If “The Final Reckoning” presents itself as a possible conclusion of the saga “mission: impossible” and that it resolves one of its mysteries left unanswered, other questions have not had any answers. We take stock.
CAUTION – The article below contains some spoilers on “Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning”, of which he notably evokes his end and one of his revelations. So please go your way if you haven't seen it yet.
Here it is, it's over. Or maybe not. Despite his title or the way he presented himself to us, as the culmination of what had preceded, Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning may not be the end of the saga launched in 1996. If there is a conclusion to the story, Ethan Hunt does not die or retire, thus leaving a door open to a return in case of success to the box -office or a brilliant idea to transpose on the big screen His past.
In an interview, Simon Pegg also kicks by saying that the franchise can continue as it can stop there. Only the future will tell us if Tom Cruise will come back to cascades in the cinema in the guise of Ethan Hunt but, at least, The Final Reckoning will have taken care to answer a question that we thought never has an answer: what is the mysterious rabbit's paw, an object that triggered hostilities between the hero and Owen Davian (Philip Seymour Hoffman) in the third opus) Never revealed?
If this branch of the story could very well have been in the shadows, to get closer to Alfred Hitchcock, a major influence of the saga and great lover of MacGuffin (pretext for the development of the scenario), The Final Reckoning chooses however to use it to reveal that it was a computer virus which transferred and found itself endowed with the entity. Either one more fault to be exposed for Ethan, who had stolen him to save his wife Julia (Michelle Monaghan) and who was therefore responsible for the birth of the AI who almost destroyed the world.
Fortunately, everything is good that ends well, even if other questions remain unanswered. And it is not said that we have the answer one day, if the saga should stop here (or if the main interested parties do not express themselves on the subject).
But who was Gabriel?
Largely put forward in the story, and this since Dead Reckoning, the nature of the link between Ethan and Gabriel (Esai Morales) remains a mystery when the end credits of The Last Reckoning scrolls. To the almost general surprise, as the appearances of the film antagonist (or the armed arm of the entity) were accompanied by flashbacks on a death which traumatized the hero and turns his destiny, since it was following this murder which he was obviously accused that he had the choice between prison and joining the ranks of the MFI.
The film is full of indications on its identity
But we will not know more. On this event, this mysterious date of May 22, 1996, which is also associated with Admiral Neely played by Hannah Waddingham (was it his sister?) And, therefore, on the identity of Gabriel. Was he a former agent who went wrong? A former accomplice from Ethan, from his criminal past, who would have betrayed him? “The film is full of signs on his identity”tells us is moral, without wanting to reveal only one.
However, we can tell you one thing: in real life, the date of May 22, 1996 is that of the release of the first mission: impossible in the United States. That the film also uses it to make it the moment when Ethan started to become the super spy that we know is both fun and not so trivial.
Who had to play Nicholas Hoult?
Be careful, we are entering an alternative version of the saga that we know: the one where the covid will not have struck the world with the world (cinema but not only) and forced Nicholas Hoult to give up the shooting of Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoningof which he was to be the villain, due to a timetable of time after his postponement. The English actor was therefore replaced by Esai Morales, but it seems difficult to believe that it is for the same role, as the Lex Luthor of the new Superman cannot have been part of Ethan as Gabriel.
Was it the hidden son of the hero (born May 22, 1996?), As many theorized when the actor joined the project? Nothing like that to confront MFI's star with her past, as the saga has done from Fallout, and accentuate a little more the fact that he was without family, even if the string would have been a little big and common. And as none of the main interested parties has been expressed on the subject since this failed meeting, the mystery is still whole.
How is Brandt?
Following the disappointing results of Mission: Impossible III And to a promotion where his star spoke more of Scientology and Katie Holmes than in the film, the Paramount had broken the contract binding it to Tom Cruise, thus putting the future of Ethan Hunt in danger. The actor and the studio were reconciled a few years later, which made it possible to give birth to a ghost protocol and his vertiginous climbing of the highest tower in the world in Dubai, but also to introduce the character of William Brandt into the saga.
The character being embodied by Jeremy Renner, then future member of the Avengers and replacement of Matt Damon in the Jason Bourne saga, everything led to believe that the star of the multi-oscientary demarier was not there to play the valve and several echoes revealed that it was the idea. Except that Tom Cruise has surpassed himself like never before by finding (literally) the summits and his partner, despite an interesting and mysterious sub-containment, has never managed to make him shade.
Paramount pictures France When you wait for the metro “Mission: Impossible” REFASSE …
Worse: Brandt is no longer on the ground in Rogue Nation, busy defending the MFI in front of the Senate, and he does not even appear in Fallout (due to time conflict with the filming of Infinity War and Endgame). No more than in Dead Reckoning and his suite, The Final Reckoning, where his name is never mentioned. Again, his agenda, his private life and his very serious injury at the beginning of 2023 prevented his return, and the main interested party declared himself having had to abandon, which leaves a taste of unfinished concerning him, in the same way as Alanna Mistopolis (Vanessa Kirby), free electron that was thought to be seeing come back here.
Anyone have news from Billy?
But yes! Billy, the funny mission helicopter pilot: Impossible II! More seriously, the exquisite form of corpse adopted by the first episodes (where each film was offered a different director) also had the consequence of the constant changes in which the only Luther then Benji escaped the duration. This is how we have never heard the character played by John Polson again in front of John Woo's camera, no more than Nyah Hall (Thandiwe Newton) or even the slightest event of the film, a villain little duck of the franchise that we still see images in the best-of editing that opens the Final Reckoning.
Paramount pictures France Goodbye forever
Among the (lively) agents lost in sight, salons Declan (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers) and Zhen Lei (Maggie Q) in episode 3 or Jane Carter (Paula Patton) in a ghost protocol. Spies who, at first glance, seem to occupy the same function, but Christopher Mcquarrie revealed that he had tried to bring them back, in vain, in Rogue Nation, and we do not know what they have become since they are never mentioned. Maybe a spin-off … (we joke)
What would have given a mission: impossible by David Fincher?
Let us plunge back into the parallel universe of the impossible mission: the one in which the saga would have followed other directions if the first directors envisaged for each film had remained on board. It should also be recalled that the franchise was not immediately thought of as an exquisite corpse on which each filmmaker was going to lay his footprint, because Tom Cruise had proposed to Brian de Palma to re -stack, which the main interested party (cooled by his few beak with the star on the set?) Refused.
Oliver Stone was then the number 1 candidate and ready to accept the mission, but the postponement of the film linked to the endless filming of Eyes Wide Shut decided otherwise. One can then wonder what the author of Born on July 4 would have made of this episode 2 in place of John Woo (more politics, less idle and doves?), Even if the main questions (and regrets) concern the following film. Which was first offered to David Fincher in 2002.
Eager to focus the intrigue around organ trafficking in South Africa and to make Sylvester Stallone the villain of history, he comes up against creative disputes with Tom Cruise and, undoubtedly little inclined to relive an experience as complicated as during the filming and post-production of Alien 3, that he still denies the sponge. For the benefit of Joe Carnahan, whose star has just produced the first film, the Narc nervous thriller, without suspecting that the character of the director will be another obstacle on his way.
According to corridor noises, some of the elements of the aborted version of David Fincher found themselves in his (a part in Africa in particular) and it was to be a question of the privatization of the American army, in a feature film which wanted to be in the vein of the paranoid thrillers of the 70s with a villain played by Kenneth Branagh inspired by the veteran Timothy McVeigh, terrorism after the Oklahoma City bomb attack in 1995, executed in June 2001.
It is even a question of bringing Nyah Hall back, but arguments concerning the tone of the film are right for the investment of Joe Carnahan, who leaves to see elsewhere (and on the side of mid $ at prices) if it is not. This does the business of JJ Abrams, promoted to director of this third opus (with the famous rabbit's paw) and producer of the following. Without withdrawing anything from work, you can't help but dream of what a mission: impossible would have given David Fincher's leadership.
Interview of Esai Morales collected by Maximilien Pierrette in Paris on May 12, 2025
