It\u2019s sort of amusing, not only that they\u2019re making a full-on direct continuation of the previous movie, but that it\u2019s one so loaded to the brim with shout-outs to everything that\u2019s come before. As the lights went down, I wondered how they\u2019d handle the cliffhangers of Dead Reckoning<\/em>; would they fully embrace its origins as a TV series, and kick things off with a \u201cPreviously on Mission: Impossible<\/em>\u201d sorta situation? The answer is, well, kinda; we hear echoing, overlapping dialogue snatches from the previous picture, and then clips from the earlier films, all of them, as we hear a message from Angela Bassett (reprising her role from Fallout<\/em>, and promoted from CIA director to president) thanks him for his 35 years of service. \u201cYou have always been the best of men in the worst of times,\u201d she says. \u201cI need you to be that man now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Copious connections to the earlier (even pre-Christopher McQuarrie) entries are spread throughout The Final Reckoning \u2014 <\/em>a clever explanation of III<\/em>\u2019s Maguffin, a fine return for a bit player from the first film<\/a>, a familial connection that feels like one too many trips to the well \u2014 which is quite a turn from the franchise\u2019s initial M.O. of handing each entry to a new auteur, who would make it their own style with little regard for the overall series. (After all, only Cruise and Ving Rhames have appeared in every entry.) That started to shift around the fourth film; in this one, there are so many references to, and snippets from, the earlier outings that it almost play like a clip episode of Friends<\/em> or something.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Anyway, the plot. Dead Reckoning<\/em>, as you may recall, was a movie somewhat ahead of the curve in its villain, who is not an evil mastermind but The Entity, a dangerous force of Artificial Intelligence, infecting cyberspace and filling it with misinformation and hallucinations. (Imagine that.) When we last left our heroes, they had acquired both halves of the \u201ckey\u201d that unlocked the Entity\u2019s source code. Now, Ethan Hunt (Cruise) and his team must retrieve that source code from the Russian submarine that sank in the previous film\u2019s opening sequence, pair it with a \u201cpoison pill\u201d designed by hacker mastermind Luther (Rhames), and trap it within \u201cThe Doomsday Vault\u201d in South Africa, a self-contained and air-gapped computer archive of the world\u2019s essential information.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As usual, the plot is both needlessly convoluted and utterly unnecessary, existing as it does primarily as a clothesline upon which writer\/director McQuarrie hangs action sequences<\/a> and (to a lesser extent) personal relationships. At this point, one of the best things about the series is the warmth and camaraderie between Cruise\u2019s Ethan, Rhames\u2019s Luther, and Simon Pegg\u2019s Benji (Luther greets Ethan by drawling, \u201cIt\u2019s always good to see you on the right side of the grass\u201d), and our knowledge of the characters, even newer ones, turns the film\u2019s sole mask pull sequence (they always<\/em> get me with those, somehow) into a crackerjack piece of character comedy, less about the kicks and punches than the wordless exchanges of explanation and compromise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But the funniest moment comes from Hayley Atwell (who remains a valuable addition to the cast, adding a welcome sense of play and mischief), when McQuarrie lets the climax of an especially grisly fight play out off-camera, left for us to interpret solely from the vivid sound effects and Atwell\u2019s facial reactions. It\u2019s a great bit of physical comedy. (A submarine sequence adds two more welcome faces to the cast: Love Lies Bleeding<\/em> breakout Katy O\u2019Brian and Severance<\/em>\u2019s Tramell Tillman, who has a delightful way of putting a conspiratorial purr into his dialogue.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, the world is on the verge of full-on apocalypse; The Entity has taken control of several nuclear arsenals, and we have only 72 hours until all the world\u2019s nukes are under its control – including ours. (The ticking clock is literal \u2014 a big countdown to doomsday on the wall of the gigantic government command center.) Propulsion is necessary, as McQuarrie and co-writer Erik Jendresen indulge in even more (a bit too much) of their ornate Dead Reckoning<\/em> exposition. That said, McQuarrie indulges in some entertainingly intricate intercutting, sending Hunt on his way while interspersing the explanation for what he\u2019s doing, slicing it in during the mission instead of before. Their various plans, of course, involve the kind of impossible odds and hyper-precise timing that all of the series\u2019 great sequences depend on \u2014 that, and the shrugging all-purpose strategy of \u201cWe\u2019ll figure it out!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n As mentioned, The Final Reckoning<\/em> takes too damn long to get where it\u2019s going, and is a bit too self-satisfied when it gets there, though there\u2019s an exquisite and moving final patch of dialogue from the last person you\u2019d expect to deliver it, and Cruise does some genuinely fine, non-verbal acting as he\u2019s listening to the final voice-over, a message that will, of course, self-destruct when it concludes. That last bit of narration feels deeply, immediately political, in a way the series has always shied away from before \u2014 it\u2019s not cringe, and it\u2019s not direct, but it certainly seems to speak to this moment, and where we are at, as human beings, right now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It feels, in other words, like an ending, a real<\/em> ending, the series coming to a conclusion; the entire picture has that same sense of finality. And that might be for the best. Even its highlight sequences directly echo other, and frankly better ones, in the series (Hunt\u2019s sub swim recalls the chip exchange in Rogue Nation<\/em>; ditto the biplane chase to the helicopter chase that ended Fallout<\/a><\/em>). Who knows if Cruise\u2019s ego will even allow him to hang it up, at this point\u2014remember how Jeremy Renner\u2019s appearance in Ghost Protocol<\/em> was supposed to tee up his takeover as the central character? But if that\u2019s the case, well, I\u2019d like to point out that Pom Klementieff returns for The Final Reckoning<\/em>, and is, again, absolutely electrifying. Just spitballing. I\u2019m sure they\u2019ll figure it out.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning” is in theaters this weekend.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/MI-2-1024x576.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n