Mission: Impossible – Final Reckoning review: Tom Cruise still has the power to surprise

An emotional and satisfying ending to Hollywood's pre-eminent action franchise

Tom Cruise plays Ethan Hunt for the eighth time in Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning. Photo: Paramount Pictures

It’s called movie magic for a reason. Watch any magic trick and it’s never in question whether you’re being tricked. The thrill comes from the surprise found in its resolution – and in the mystery as to how they managed to fool you.

But increasingly, in the era of green screen CGI, the mystery is gone from big action movies. How did Marvel do it, for instance? They pre-visualised it on a computer and then brought in the actors to fill in the blanks. Even the director often becomes secondary. And, as generative AI develops, human ingenuity is likely to become less a part of the equation. What, in that world, will we go to the cinemas for?

It makes sense, then, that the villain of the last two Mission: Impossible films has been AI. After all, there is no franchise more steeped in the fundamentals of old-school filmmaking – no greater successor to the early days of cinema in which Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin pushed themselves to their physical limits to surprise and delight an audience.

Perhaps that’s why the narrative around these films has entirely become about what goes into making them. Since Tom Cruise first scaled Dubai’s Burj Khalifa with 2011’s Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, we’ve flocked to each subsequent instalment to see a man seemingly past his physical prime do things that most other people on earth couldn't – or wouldn't even try to manage. And the further he’s pushed his limits, the further we’re moved to the edge of our seats.

Tom Cruise performs some of his most death-defying stunts in Final Reckoning. Photo: Paramount Pictures

In many ways, it’s turned Cruise into more of an elite pro wrestler than an actor. When watching a great wrestling match, audiences are thinking about what the wrestler will do when they ascend to the top rope – and whether they’ll survive the stunt they attempt from there. The storytelling is dependent on the real-life stakes – and when the two intertwine, it feels like nothing else.

If you’re chasing that transcendent feeling once again, then I have good news: Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning more than delivers. But there's a caveat – it takes a while to get there.

The story begins with about 20 minutes of recapping – this is a part two after all, although the title obfuscates that. Ethan Hunt (Cruise), the oft-disavowed agent of the Impossible Mission Force and multi-time saviour of the world, is in hot pursuit of the Entity, a rogue artificial intelligence that is working to take hold of the world’s nuclear arsenal – and wipe out all life on Earth.

The Entity has flooded the internet with false narratives that no one can discern from the truth, which has plunged the world into chaos. Only Ethan has the power to stop it all, of course – although it won’t be easy. As they often say in these movies, this isn’t Mission: Difficult.

Tom Cruise and Esai Morales face off in the potential final instalment of the Mission: Impossible series. Photo: Paramount Pictures

There’s an overwhelming amount of exposition here, thanks in part to this potentially being the final film in the series. As a result, forgotten storylines and characters from previous films are brought back, in an admirable attempt to reverse-engineer an overarching narrative.

But this is a franchise that has largely been made up on the fly – most of the films are heavily rewritten mid-production. The plotting has always been secondary. If you forget details or people along the way, don’t feel the need to interrogate your confusion or to rewatch the whole series later to figure out how it all fits together. Treat it as decoration – the sprig of parsley you pick off before you cut into the juicy steak beneath.

You’re here, first and foremost, for the action set pieces – and this instalment contains among the best in the series. Cruise dives to the bottom of the ocean and jumps between propeller planes – all beautifully photographed by director Christopher McQuarrie, who literally went along for the ride to capture them. While he’ll never have the eye or visual flair of Brian De Palma or John Woo, who directed the first two films respectively, he makes up the difference in sheer ambition.

Cruise, it should be said, is far from just a glorified stuntman. He’s a consummate performer, and his unmatched physicality does most of the narrative's heavy lifting. Every bone in his body is acting – every movement full of heart and soul, every stride telling a story.

Hayley Atwell plays Grace, Simon Pegg plays Benji, Pom Klementieff plays Paris and Greg Tarzan Davis plays Degas in Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning. Photo: Paramount Pictures

But Cruise alone doesn’t make these globe-trotting movies successful. The supporting cast, assembled through trial and error over the past seven films, is the most effective in the series so far.

Ving Rhames, who plays Luther, is the only one who’s stuck around since the beginning – and as he’s diminished physically, his appearances have become even more emotional to witness, like Val Kilmer’s cameo in Top Gun: Maverick. Simon Pegg was added as the bumbling comic relief in Mission: Impossible 3 and has become a key ingredient. And Hayley Atwell, who plays Grace and joined in Dead Reckoning, is Cruise’s most versatile female co-star to date – jumping between tones with ease and fostering palpable chemistry with each scene partner.

There are good arguments to be made for this film to end the franchise. For one, Tom Cruise is now in his 60s. It’s impossible not to wonder how many of these he still has in him – although he’s continually proved that he’s not one to be doubted. And unlike James Bond, it’s impossible to imagine anyone else taking on the role of Ethan Hunt. Anyone who can fit into a tuxedo can play James Bond – but there’s only one Tom Cruise. He’s the character. He’s the magic trick. And the mystery that lingers is how and why he does it.

And two, we’ve seen versions of these stunts in other forms throughout the series, lessening the impact of some of the action. But despite that feeling of creeping familiarity, the film still has the capacity to surprise. I even got emotional at times, wiping tears from my eyes. That never happened in the other seven. And when a series can still surprise you like that, you never want to let it go. Particularly when it’s unclear if we’ll ever see filmmaking of this kind again.

Mission: Impossible – Final Reckoning releases in cinemas May 21 across the Middle East