over to Christopher McQuarrie to direct and write the last four films. Film six, subtitled Fallout, remains the uncontested high point of the series. Viewers went crazy for the powerhouse cast of Ving Rhames as Luther, Simon Pegg as Benji, Rebecca Ferguson as Ilsa, and Tom Cruise as Ethan working together as a team. Add in Sean Harris as the mercurial Solomon Lane, plus Henry Cavill and Vanessa Kirby as side characters with unclear motives, and you have the stuff of legends.
 |
| Tom Cruise as ETHAN |
With Fallout, Cruise and McQuarrie had assembled a dream team functioning as a chosen family that could have played out like a Fast and the Furious film, minus the family cookout. This team trusts each other and knows each other's weaknesses. The chemistry of these various cast members led to a stronger film. At some level, this required the speeches to be more grandiose and the mythos of the world to expand to keep up a rich tapestry of storytelling. But this is where things went wrong. It's fitting for a conclusion of an action franchise this epic to feature earth-shattering stakes and satisfying conclusion to any hanging threads, but that didn't mean fans wanted an Endgame experience with a web of connections between operations past and present.
For some reason, McQuarrie leans this direction with Dead Reckoning and Final Reckoning. The success of the MCU has inspired every franchise coming out on its tails to believe that filmgoers want a cinematic universe that ties every film and every plot point into each other. This sudden exploration of the entire journey of Ethan Hunt also required heavy exposition not normally included in action films. McQuarrie further decided that Ethan Hunt now deserved a tragic backstory worthy of a superhero or mythological figure. Ethan becomes a lone man against the world who now carries the weight of the world on his shoulders alone. The team does its own thing on the side and, unfortunately, we haven't had as much time to grow attached to any of these characters to care about them apart from Ethan, except for Benji.
 |
| Esai Morales as GABRIEL |
Two stunt set pieces shake things up and carry most of the reasons people will remember these films. One, Ethan forces his way onto the USS Ohio and meets Captain Jack Bledsoe (an always devilish Tramell Tillman) and crew, who help him deep-sea dive to the Sevastopol to retrieve the Entity's source code. Unlike the fast-paced action that Ethan usually delivers, the underwater dive requires slow-paced, methodical movements. This submarine has been undisturbed for over a decade, and each movement proves detrimental as the vessel floats untethered. The intensity was unbelievable.
Two, Ethan pursues a fleeing Gabriel by hijacking and hanging onto biplanes. Cruise makes sure you know he's on there for real with the wind blowing his hair into a mop top. Of course, Ethan isn't just pursuing Gabriel. He also needs to retrieve the podkova form Garbriel's clutches and insert a poison pill into the device in just the nick of time. These stunts save the day and the movie.
 |
| Hayley Atwell as GRACE |
With no time spent on character chemistry (except those doomed to die) or a team heist – both cornerstones of what viewers have grown to love about these films – Final Reckoning becomes like any action film, albeit one with stupendous stunts. Heavy exposition shows a distrust in the audience's ability to keep up. This imbalance, and a mistaken belief that you can easily swap in one brunette for another, leads to one of the less satisfying conclusions of a franchise I've seen in awhile. Without the stunts, The Final Reckoning would have drowned like a slowly sinking submarine.
Release info: May 23, 2025
Final score: 3 out of 5
Comments