Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning (trailer).
Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning. Just hearing the title is enough to make one’s adrenaline spike. It promises to be the ultimate culmination of Ethan Hunt’s decades-long campaign against logic, gravity, and the fundamental principles of spycraft. But let’s be honest: the real mission is not what happens on screen, but how Tom Cruise can possibly top his latest death-defying stunt.
Following the events of Dead Reckoning Part One, which left audiences with more questions than answers (and a lingering fear of sentient AI entities taking over the world), The Final Reckoning is poised to bring Ethan Hunt’s IMF (Impossible Missions Force, not the financial institution—though that’s a missed opportunity) career to a thrilling, explosive, and probably very sweaty conclusion. Or is it? Because in true Ethan Hunt fashion, what looks like a final bow might just be the precursor to Mission: Impossible 12 – Even Reckoninger.
When last we saw Ethan and his team, they were locked in a battle against “The Entity,” a rogue AI with the kind of villainous streak usually reserved for Bond films and poorly managed Twitter accounts. This malevolent algorithm was wreaking havoc on global systems and doing its best HAL 9000 impression. Naturally, Ethan decided that no supercomputer can stand up to a man with a high pain tolerance and a knack for holding his breath for absurdly long periods.
But Dead Reckoning Part One ended with the AI very much still in play, along with Esai Morales’ Gabriel, the man who is somehow both the Entity’s liaison and Ethan’s arch-nemesis with a tragic backstory that feels ripped from a soap opera Ethan can’t quite remember. Expect The Final Reckoning to double down on this existential face-off: man versus machine, human determination versus cold, hard logic, Ethan Hunt’s quippy optimism versus the Entity’s calculated malevolence.
Joining Ethan on this final (wink) mission is a dream team of returning favourites. There’s Hayley Atwell’s Grace, the former thief who’s quickly become Ethan’s most reluctant ally. If her arc continues, she’ll go from “I didn’t ask for this” to “Alright, Ethan, let’s blow up a submarine.” And yes, submarines will undoubtedly play a role. Because if Fallout gave us helicopters and Dead Reckoning gave us trains, The Final Reckoning demands underwater chaos. Tom Cruise probably insisted on learning how to pilot a nuclear sub just for authenticity.
Ving Rhames’ Luther Stickell will surely provide his usual gravitas and tech wizardry, all while reminding everyone that he’s Ethan’s oldest and most loyal friend. Simon Pegg’s Benji Dunn will continue to serve as the team’s comic relief, probably while diffusing a bomb inside a live volcano or something equally ludicrous. And Vanessa Kirby’s White Widow will presumably strut back into the chaos, once again delivering arms deals with a side of smirk. Let’s not forget Pom Klementieff’s Paris, who survived Gabriel’s betrayal and is likely to switch from “wildcard assassin” to “wildcard with a heart of gold.”
But the real wildcard is Angela Bassett’s Erika Sloane, now apparently the President of the United States. Yes, that’s right: the woman who once sent Ethan on a wild goose chase for plutonium cores is now running the free world. Expect her scenes to feature a mix of exasperated facepalms and steely determination as she inevitably grants Ethan full carte blanche to destroy half of Europe in the name of saving the world.
As for the stunts, let’s not kid ourselves. This is where Tom Cruise thrives. After scaling the Burj Khalifa, hanging off a moving plane, and driving a motorcycle off a cliff, one wonders what’s left. Will he free-dive to the Mariana Trench to retrieve an underwater server hosting the Entity’s core data? Perform a HALO jump into a volcano? Or maybe he’ll just fistfight Gabriel on the wings of a supersonic jet while Lorne Balfe’s score crescendos in the background.
Of course, The Final Reckoning isn’t just about stunts (though let’s face it, that’s 90% of why we’re here). The film promises to bring Ethan Hunt’s emotional arc full circle. Expect callbacks to the first Mission: Impossible film, including the return of Henry Czerny’s Eugene Kittridge, who will undoubtedly deliver more of his patented deadpan shade. And Rolf Saxon’s William Donloe is back too—possibly still recovering from that time Ethan dangled him over a pressure-sensitive floor. It’s nostalgia with a side of unresolved trauma.
The big question is whether Ethan will survive this mission. With a title like The Final Reckoning, it’s hard not to wonder if this is Cruise’s swan song as the indomitable super spy. But let’s be real: Tom Cruise doesn’t age; he just becomes more determined. Even if Ethan rides off into the sunset (or is tragically lost in a self-sacrificial blaze of glory), you can bet Cruise will be back, dangling from some precarious structure in Mission: Impossible 9 – Ethan’s Back, Baby.
And if The Final Reckoning truly is the end, it’s bound to be a wild, heart-pounding, logic-defying ride. So buckle up, grab your IMF-approved gadgets, and prepare to watch Ethan Hunt do what he does best: laugh in the face of physics, defy the odds, and remind us all that sometimes, saving the world just takes one very determined man in a leather jacket.
