Mission Impossible: Final Reckoning – The BRWC Review.

A franchise now spanning four decades, Mission Impossible: Final Reckoning promises one last mission for Ethan Hunt and his band of covert agents. The journey began with Brain De Palma in the original spy thriller installment Mission Impossible. The franchise found new life with J.J. Abrams and Brad Bird before Christopher McQuirre turned the series into a masterclass in action filmmaking. Centered around Tom Cruise’s Hunt, Cruise, and McQuarrie have spent the latter half of the franchise creating stunts that rival and even surpass Buster Keaton, Michelle Yeoh, and the great Jackie Chan. But despite Ethan’s found family, incredible stunts, and an iconic theme song, can Cruise and McQuirre stick the landing? Will this be the finale of Hollywood’s adventures with Ethan Hunt and the IMF?

Final Reckoning picks up quickly after the events of Dead Reckoning, getting the audience up to speed on the rogue AI known as “The Entity.” Threatening to end all life on the planet and itself as a God, “The Entity” poses the biggest threat to Ethan Hunt yet. The world is closer to nuclear fallout than ever, and once again, Ethan Hunt and his team must do the impossible. Whether it’s free diving in the Arctic to find a nuclear sub, fighting nameless bad guys, or performing acrobatics on the wings of a plane, Final Reckoning is a vehicle for the superb stunt work of Cruise and his team.

McGuffins are plentiful in Final Reckoning. Ethan Hunt always has a new code, key, or disk to find, break, or steal. Yet, these McGuffins are a classic of the spy genre and allow the ensemble of Mission Impossible as a franchise to shine. Final Reckoning begins with a unified team of Ethan, Benji (Simon Pegg), Grace (Hayley Atwell), Luther (Ving Rhames), and Paris (Pom Klementieff) facing off against Gabriel (Esai Morales), all attempting to capture “The Entity.” When Ethan comes face-to-face with the superintelligence of deity-like AI, the IMF must race across the globe to stop Gabriel and the world’s end.

Performances in Final Reckoning play to everyone’s strengths. Cruise’s stunt work and physicality are as impressive as ever as the installment seems to ramp up each previous stunt under McQuarrie. Hanging on the side of an aircraft in Rogue Nation has turned to fighting on the wings of a small plane in Final Reckoning. Cruise puts everything into the role, continuing to better even himself, save for the base jump off a motorcycle in the previous film. Pegg remains quippy, and the lovable Benji, Atwell is electric as the charming pickpocket Grace and Vic Rhames brings gravitas as always, evening giving the film its emotional core. While Gabriel continues as a very one-note villain, Esai Morales still brings charisma to the role, and Pom Klementieff brings just a little anti-hero energy to the action.

More so than previous installments, Dead Reckoning feels like a fandom film farewell. Easter eggs to prior installments line the story and more than a few familiar faces rejoin for a seeming sendoff to Ethan Hunt. Yet, despite the heavy reunions and callbacks, the ensemble heists are absent from the narrative’s first half, sending Ethan to the depths of the Arctic and the team off to find a spy outpost. When reunited, the cast resumes their effortless chemistry, but without the sleek gadgets of prior films (unfortunately, little latex mask pulling, exploding gum, or suction glove wall-scaling). Still without the gadgets and gizmos, Cruise and McQuarrie keep the tension mounting as long-time favorite characters jeopardize their lives for “the ones we’ll never meet.”

Sitting in the shadow of the black vault heist in Mission Impossible, scaling skyscrapers in Ghost Protocol, Henry Cavil reloading his fist mid-fight in Fallout, and the epic motorcycle jump in Dead Reckoning is daunting. But once more, Cruise and McQuarrie prove that they and the IMF are up to the task. Final Reckoning leans into legacy in all the right places while remaining innovative in the genre of action-filmmaking. The final does not quite hit the emotional resonance of James Bond’s farewell in No Time to Die, but after Final Reckoning, who’s to say this is the end for IMF? Would anyone be shocked to see a film set in the same universe labeled “A Mission Impossible Story”? John Wick has spin-offs, and Fast and the Furious has its share. Who knows, maybe Final Reckoning isn’t the end, there is always a mission; it may just be up to a new team to “choose to accept it.”

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