Is Mission Impossible Final Reckoning the movie of the summer? 

Mission: Impossible, The Final Reckoning (Final Reckoning) released Memorial Day weekend partnering with Disney’s Lilo and Stitch for a record breaking box office haul. 

The eighth installment of the beloved franchise was greatly anticipated as a direct follow-up to the 2024 Freedom Award winning, Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning. It’s also been marketed as the final installment at least of lead character Ethan Hunt’s story, all though, nothing has been formally announced in terms of franchise conclusion or new leading characters.

In viewing the film, it didn’t feel like a worthy conclusion to such a big story and frankly this critic doesn’t think it is the conclusion. It is simply the conclusion to the two part ‘Reckoning’ story. But that is all to be seen. 

Despite not being a worthy conclusion to the MI franchise, is Final Reckoning otherwise a strong enough submission to be the movie of the summer? 

The Conservative Critic Asks: Is it entertaining? Does it have artistic/intellectual value? And Is it liberal propaganda? 

Final Reckoning meter check: 

Overall rating: Great compared to other films. Okay for an MI installment.

Mission Impossible is probably the strongest franchise of any long-term franchise on the market. Film for film, there is no true flop and when it hits it hits bigly. So to say Final Reckoning is in the middle of the pack of the Mission Impossible movies, is not to say it isn’t absolutely great compared to the other offerings on the market. Marvel could truly never. 

With Fallout and Dead Reckoning being the 1 and 2 best of the 8 Mission Impossible movies, Final Reckoning fits somewhere in the 5 or 6 spot. It relies too heavily on dialogue and flashbacks to keep viewers educated into the intricacies and Haley Atwell’ Grace as the new leading lady is simply not as dynamic as Rebecca Ferguson’s Ilsa. Additionally, there aren’t really any surprises or fun twists which is a hallmark of most of the Mission Impossible movies. However, the third act of the film features high tension, edge of seat action sequences that have no peer in modern filmmaking. It is full of fun and heart and big movie moments. It is definitely a contender for movie of the summer. 

Is it entertaining? 

Rating:First no then big yes

Final Reckoning has a lot of set up. It begins heavy on the dialogue and shoehorns in several flashbacks to remind viewers of important plot points and characters who reemerge. It’s not boring, there are bombs and intrigue and planning, but it’s definitely not exciting. It’s nothing like Dead Reckoning which gives us the brilliant desert shootout sequence with Ilsa within the first act. One would have to be a fan of the franchise to stick with the pace of the first two acts of the movie. 

But when the third act hits, it hits. From the end of the second act onward, the excitement level goes up exponentially. Our heroes find themselves in a dueling crisis, some in a fiery shootout and some alone facing the most deadly opponent of the mission: the elements. From there its only up up up. There are bombs. There are shootouts. There is the highly marketed prop plane fight complete with practical zero-G stunt work. It is very high tension, high anxiety and fully satisfying. 

That being said, the movie does not feature any surprises or twists and turns. The mission is given, the mission is executed. There is very little disruption or meaningful surprises by which the audience can be blown away. 

All-in-all, it’s a fun movie by any objective measure. But to play in the same category as its own franchise installments, Final Reckoning needed a lot less talk and a lot more action. 

Does it have artistic/intellectual value? 

Rating: Great

Final Reckoning is as carefully and lovingly made as anything else Tom Cruise has touched in the last ten years. The story is rich, the characters are vibrant and the performances are only of the highest quality including, of course, Cruise himself. The cinematography is also interesting and while not my favorite style, had a lot of purpose and care. 

While the character Grace is simply not as interesting as Ilsa, Haley Atwell is a smart choice to replace Rebecca Ferguson. Atwell is a veteran to action franchises having been opposite Captain America himself in the MCU and has the right amount of beauty and pluck to fill a leading lady role in a franchise of the scale of Mission Impossible. Grace is much more of the ‘damsel’ role offering Hunt care, comfort and vulnerability. There is nothing wrong with that kind of character, its a great character to have and Atwell played her well. But Ilsa (Ferguson) filled a completely different role for the story which remained void without her. Ilsa was the pessimistic foil to Hunt. She didn’t believe good would always win and Hunt turned her to his side slowly over time and never quite fully. The dynamic, for this critic, is greatly missed. 

Pom Klementieff returns to the story as the lethal assassin, Paris. Klementieff is most well known for her roll as Mantis in the MCU but she dazzles as Paris in Dead Reckoning. Partially credit to her stylists (hair, makeup and costume), Paris really works as a brooding, scary death machine with an axe to grind. Her slick blonde hair and high gloss paled face make her look a bit like a ghost. It works. And boy does her performance hit. Because she speaks a different language than the protagonists, Klementieff is allowed to perform without being bogged down with so much heavy dialogue. It works. If Mission Impossible isn’t over, it needs more Paris. 

New faces (to the franchise) Hannah Waddingham and Tramell Tillman make a huge impact with their relatively small parts and it would make no sense to bring them back for future missions and yet: they must. The two are absolute stars and really help make the movie. 

Cruise himself, of course, carries the day. His stunt work is unimpeachable. In particular in this film, the practical stunts make the movie more watchable and more on a scale that can be appreciated by audiences. The idea of a digital faux versus a real human being, has a really tangible modernity as AI is quickly able to render humans that could replace actors. But the knowledge that the stunt is performed for real by a real person, the main actor himself, is half of the fun of the movie and AI could never replace real human struggle. 

Finally, the cinematography is really interesting. The film is shot on digital and iMax compatible but viewers would think on first glance, particularly in the early parts of the movie, that it is shot on film. Whatever was done with color and light was done to the effect of making the movie look a bit more like the movies prior to Dead Reckoning which were all at least in part shot on film.

Is it liberal propaganda? 

Rating: Christian allegories mainly, slightly humanist at the end

The movie continues with a Christian allegory which was introduced and was more pronounced in Dead Reckoning. However, it concludes with a humanist monologue that is somewhat in conflict with the very Christian imagery of the movie. Additionally, the movie does a right wing job of depicting the government. While the President is an attractive black woman which one might think is because of who they expected to be President of the United States, she was actually a call back character from a prior film who’s political trajectory is closer to George H. W. Bush than Kamala Harris. The skepticism that the government could handle the crisis of a hostile AI takeover blended with the patriotism of the US being well positioned worked well and leaned away from leftist ideologies. 

Conclusion: 

Mission Impossible: Final Reckoning is a strong conclusion for Dead Reckoning but not the best movie in the Mission Impossible franchise. It still may hold out as the best movie of the summer depending on how movies like Superman and The Fantastic Four turn out.