Movie Scene: Mission accomplished!

Its all come down to this: Eight films, billions of dollars, nerve-wracking death-defying stunts and countless shots of Tom Cruise showing people he can run really fast. However Ethan Hunt’s race looks finally run in ‘Mission Impossible: Final Reckoning’ (initially titled ‘Dead Reckoning – Part 2’ following 2023’s Part 1).

Set two months after Dead Reckoning, Ethan and team Luther (Ving Rhames) and Benji (Simon Pegg) have gone into hiding, wanted men by Kittridge (Henry Czerny in boo-hiss villain mode). Still determined to stop Gabriel (Esai Morales) and the Entity, a word people say a lot in this, Ethan dreams up a plan involving a submarine, an aircraft carrier and a helluva lot of goodwill from the US President (Angela Bassett) as the trio re-recruit Grace (Hayley Atwell) and Paris (Pom Klementieff) to travel the globe and finally put an end to yet another worldwide threat.

‘Final Reckoning’ isn’t just the conclusion of the eight-film behemoth wrangled from an obscure-outside-the-US ‘60s TV show, it’s also a love-letter to those eight films and, bizarrely, the character of Hunt. It’s even a celebration of the man who plays him.

Before the film even begins, Cruise somewhat hubristically appeared on-screen to thank people for coming to see it and for being part of the ‘MI’ journey.

Beginning proper, we get treated to a nostalgic montage of previous films with Bassett’s presidential voiceover intoning just how great Hunt (and by extension Cruise) is to everyone, continuing this reverential tone to its star throughout before reuniting the team. The first hour is short on incident – aside from one shocking twist – and high on exposition with yet more nostalgia and callbacks brought in at every opportunity, tying in previous instalments through themes and an overall arc. For the most part, they work; one in particular involving Rolf Saxon’s William Donloe is a beautiful redemption arc but another involving MI:1’s baddie feels horribly unnecessary.

Scripted by director Christopher McQuarrie and Erik Jendresen, the plot is overly-convoluted in places and can be difficult to keep tabs on, which is exacerbated by McQuarrie’s habit of having two or more different people explain plot machinations whilst in different locations at the same time.

If we’re being honest though; we watch these films for the stunts, and boy, are they doozies. Despite the bloated 170-minute runtime, ‘Final Reckoning’ really only has two major set pieces; one in a downed submarine that plays out like a silent movie and the other involving bi-planes in the South African countryside. McQuarrie and Cruise excel here, as does cinematographer Fraser Taggart taking the audience on two genuine cinematic rollercoaster rides with beautifully shot sequences. I wont say he’s kept the best till last, but the stunts are up there with the best of the series.

As curtain calls go, ‘Final Reckoning’ is a bombastic, adrenaline-fuelled farewell to Ethan Hunt, even if his ego takes over in places.

Mission accomplished.