My thoughts: I really enjoyed it and I think this one will age well. I still like Fallout and Rogue Nation more, and maybe the plot of Dead Reckoning, but the action scenes in this movie are absolutely unreal.

That said, it was far from perfect. It's certainly not as tight as the other installments. I didn't like how much they seemed to try and cram old, 'lore' if you will, into this movie. Especially bringing back the Rabbits Foot. It kind of took me out of the movie trying to remember the plot of that film.

What I liked:

• Action scenes were top notch. No clue how they do some of this stuff but the final act over South Africa was both gorgeous and breathtaking. While watching, and knowing that was Tom Cruise on the plane, I genuinely cannot understand how they pull some of this stuff off. Literally heard people sighing in relief when it was revealed he survived.
• The submarine scene had the whole theatre stressing, in a good way. Really really cool set piece.
• The US Navy sub commander stole ever scene he was in.
• Great chemistry amongst some of the newer members, Paris especially.
• That shot when Ethan lands on the sub and the flares he fired a few moments prior fall behind him and illuminate the structure was beautiful.
• I love the character, but Luther dying really added a nice ending with the message he left Ethan.
• Props to whoever framed the CPR scene with Haley Atwell and Tom Cruise. You know what I'm talking about.

The bad:

• Almost felt campy with the callbacks to old films. It felt like because of that, they explained the plot almost too much, which, to me, made it seem like they overcomplicated things.
• Some of the dialogue in the government scenes were a bit corny. Nick Offerman was a honey baked ham.
• The Gabriel character wasn't a great villain IMO.
• The submarine was supposedly 500' on the ocean floor yet TC swam (almost) to the top without oxygen? I know you're supposed to stretch the imagination but that's completely unrealistic, even for this franchise.
• Wasn't the biggest fan of the whole Jim Phelps son reveal, but whatever.
• I have to assume TC is done, but I wish we'd have gotten some kind of hint as to where the team goes next.
• Missed Vanessa Kirby

Fancy Ketchup nailed it.

As will be stated repeatedly.....the sub and South Africa scenes were jawdropping.

Thought Benji had some great moments...especially in the vault.

Overall I really enjoyed it.

For me the lowlights were:
too many clips from old movies. Did not really need to "see" what they were talking about all of the time. A few would have been fine. Definitely bogged down the first hour. Unlike fancy Ketchup, I actually liked the callback to the rabbits foot.

Gabriel was an absolute clown when on screen (and I am a big Esai fan). He took WAY too much delight in teh final scenes of being chased. He was constantly flashing an insane maniacal grin and using some top notch dialog like " catch me if you can" followed by wild laughter. Hard pass on his villain.

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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Yeah swimming to the surface without a tank was the most ridiculous part for me, even for this franchise.

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remember - he can hold his breath for 5 minutes - shown in MI 5

also - he didn't make it to the top and 'died' for a bit

PatAg said:

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I enjoyed the movie, but it needed some paring down.

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Probably could have done away with some of the flashbacks to earlier MI movies. Not sure what else they could have cut. I knew it was long but didn't really notice as it moved pretty well, not much down time between sequences.

odd choice to reuse the whole "I only have time to stop one detonator" thing in the same movie too

Saw it again last night - loved it… It might've even been the second time

I wasn't so tense during a few scenes but could really pay attention to the dialog and plot plan - it made more sense the 2nd time

On another note, does anyone know why Ving Rhames isn't at any of these premiers? Is he really that sick? His role in 8 was SO GOOD!! - but he was on oxygen and had a nurse.. did I miss it that he was sick with cancer or something in the actual movie?

Saw it last night in IMAX and the action sequences were amazing.

The plot kinda wore me out, as did the self awareness the movie tried to have about how ridiculous their plans are all the time.

Definitely liked Fallout and DR more.

The Donahue bring back was awesome.

Movie was worth it for the plane sequence alone.

nosoupforyou said:

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Saw it again last night - loved it… It might've even been the second time

I wasn't so tense during a few scenes but could really pay attention to the dialog and plot plan - it made more sense the 2nd time

On another note, does anyone know why Ving Rhames isn't at any of these premiers? Is he really that sick? His role in 8 was SO GOOD!! - but he was on oxygen and had a nurse.. did I miss it that he was sick with cancer or something in the actual movie?

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They didn't specify this. I was wondering if that was intentional to kind of lessen the blow of his death for the audience. In a sense he was already on borrowed time so don't feel bad cause he went out the best way possible.

I loved it overall. It took a while to get going and yes they did a lot of work to link it to every other movie in the series. I loved Pom/Paris in the movie and adding Degas and Donloe to the team worked real well also.
The stunts were incredible, and I made a point not to watch too many of the videos they put out on how they did them so I wouldn't lose that sense of awe watching the first time. I won't avoid them now.


At the end in London, was that the same square where he made the phone call to Langley in the first movie?

What production issues did you spot?

Aggies76 said:

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What production issues did you spot?

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Nothing like boom mics visible on screen or anything, but I'd heard before how the McQuarrie MI films did a lot of writing the script on the fly, and I feel like that shows here. The first act especially. Ethan is in hiding, but here's a VHS recap, also now there's a cult, then have a 10-second reunion with Benji and Luther and then do a lazy infiltration, here's Grace, now we're caught, now we rescue Paris, etc. It was kinda jarring. Oh and interfacing with the AI in a big sarco****us?

Or even the second act - gotta get caught, talk to the president, go to a boat, to get to a sub, to get to the sub we actually want to get to. That's a lot of logistics, not a lot of action. Thankfully once Ethan's on the first sub, the dual fight sequence with him and the team vs the Russians was pretty strong.

It's weird how the things that I thought were pretty effective in Dead Reckoning - the AI taunting Benji to learn more about the team, and the intrigue surrounding Ethan's origin - were basically dropped here. Instead we got AI sarco****us, random callbacks and Gabriel twirling his mustache instead of explaining how he's connected to Ethan.

Just weird stuff. I don't remember 7 all that well but I didn't feel like they were two parts of the same story, aside from having the same villains.

How many of these have been made? I saw it tonight and I'm not sure I've seen more than the first couple. Ironically, I saw it tonight in the same theater I saw the first one in on May 22, 1996.

The whole "we operate in the shadows to protect the ones we love and the ones we'll never meet" thing was new for this one, right? Or did it come up in Dead Reckoning?

Final Reckoning is number 8 in the series.

Typical for movies these days.

rhutton125 said:

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5, 6, 1, 4, 3, 7, 8, 2 IMO

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My order exactly.

Some of the best MI movies developed the supporting cast well. Conversely, the worst ones were typically too TC centric or failed to do any development. Every scene in 8 with the President, cabinet, generals, etc. carried no weight with me outside of a grandiose ticking clock. I kept hoping someone would show up and gas them all again.

Bringing back Donloe was fantastic - in an Alaskan oupost as mentioned in the original, no less. "Mail him his clothes."

Vanessa Kirby stole the scene every time she was on the screen for me throughout the series. The similarities in manarisms between her and Vanessa Redgrave in the original MI are so good. I was disappointed she wasn't in 8.

Definately missed Rebecca Ferguson as well. I couldn't grasp why Ethan got so immediately attached Grace aka: the poor man's Cat Woman (although she definately knows how to give CPR). Needed quite a bit more development there.

These moments in IMAX 🤯 #MissionImpossible - The Final Reckoning #FilmedForIMAX pic.twitter.com/1zuISqc0H0

— IMAX (@IMAX) May 24, 2025

Can someone explain to me how the rabbit's foot factored in? Was it the hard drive on the sub?

At the end of 3, his wife shoots the guy and the rabbits foot falls out of the briefcase

And then the movie basically ended - so the good guys at the US government ended up with the rabbit's foot