Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning
Starring: Tom Cruise, Haley Atwell, Simon Pegg, Ving Rhames
Directed By: Christopher McQuarrie
As a Mission: Impossible enthusiast, I was naturally excited to see the latest installment of the series. Excited but a little hesitant. Final Reckoning was part 2 of 2023’s Dead Reckoning, a film that didn’t quite land for me compared to the brilliance of Mission: Impossible - Fallout. With all of the lead up and hype, could Final Reckoning return to that greatness?
Unfortunately no. It does not get to the levels that Rogue Nation or Fallout created in the glory days of the franchise. Some of that is due to the story and some is due to too much.
For a refresher: Ethan Hunt is trying to stop the Entity, an AI program, from taking over the world and starting a nuclear apocalypse. With the help of his team, Ethan must take on an impossible mission: get the source code that stops the entity and destroy it before it can wipe out all of humanity. Along the way, he encounters Gabriel, the entity’s henchman, and approximately 1,000 other roadblocks. But this is Ethan Hunt we’re talking about! Is that really going to stop him from trying to accomplish an impossible mission?
Here’s the problem with The Final Reckoning (which was the same problem with Dead Reckoning), Gabriel and the entity are not one fraction as intimidating as Phillip Seymour Hoffman in MI:3 or Sean Harris in Rogue Nation/Fallout. Where’s the terror? Where’s the intimidation? Where are the spine-chilling monologues? I need to feel the stakes of the situation. Yes, the idea of AI taking over the world is scary (especially considering how much influence it has today) but it doesn’t feel as intense as several of Ethan’s other missions. Gabriel acts like a mustache-twirling cartoon villain. Considering this is supposed to be the “Final” movie (we’ll see if that holds true), the villains need to be way more intense.
I feel that the movie is way too heavy in exposition. Characters explain their plans in excruciating detail over and over. We get it! This is a mission. The mission is seemingly impossible! Ethan Hunt is there. Let’s go! There is no reason for this movie to be almost 3 hours. Half of the sequences involving the military could be condensed. Their dialogue feels very poorly written and way too expositional.
Alright that’s enough complaining. What’s good about this movie? We all know that this franchise is known for its stunts. What’s a Mission: Impossible movie without a car chase, building jump, plane sequence, water scene, or a Tom Cruise run? Don’t worry, he runs many times here. The stunts in The Final Reckoning are great, I’ll give it that. There’s a submarine sequence that had me on the edge of my seat. It was far more scary than the entity, I’ll tell you that much. It’s a 20 minute sequence that veers into horror territory. There’s also a biplane sequence that is pretty amazing. Yes, we’ve seen Mission: Impossible do planes before but it’s still quite cool to see it all and imagine how on earth they filmed something so complex. None of it looks green screen. Maybe that was the entity tricking me. I plan to write the word entity in this review as many times as they said it in the movie. Which was about 30,000 times. So get ready.
This is the Tom Cruise show and always has been. Cruise continues to entertain as Hunt by running, diving, and flying around the world. It’s a little humorous how often everyone in the movie makes a comment stating that only Ethan Hunt can save the world from the destruction that the entity will cause. We get it, he’s the protagonist of the series. No need to lay it on too thick!
The ensemble cast is fine. It’s good to see Luther (Ving Rhames), Benji (Simon Pegg), and Angela Bassett return. I don’t think the team dynamic is as strong as it was in Rogue Nation/Fallout but that could just be me. Despite that, it’s very cool to see Donloe return in a role as a callback to the first Mission: Impossible. (He too finds a way to sing Ethan’s praises despite Ethan sort of ruining his social life.)
Listen, I’m being picky because I am a fan of this franchise. In the grand scheme of things, The Final Reckoning is an entertaining summer blockbuster. Due to lackluster villains and too many plot lines, it does not soar to the heights of Fallout and Rogue Nation but let me tell you that Ethan Hunt is the only man in the galaxy who could take on this mission. The entity did not tell me to say that either.
My Rating: 6/10