A Mission: Impossible Film Franchise Retrospective

Watching Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One recently and I felt like there were references I was missing. I knew I had seen the previous films, but only once each and years, if not decades, ago. So here’s my takeaways from rewatching the entire series.

Mission: Impossible

I was struck by how different this movie was from what the franchise would become. It’s not an action movie. Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) does not throw a punch and does not fire a gun in the entire movie. There are several scenes of him reading a Bible. This is a thriller, the genre director Brian De Palma is known for.

In the most iconic scene Hunt must carefully rappel into a CIA secure room without setting off the pressure sensors in the floor, the temperature sensors or the noise sensors. These sensors are supposed to be unbeatable but if you actually tried to use them they would constantly be giving you false alarms -- indeed the movie even shows a false alarm being set off by a drop of condensation. Hunt tricks the sensors anyway; Langley would have probably been better off just getting a $13 motion sensor from Home Depot.

Hunt’s team is all killed on their first mission, so he gets a new team, who are also all killed, with the exception of Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames) who gains a final girl status, and is able to go from sequel to sequel unscathed.

MacGuffin: The CIA NOC (Non-official cover) list

Mission: Impossible II

I had remembered this one as being action packed, so I was surprised when the first hour passed and there was even less action than in the first film. Then at over an hour and 15 minutes into the film, Hunt finally fires a gun. From there on the violence becomes frantic and non-stop, as if trying to make up for the last film and a half. Director John Woo is legendary for his action scenes featuring heroes with two guns and flocks of doves. Yet the fights start to drag on. Part of this is the action simply not aging well, the rapid cuts are noticeable. Contemporary directors looking to impress savvy viewers will do an action scene in one continuous take. Also Hunt’s character has to change for the needs of the film, previously he was easily knocked to the ground, now he can take an extended beating.

For me though, the most interesting part of the viewing experience was when my wife, who was more focused on her phone, asked me to explain the plot.

Me: A pharmaceutical company made a virus to release into the world so they could also sell the cure.

Wife: So like COVID?

Me: Hold up. Are you saying the COVID-19 pandemic was inspired by the movie Mission: Impossible II?

Wife: …No.

MacGuffin: The Chimera virus and the cure, Bellerophon

Mission: Impossible III

This film seemed aware of the previous movie’s pacing issues and aimed to have the action beats more evenly spread. Unfortunately the story begins with Ethan’s engagement party. In order to start off with a bang, the film jumps ahead chronologically to the villain threatening Hunt’s now wife Julia (Michelle Monaghan). This scene then hangs over the rest of the film, which is told sequentially.

Philip Seymour Hoffman is not an obvious choice as villain, as the franchise has generally favored men who look more physically menacing. Yet the way the final showdown is set up leads to a much more griping fight than the one in M:I 2.

There is also an unnecessary part where a US government official talks about plans to launch a preemptive war in the Middle East, which seems like a pretty tardy prediction in 2006.

MacGuffin: The Rabbit's Foot. (never explained, implied to be a biological weapon)

Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol

Most film franchises find themselves in a rut by the fourth installment, Mission: Impossible is only finding its groove.

When James Bond got married in On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) his wife was subsequently killed by the end of the film. When Bond was ready to quit the spy game to settle down with Vesper Lynd in Casino Royale (2006) she met a similar fate. Both these women would get passing references in later films but ultimately had to go as they got in the way of Bond’s trademark womanizing. While Ethan Hunt was never the Lothario that Bond is, Hunt did sleep with coworkers in M:I 1 & 2. In M:I 3 he gets married, but at the start of M:I 4 it’s announced that she has left him, which is then revised to she was killed, before settling on her being alive and married but effectively separated for her safety. From here out the characters will be celibate. Sexuality will be restricted to women wearing cocktail dresses with low necklines and high slits.

Ethan has another character change. At the start of the franchise he is cocky and finds joy in the impossible nature of his tasks. He still takes on the tasks, but now first expresses horror at the suicidal requests his team makes. This adds humor and makes him more relatable.

This is also the start of planning beyond just the one move, the film ends with the team getting orders for their next mission.

MacGuffin: Nuclear launch codes

Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation

M:I 4 ends with Ethan Hunt inviting Agents Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg), William Brandt (Jeremy Renner) and Jane Carter (Paula Patton) on the next mission. In M:I 5 Benji and William are there but Jane is gone without mention. It kind of feels like only one female agent is allowed at a time.

Well I won’t complain too much because her replacement is Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson) a British agent who is of questionable loyalties and prone to fan service. The brawls in the series become increasingly fantastical as it goes on, but Ilsa’s fighting style is particularly outlandish. She likes to climb on top of her opponent’s shoulders before striking them.

The heists also become more outlandish in this outing. Hunt has to break into an underwater computer to insert a fake security profile. Never mind the break in, how would this computer function on a regular basis? Don’t you usually want to keep computers and water separate? How is it normally accessed? There seems to be no clear way for a computer engineer to enter the thing without death defying stunts. And all this is before they kidnap the British Prime Minister.

MacGuffin: 2.4 Billion dollars.

Mission: Impossible – Fallout

As the series has progressed it has gone from largely stand alone films to an increasingly integrated cinematic universe. In Fallout we have our first returning villain, the very organized anarchist Solomon Lane (Sean Harris) and returning Secretary (Leader) of the Impossible Mission Force, Alan Hunley (Alex Baldwin).

Ilsa Faust is also back with her dubious alliances and extraneous fight moves, though the bikinis have been replaced with sensible pants suits. Hunt's now ex-wife Julia is also back, forming a kind of love triangle.

They dial it back a notch on heists, only needing to steal a wristband at a party which they parachute into for some reason.

MacGuffin: three plutonium cores.

Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One

In a way, you can’t give a complete review of this movie, because the story isn’t finished. Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning comes out in 2025.

This one is packed with returning characters. Ilsa Faust somehow makes a return even as a new lady agent, Grace (Hayley Atwell) is set up. Annnnd then Ilsa is killed off. Though I suppose I have to give the M:I franchise credit for not replacing Ferguson with a younger actor -- Atwell is actually a bit older.

Also returning is Henry Czerny as Secretary Eugene Kittridge, which is kind of weird since he was in M:I 1, and then absent for nearly three decades before returning for this movie. Multiple other men have been the Secretary, where has he been? I also think it’s funny that Kittridge has to spend time explaining the Impossible Mission Force, because the idea of secret agent getting the option to accept a mission or not is dumb, but trying to explain it just draws attention to its dumbness.

The plot revolves around the possession of a key that will give the user control of an omnipotent AI known as the Entity. Never mind that the film opens with the Entity murdering the current holders of the key. Regardless, the plot is secondary to the over the top action sequences.

MacGuffin: A two-piece cruciform key.

Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning

Trailers for M:I 8 indicate dangerously high levels of nostalgia and self reference. Also this is not the first time a trailer has claimed this movie will be the accumulation of everything that as come before.