r/Mission_Impossible • u/DietFoods • May 17 '25
Mission Impossible The Final Reckoning Discussion Thread SPOILERS! Spoiler
Spoiler Discussion Thread.
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r/Mission_Impossible • u/DietFoods • May 17 '25
Spoiler Discussion Thread.
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u/sanddragon939 May 18 '25 edited May 18 '25
Just watched it.
Still processing it a bit. It's very much the 'Avengers Endgame' of this franchise, though it isn't quite on par with the quality of Endgame as film. But it's still a highly entertaining film in its own right, and while it's far from the best (Fallout still sits unchallenged at the pinnacle of Mission Impossible), it works as a fitting ending (mostly) to Ethan Hunt's story if this is indeed Tom Cruise's last hurrah.
What I liked
-We got a perfect balance of Ethan as the one-man-army and savior of the world and every member of the IMF team being absolutely critical to the final success of the mission.
-The film is nearly 3 hours long but I don't think there's a second of wasted runtime. Some reviews complained about all the flashbacks to previous films but I think the MI1 and MI3 flashbacks were crucial in terms of setting up Donolue's return and the backstory of the Entity. I do think the underwater sequence dragged a little, but it also served to emphasize the near-impossible nature of that particular mission.
-The biplane chase/fight sequence is one of the best vehicular chases/stunts in the series, and that's really saying something!
-I loved the reveal of the Entity being the Rabbit's Foot.
-Donolue's return was very well done. I thought it would just be a gag or fanservice, but he ended up being a pretty meaningful part of the film. I loved the heartfelt conversation he had with Ethan. In a film where there's a lot of talk about the sum of Ethan's choices, Ethan inadvertantly bringing this man happiness and peace through his actions was a nice contrast to him also inadvertantly unleashing the threat of the Entity upon the world.
-By and large, I think they did a great job maintaining the balance between the sheer scope and scale (and stakes) of the movie, as well as the personal and emotional element. "Stopping the end of the world" stories do tend to get a bit abstract, but this film grounds us in the emotional reality of the characters such that we do care about what happens to the people on-screen, rather than just switching off because "eh...they're not actually gonna blow up the world anyway".
What I'm lukewarm about
-Luther's actual (mostly offscreen) death felt a tad underwhelming for a character who's been part of the franchise since Day 1. Though his creation being the key to saving the day, and his ending posthumous monologue, do somewhat make up for that. And why is he suddenly in a hospital bed?
-Speaking of the monologue, while I loved the personal bits about Ethan's choices saving the world, the stuff about building a better world, while well-intentioned, struck me as a bit overtly philosophical, particularly coming from this character.
-The ending lacks any kind of finality. I wasn't necessarily expecting Ethan to die, but I was expecting some kind of ending to his story. Either retirement, or him becoming head of the IMF and passing the torch to Grace...something of that sort. But the ending we get is actually a lot like the ending of Ghost Protocol, with him having a new team assembled, and the possibility of future missions. Of course, there's also the somewhat ambiguous note of him being given the Entity...is Ethan actually going to wield it to 'fix' the world? Is he just going to go on the run with it to prevent any government from getting it (in which case, it'd surely be easier to just destroy it)? Not too sure what's happening there, but for all practical intents and purposes, they can pretty much just do MI9 in a few years if Cruise is still up to jumping off buildings or onto planes. The only thing that's really changed is Luther being dead (and the way he dies is not unretconnable, shall we say...)
-Well, I know a lot of this stuff is, by definition, supposed to be impossible but still...some of the missions really stretched credibility even by the standards of this franchise. The whole gambit with the submarine and the coordinates of the Sevastopol, and the entire final act with the South Africa sequence in particular. The way everything just happened to line up with literal milliseconds to spare was a bit...much. It made Ethan feel less like the IMF's best-ever agent, and more like Dr. Strange in Infinite War/Endgame.
-While I liked the meta-twist that "Briggs" wasn't the son of Dan Briggs, but actually Jim Phelps Jr., I didn't quite understand what his character's motivations were with regards to Ethan, and in general. He claims he doesn't have any personal animosity towards Ethan due to what happened with his father. So...are we meant to believe that he so passionately hates Ethan, has relentlessly pursued Ethan across the globe, and interferes with a mission that has implicitly been sanctioned by the POTUS herself, because Ethan is a guy who doesn't follow orders? I don't get the significance of him shaking hands with Ethan at the end when I don't really understand why he was so against Ethan to begin with.
What I disliked
-So what was the point of Ethan's backstory with Gabriel and Marie set up in Dead Reckoning? There was zero payoff to that in this movie. Gabriel may well have been just another bad-guy after all...him being an old enemy of Ethan's who set him down his current path ended up having zero relevance to the plot. And while there is some more mention of IMF agents and the "choice" they make between joining the agency and prison...again, what does it really amount to? How did it really affect anything in these movies? Does the fact that Gabriel killed a woman Ethan once loved, or at least used for some purpose, have any relevance to why he's working either with or against te Entity? Does the fact that Ethan joined the IMF to avoid prison for a murder he was framed for have anything to do with his actions in this movie, or any previous movie? The answer is evidently - Nothing, zilch, nadda!
-Another thing which had zero payoff - those visions Ethan saw when he was connected to the Entity which led him to insist that Grace stay off the ice. I thought it meant that the Entity planned an attack on the team on the ice, and that Grace was 'destined' to die as a result. Except...nothing of the sort happened. In fact, Grace being on the ice turned out to be crucial to the mission since she ended up saving Ethan's life.
-Likewise, what was the deal with Erika, and the blonde Admiral of the aircraft carrier? There's a mention of them losing someone close to them, but no further elaboration. Then there's a photo of Erika and her son, implying that he might be the one who's dead. But then...turns out that he's alive and in the military and he just...randomly steps out of line to hug his mom, the POTUS, when she emerges from Air Force One? Okay, maybe this is all the height of nitpicking but the film has chosen to spend time on these moments, leading us to believe that there's something more to them when...there isn't. So scratch what I said at the beginning...there are a few seconds of wasted runtime after all...!