Of all the film franchises, Mission: Impossible has always been known for Tom Cruise and his insatiable hunger for death-defying stunts. I fondly remember watching Rogue Nation with friends during a party and putting together a last-minute dash to the theater with a friend when Fallout came out.

With Dead Reckoning and Final Reckoning being marketed as the supposed swan song for Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt and his ragtag group of IMF agents, I was definitely interested in seeing how his story would be coming to a close. I also recognized that Dead Reckoning had several issues that led to creative changes in The Final Reckoning. The question is simple: did they make the necessary changes to save the mission?

For those who don’t know, Mission: Impossible- The Final Reckoning is the eighth film in the action-adventure franchise led by Tom Cruise. In this movie, Ethan Hunt must continue his mission of defeating an artificial intelligence known as The Entity. With a three-day countdown until every nuclear arsenal in the world is under its control, Ethan and his team must find a way to destroy the entity and stop a nuclear armageddon. Hindered by the all-encompassing nature of The Entity in modern technology and various disciples of The Entity, Ethan and his team must put together an audacious plan to pull off one last mission.

Let’s start with the main course of these films, which are the stunts. Tom Cruise manages to do it once again by doing absolutely incredible stunts! The primary one that has been advertised, which is him climbing on top of two biplanes, is quite something. There are a few shots where Tom Cruise looks rather funny, but that is just man fighting gravity.

While there are a few others, the one that I found truly jaw-dropping was the underwater submarine stunt. This is more than likely due to my fear of being that deep underwater, but it is still a great stunt. The rest of the team primarily have action stunts, so there isn’t a whole lot of ridiculous things for them to do, but there is a lot of stuff that they get into that are wonderfully choreographed.

As for the story of this film, it is lacking in a number of areas. The first problem with the film is the pacing. The movie is way too long for its own good, clocking in at almost three hours. The strange thing is that I couldn’t find a single significant moment of footage that could be cut to reduce the runtime without the plot having more holes than it already does. The holes of the plot are the second (frequent) problem. It is clear that these plot holes were left in so that all of the events could stitch everything together, but it proved to be a bit too much. The one saving grace of this is that the characters themselves have multiple moments where they question the sheer ridiculousness of what the plan is.

As for the sound and set design, they did a phenomenal job on everything. The production design of all the films is always top-notch, and this one manages to do it again. The sets bring a sense of realism that helps to ground together some of the extraordinary parts of the plot. The music and overall sound design is top notch as they help suck us into the sets. All the props in the world should be given to the musicians of this film, as it is a behemoth of to score. However, there isn’t any notable piece of music that will get stuck in your head after viewing the film. 

Overall, I believe that Mission: Impossible The Final Reckoning is a rather mixed bag of a film. There are a lot of good things in here, but they often feel weighed down by the amount of bad creative choices that exist. Perhaps I would look at this film differently if I had seen all of the Mission: Impossible movies recently, as this film is a definitive conclusion to the story that started in 1996.

Sometime down the road, I may revisit this film and have a greater appreciation for it. However, standing on its own merits, I do not see this movie as being one of the greats of 2025. If you want to look at Edward Harding’s review of Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning, click right here.

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Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning

0.00

7

Score

7.0/10

Pros

• Amazing Stunts
• Good Set Design
• Superb Sound Design

Cons

• Lackluster Story
• Threat isn't as concentrated
• Not a film to watch with no knowledge of previous films
• Too Long