Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning (Movie Review)

It's been nearly three decades since Tom Cruise first donned the mask of IMF agent, Ethan Hunt. And if, for some reason, you'd forgotten about most of his past exploits, you can rest assured that Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning would remind you of them at every given opportunity. It is not only the eighth entry in the long-running series, but the conclusion to the two-part story arc introduced in Dead Reckoning - Part One. But is the film the culmination of the entire franchise as it was marketed, or is it merely leaning on nostalgia to help sell some tickets? 

Set after the events of Dead Reckoning, the movie has Ethan (Tom Cruise) and the rest of his band of IMF agents once again on the trail of the rogue AI known as the Entity. Ever since their failure to contain it in the last film, the world has fallen into chaos and is on the verge of full-scale nuclear war. In order to stop this, they must seek the help of friend and foe alike. But with the odds stacked against them like never before, they will have to live up to the name of their unit as they struggle to complete their most impossible mission yet.

When it was first revealed that the seventh Mission: Impossible movie was the first of two parts, many were undoubtedly skeptical about having to wait an additional year or two before they would get the complete story. And following the muted box office reception of the first of those two parts, the fate of that second one seemed all but sealed. But if there's any actor who has earned enough goodwill to forgive an occasional underperformer, then it is certainly Tom Cruise.

And so the second part had gone ahead as planned, with only a minor changing of its title to The Final Reckoning being the clear concession to that original vision. This was no doubt done to make the movie pass itself off as a standalone feature. But don't be fooled into thinking that knowledge of the previous film isn't required to make sense of this one. I'd even go a step further and say that basic knowledge of all the movies in the franchise is a requirement. 

Thankfully, the filmmakers themselves seemed to know this, which is why they'd included numerous flashbacks to help give context to what was happening and how it related to what came before. This was particularly necessary because of how intricately connected the various plot threads and characters were, weaving a complex web of a story that stretched all the way back to the 1996 original. But for all of its complexities and various twists and turns, I was still able to follow along without too much hassle, and I imagine most others would as well.

One downside of that complex plot is how exposition-heavy it made the dialogue. So expect to hear more than a few characters launch into paragraphs worth of background information. The story itself is also what I would consider far-fetched and over-the-top, especially how we are meant to believe that entire nations could be so easily played like pawns by AI. Yes, I realize the irony of that statement considering how social media algorithms currently shape the beliefs and values of people in societies today, but seeing it on this scale, as depicted in this movie, just felt too far from reality in my opinion.

But aside from a story filled with twists and turns, the things these Mission: Impossible movies are perhaps best known for are the various action setpieces. And I think that The Final Reckoning delivers some of the more creative ones seen in the franchise thus far. The knowledge that Tom Cruise usually performs as much of these stunt sequences as is physically possible only adds to the thrill. So I found myself holding my breath while watching him dangling precariously from the flimsy frame of a biplane.

The one stunt that held me on the edge of my seat the longest, though, was a prolonged setpiece set in the bowels of a sunken submarine. Everything from the way the scene was lit, to the shifting orientations, to the ratcheting stakes as everything that could go wrong did, just had me in awe, as I wondered what was accomplished practically and what was done using CG. The sequence is certainly up there with the HALO jump from Fallout as one of the most awe-inspiring scenes in the franchise, and is another benchmark for action setpieces in general.

Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning is a thrilling conclusion to Dead Reckoning - Part One that also works as a potential coda to the Tom Cruise era of the franchise. It is hard to say what the future holds for the IP but I imagine a lot of that hinges on how well this current movie does at the box office. And while there is no denying that the movie lays it thick with the member berries, with frequent flashbacks and callbacks to previous movies, it at least does so with the requisite amount of care and respect for those older films.