TAKE ONE Presents... - The Impossipod 6: MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – FALLOUT (2018)

Episode Date: September 24, 2025

Simon and Jim discuss Christopher McQuarrie's second Mission: Impossible film, MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - FALLOUT, a very highly-regarded entry in the franchise that frankly Simon and Jim are a bit meh about. They discuss how Henry Cavill (and his $3 million moustache) is a great addition to the film, the shift in Ethan's character towards mythologising messianic tropes, McQuarrie's obsession with continuity in the franchise, the franchise's continuing approach to femininity in action films, and the script's lazy misunderstanding of political anarchism.Content warnings: nuclear explosions and mass death; violent deaths including murder and assassination; destruction of religious sites; cult leadership and the Church of Scientology; flying including parachuting and helicopter crashes.Our theme song is Star - X - Impossible Mission (Mission Impossible Theme PsyTrance Remix) by EDM Non-Stop (https://soundcloud.com/edm-non-stop/star-x-impossible-mission) licensed under a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 license.Full references for this episode available in Zotero at https://www.zotero.org/groups/5642177/take_one/collections/RQWZD7BU

Your mission should you choose to accept it is to obtain photographic proof, theft, shadow glitzen to his buyer, and apprehend with both. As always, should you or any member of your I am force be caught or kill Secretary of Sabo? Hello and welcome to Take One Presents, The Impossopod. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to listen to us while we watch all the Mission Impossible franchise films in order, contextualizing them and critiquing them. I'm Simon Bowie, and as always, I'm joined by my co-host, Jim Ross. Hello. How are you? I'm good.

I come to this recording with an interesting little. Mission Possible fact where I've just found out in my daughter's nursery, they played a mission possible theme to make them tidy up. So when they get them to tidy up all the toys before they go outside or at the end of the day, apparently they don't play one of these, you know, it's tidy up, it's tidy up. You know, one of these, like, apparently they played the Mission Possible theme. I just found out from some other parents. So I'm going to be, I'm going to be testing this out in the near future. Yeah, that seems awfully frantic for toddlers tidying up.

yeah that's good your mission should you choose to accept it is to tidy up the playroom yeah your mission if you choose to accept it is to actually put the playdow away before it turns into a rock that you could bludgeon the man to death that's good that's high stakes high stakes yeah so we are here today on this episode talking about mission impossible fallout from 2018 so this is Christopher McCrory writing and directing this is the first time a director has returned to the franchise and kind of sets the template for

what will be the rest of the franchise as we head through the next well it's only two films after this but they're both written and directed by Christopher McCrory what Jim is your experience with Mission Impossible Fallout do you remember seeing it when it came out yep I do I went to I think it was probably one of the ones that I can't remember precisely what cinema I went to. I would definitely

have been in Edinburgh but I think it was I'm pretty sure it would have been the Ciney world because I've vague memories of seeing it in IMAX format and that's the only IMAC, well I mean, when I wanted to go off into a separate IMAX rant about how the IMAX screen in Edinburgh is and actually an IMAX

screen, it's IMAX digital, blah blah blah blah I've done that in other media right so I'm not going to do that here but it was an IMAX screening I'm pretty sure and that's the only IMAX creating in Edinburgh so I think it would have been at the city world in Edinburgh when it came out I think sure sure I saw this on streaming I didn't see this in the cinema and I remember I remember it was very well received and everyone was raving about it so I just watched it one Sunday afternoon you know it's a it's a very Sunday afternoon kind of blockbuster in my head

but yeah it's it's very well received a lot of people have this as their their favorite of the franchise and I don't want to give away my fault too soon. But yes, it's a very well-regarded film in the franchise. And it came out in 2018, so it went into production before the last film came out, before Rogue Nation came out, because they knew they wanted to crack on with these. Christopher McCrory did not want to return because he felt that wasn't true to the franchise, but Tom Cruise insisted. He very much wanted McCrory, who he loves, to lead the sequel. And McCrory, wanted to resolve some long-running narratives so he we'll talk about this when we get into it but he

has what I'll describe later as an obsession with continuity in this franchise and making it a cohesive story so he wanted to bring back Ethan's wife Julia from Mission Impossible 3 he wanted to delve into Ethan's emotions and how he reacts to these missions and he wanted to bring back some abandoned ideas from Rogue Nation, which he does. So the film came out in July, 2018, premiere in Paris, a couple of weeks later came out in the United States. This is the longest film in the franchise we've seen so far, because this series suffers from franchise inflation, where each subsequent film is longer than the last. What else comes out in 2018? Franchise Films.

So we've actually ran through this before, because we'll get to one of the films we've covered on the podcast before. But number one is Avengers Infinity War. Black Panther at number two, so two MCU at the top. Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom, which we've covered before. Incredibles 2, Aquaman, Bohemian Rhapsody, Venom, Mission Impossible Fallout, Deadpool 2, and Fantastic Beasts, the Crimes of Grindle Wald. so the standout here is Bohemian Rhapsody which is not a franchise film and not a superhero film

there's a lot of superhero films in this list you know Venom, Aquaman even Incredibles too yeah the only non-superheroes are Jurassic World Behamean Rhapsody Mission Impossible which arguable and Fantastic Peace The Crimes of Grindlewald

so we're fully in, you know, big franchise territory. Yeah, yeah, and I think this is probably, I mean, especially if you look at the top two, this is probably kind of like peak MCU, I would say, not necessarily in quality, we're not going to go into that right now, but in terms of kind of like box office dominance, right? We're one year out from end game kind of sweeping all before it, and you've got two films there at the top, which were pretty well regarded, I mean, I think from a critical standpoint, probably more Black Panther, Infinity War

but I don't think I don't think many people came out from Finney War I think it was bad you know I did you know

well you know bad for the MTCU at that point so yeah yeah you know it's like you can you can argue the toss

about that that specific film I think it's like I think it's aged quite well with some of the stuff that's come after it's basically

yeah this is what I'm thinking so I thought it was bad at the time but I've seen the depths that the MTC can sink to so Yeah, so, you know, but yeah, and even a little bit beyond that top ten,

you've got the same sort of thing, right? Because you've got Ant Man the Wasps. Ready Player One is not a franchise film, but it makes so many bloody nostalgia. You might as well include it in that sort of like area. And then there's quite a lot of other sequels and stuff down there. God, Solo a Star Wars movie, he really didn't make a lot of money, did it, for a Star Wars film.

I didn't. I re-watch that just recently, having watched Andor and wanting more Star Wars. World's content and it's just, it is just too dark. Like that film is just lit, it is a very dark film, yeah. Particularly the opening. I remember it being fine in the cinema, but, you know, I don't have a cinema set up at home, so it just does not look good on TV.

Too dark, part of a trend in films, not being lit well. But yes, this comes out in 2018 in this context of superhero films and big flashy action films. and very clearly fits into this model. I think this is more of a big action film than even the previous films have been. I mean, they've been moving towards that, but centrally, one of my central problems with this film is that it doesn't even have a heist, which has characterised this franchise in the past. So this one is big action stunts and set pieces in the way that Mission Impossible

becomes known for in the decade since. Christopher McCrory's leadership, or directorship at least. So, yes, let's get into the film and run through it and share our thoughts. So the film opens with, the film actually interestingly opens with production logos, which they sought special permission to show at two times speed. So the production logos are actually a little faster than normal because they were attempting to squeeze every drop out of the edit. you know they really wanted to keep it relatively tight and so got special permission from the production

companies to squeeze those logos super fast but we go from that to a brief scene of Ethan marrying Julia by a lake but the wedding is ordained by Solomon Lane Sean Harris from the last film it becomes very disturbing and then nuke goes off in the background and it's it's a nightmare so it's one of a few flashbacks that we'll get in the film that seem a bit out of place flashback slash dream sequences yeah it's funny this opening scene kind of sets it up as a little different from the off because this is definitely like the most personal intro that any of these films have had it's also it kind of goes to a preoccupation with um you know the fate of the world you know and this sort of thing. It's actually, it's such a tiny little scene, but it's actually like re-watching

this, I did find it absolutely fascinating because it sets so many things up that haven't happened in these films to date. You know, we've got a really kind of explicit character callback in the form of Julian, Michelle Monaghan's character,

the wife from Mission Possible 3. You've got Solomon Lane an explosive turning right out the gate, right? You know, he's right there from the off of the sort of like, you know, avatar of everything that kind of like worries Ethan or something. Yeah. And it's also interesting how these films all seem to contain little echoes of things that you don't expect.

Because frankly, the way that they all die in this kind of nightmare sequence in response to the bomb going off, it's actually quite a lot like Avengers Infinity War. Like they kind of, you know, they turn to dust and then sort of like, but it's really, it's weird. It's actually kind of fascinating watching it back, but it's also just like so much about what I think doesn't work about this film. And I think I, you know, I think I can say, I'm probably going to come out of this more

positive about Fallout than you, but I do have my issues with it, and it's amazing how many of them are encapsulated in this tiny little cold open, basically. Yeah, it does feel different from the jump, you know, this kind of dreams. sequence is different for this franchise and feels for me out of place. Yeah, the return of Mitchell Monaghan playing Julia, the return of Sean Harris playing Solomon Lane, immediately set this up as in continuity with previous films in a way that other films haven't been. I mean, we've had recurring characters like Lufa has been in the franchise from the start,

but there's a real sense of continuity and serialization here, which I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll get into more later, but it's here from the start. So Ethan wakes from this dream sequence in Belfast, in the North of Ireland, and he receives a briefing package from Mysterious Contact. It's a hardback copy of Homer's Odyssey, but it's actually a tiny projector. We get a lot of exposition here. He's very exposition heavy for the start, but at least it sort of gets it out the way. The syndicate are continuing to operate, despite Lane's arrest.

the core group the apostles are doing terror for hire there's an extremist called John Lark who has hired the apostles and stolen free plutonium cores to build free nuclear weapons Have you ever um Have you ever played Metal Gear Solid too? Yeah yeah loads of times This whole apostles thing just made me think of the Patriots

Oh yeah that's similar to the Patriots It has a similar sort of like Shaddy Kabal of like faceless people working for it It's a strange one It's another one where I feel like It's a slightly odd direction For this franchise to ghost Well, yeah

I think that links to your deep state comparison From the last film Where the syndicate represent this kind of deep state And that's very much a theme Throughout the Metal Gear Solid films Where Kajima's very concerned with A shadowy deep state

Running things from the shadows An Illuminati type type group And yeah, we get the same with The Apostle here. I mentioned the apostles. They're largely not mentioned throughout the rest of the film. They largely, our background context here to John Lark, who is mentioned, and will become very important, but the apostles really aren't mentioned much. So we go from Belfast to Berlin, where Benji and Ethan are waiting to meet someone under an overpass while Lufa watches remotely. There's some

nice, easy, fun banter between the three team members. And, you know, they obviously have a rapport from the previous films. They're setting up a deal to buy one of the plutonium cores, or all the plutonium cores, maybe. But it goes badly and Luther gets kidnapped. Even can't bring himself to sacrifice his friend for the mission. And this brings up and emphasizes the friendship films, which were themes, which were raised in the last film, and which will be really consolidated in this. And anyway, the apostles get away with the plutonium. So the original plan for this scene was for Jeremy Renner to return as Brant and get killed off to kind of emphasise the dramatic state because Winston McRoy wanted to kill someone but couldn't bring himself

to kill Lufa or Benji. Renner could not come back because he was busy. He had a commitment to Avengers Infinity War which ultimately wasn't exercised but he still had that commitment holding him back. He's also been very open that he did not like filming Rogue Nation because the script was in such flux and changing day-to-day. He was flying between London and where they were filming and sometimes he wouldn't be used at all, so it was a bit of a nightmare for him. So he didn't want to come back. I think it would have been nice to have Renner here and kill off Brant. So the extremist nuclear scientist who was referred to in the briefing wakes up in a hospital bed. He's in custody and CNN is on TV talking about how there's been three nuclear attacks that have devastated

Rome, Jerusalem and Mecca. Ethan and Lufor asking about John Lark and he agrees to open his phone if CNN reads Lark's manifesto on air. Wolf Blitzer on CNN reads the manifesto and so the scientist unlocks his phone and then the walls fall down to reveal

that it's a studio set and Wolf Blitzer removes his mask to reveal Benjie. I like this sequence. This is a fun sequence. This is the closest they get to kind of spycraft and heisty stuff that I've liked some of the previous films. Yeah, of that sort of, like, slightly ridiculous but fun variety

that they've had in some of the previous ones. Exactly. There's been quite a bit of... There's been some analysis of this scene. Rebecca Keegan and Matt Miller wrote something about kind of fake news and how incorporating a real figure, like the actual Wolf Blitzer,

in this action film, talks about journalistic, credibility and sort of highlights contemporary issues around fake news and post-truth and blah, blah, blah. And some people have voiced apprehensions regarding the implications of his cameo appearance, you know, should a journalist like this appear in a film like this spreading fake news, which is fake even within the context of the film? I don't know, I'm not particularly interested in that concerns. I frankly haven't read a lot about it.

I personally think that's... Like, I don't know, because I read that myself. Like, come on now. I don't know. I just, I find that... It feels like we've always had, you know, real-life journalists play themselves in fiction. Yeah, you know, I mean, like how far we're going to go with this? Are we going to have a go at the British news readers

who were in Sean of the Dead here? Like, you know, it's just... I find it a bit of a nonsense. I think it's also CNN are rightly not particularly popular these days because of the way that they've approached their coverage of a lot of news in the state. And I think it's just a stick to beat them

with, to be honest with you. I think that there are bigger issue, you know, I'm not trying to do what about it here, but it's more just a case of if we're actually going to have a serious conversation about disinformation, misinformation,

fake news and all the rest of it this is not a serious way to talk about it I'm sorry it's just not you know like it's a very obviously meant to be a vaguely comedic sequence as well you know so nah I don't buy into that myself like you know yeah I don't see it personally

I don't know if it's a cultural thing that I am not used to the authority of Wolf Blitzer because I'm not American I don't watch CNN but yeah I can't imagine if it was any UK newsreader and I'd be concerned if it was Clive Myrie risk ripping a mask up I'm not sure I'd carry it I'm sorry I mean you could make this Trevor McDonald's

and I wouldn't suddenly like not trust anything that Trevor McDonald said on the news like you know it's nonsense I'm sorry I probably should be quite as dismissive to that thing as I am but like nah come on now so then we get titles so it seems like we've had quite a lot before the titles, but we get the titles, and then we get cut to Alec Baldwin, who is continuing as a secretary, meeting Ethan at an airbase in Germany. The phone led them to a server,

which leads them to the White Widow, who is played by the lovely Vanessa Kirby. And Baldwin absolutely makes explicit this theme of Ethan being unable to give up one member of his team for the greater good to the theme that will go through the entire film, this theme of sacrifice, and what is even willing to sacrifice? Can he sacrifice his friends? Because there's his theme of friendship again. Can he sacrifice his friend when the whole world is at stake? The CIA turn up.

Angela Bassett and Henry Cavill get involved and they criticise the IMF. An Agent Walker, played by Henry Cavill, is going to join. He is described as a hammer to hunt's scalpel. So we are immediately into these themes that have been in the previous films of the kind of internecing squabbles between U.S. intelligence agencies and accountability. The Pat Cassell's article in Los Angeles Review of Books that I've continually referred to throughout this podcast

talks about how the incorporation of an uptight Washington suit into Hunt's team suggests the IMF's willingness after 25 years to evolve and incorporate, in this case, Hunley, Alec Baldwin's more restrained attitude. Early in Fallout, Hunley tells an IMF agent, coming over here from the CIA was a lateral move, Some say a step down. And Packer Sells is concerned that IMF agents are thinking about their resumes now.

You know, they're not rogue. This is kind of careerism. This is kind of neoliberal managerialism incorporated into the films. Yeah. I think also, as we'll get into with the way his role develops in his film, I feel like there's a disappointing underuse of Alec Baldwin here. I enjoyed a little bit more the previous one

that I comment on the fact that you could just add lemon to some of his lines and it would not seem out of place for Jadal there's less of that this time which I think is a I think it's a step back myself

I agree it's a shame Baldwin was meant to do the opening voiceover but McCrory said his voice was too velvety and so he they ended up getting someone else for the briefing

for the initial briefing I mean it's true he has a velvety voice Sorry, I got velvety, oh God Christ Chris, get a room Oh, dearie me velvety

So Henry Cavill is Agent Walker He is a rough tough You know, I just said He's described as a hammer To hunt scalpel He's a rough tough CIA man

And he has I think Henry Cavill is great in this I think he has great moustache in this he has a three million dollar mustache in this yeah i will i will happily i will happily take henry cavill and his mustache in this over um over his role in justice league to be well yes it's a free million which we'll come to because i'm assuming everybody is aware of this by now but it's probably worth to go it over at some point it's a three million dollar mustache because during the filming of this cavill got called to reshoots for justice

League, which required him to be clean-shaven, because Superman does not have a mustache. And McCrory said, he can shave if we're compensated $3 million from Justice League to cover the costs of digitally adding Cavill's mustache back into Fallout. Paramount, the studio, eventually intervened and said, no, that's nonsense. We're not doing that. We're not even accepting $3 million. He's just not allowed to shave his mustache. and so the moustache had to be digitally moved in Justice League to comic effect, I understand, having not seen the film, but having seen photos of it.

I have watched, so I saw Justice League when it came out, I also watched the recut, you know, all that released the Snyder cut shite, I watched that, which doesn't contain any, as I understand it, doesn't contain, any of the footage of him with the moustache because it only contains the footage that Zach Snyder shot and I have to be honest I don't think I don't think the efforts to remove it in Just League are quite as bad as are made out but it's just

something just doesn't seem quite right and I you know hashtag release the mustache cut and all that you know I think I would quite like to do it like I think there are some images of like the untreated footage floating around and like

should have just line into it to be honest so the world is ready for I don't know why did it go that route The world is ready for a bearded Mustached Superman Yeah I don't know If we can have a Batman with like a 5 o'clock shadow I think we can have Superman with a beard

But you know Yeah But the mission is to jump into France Undetected from high altitude Where the White Widow is in Paris Again Walker Hammond's home That Hunt won't make the hard decision and Walker just jumps out through a thunderstorm at high altitude into Paris.

There's a great single shot going right out of the plane into the jump. So this halo jump was planned for over a year. The filming took place in the United Arab Emirates, as that was the only area that would legally allow them to perform the stunt. And they tried it in a wind tunnel. They tried filming it in a wind tunnel, but they found it looked unrealistic. Cruz actually performed the stunt 106 times, including practice jumps.

To prepare for each jump, Cruz inhaled pure oxygen for 20 minutes to avoid decompression sickness. Yeah, I think the thing that I find... I have a weird mixture of feelings about this stunt. So I would say this is... This is the thing for this film, right?

Yeah, so... The same way to you had them. Hanging off the plane for the last one. Burge Gleifa for four I think when we get to the next one I won't go into it now it's probably the train thing in the next one right

and then there's bi planes in final reckoning yeah right this is the thing for this film and there's a lot to be said for the sequence right I find it a very engaging a very engaging sequence right

I think it's paced quite well in terms of like building tension because obviously like Cavill's character gets knocked out and you know it's very well done right and this kind of like you know the approaching solid ground

like really ramps up the stress levels it's very involving in terms of like actually being impressed by the stunt work it is underneath so many levels of unnecessarily amped up digital embellishment

so yes I was going to say the same it looks CG to me like at a point says there's clearly digital effects. Like, they're clearly jumping into a digital Paris, because as I just said, they shot it in the United Arab Emirates. But you could, it looks CGE. So, falling

through the thunderstorm, looks computer generated. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but I don't know, the way they shoot it doesn't make it the most engaging stunt in this franchise for me. No, I mean, because the funny

thing is, like, this is the thing for this film, but we'll go to talk about the sequence ones that are on the ground, right? And there's a couple of things that happened there that have actually ended up a lot more memorable than this. Yeah. And I don't know why they've taken that approach with this. I don't know if it was because they needed something to obscure the digital Paris, because they were worried it was going to look too fake. I don't think it does. I think you could tell somebody that was filmed above Paris with digital weather effects on top of it. They'd probably believe you, to be honest,

you know so it's it's a weird decision I don't really you know for a for a season hangs its hat on the tangibility

of its set pieces I find it a weird decision narratively as well it does not feel as impactful as say the Birch Khalifa because I clearly understood why Tom Cruise had to climb the Birch Khalifa

in character I understood that he had to get to the server room to blah blah blah to whatever I'm less clear about why he has to jump into Paris from higher altitude there is some explanation like

the White Widow watches all routes into the country so you'll know if you go on the ground but it doesn't feel as necessary it doesn't feel as important for the narrative or the character yeah it's a set piece it's a set piece that has

been inserted so as a set piece yes you know rather than building some ridiculous set piece around, I mean, sure, it might be, you know, like the, like the, like the, to take the Birch-Kalifa example, right, which we've spoken about many times, right? Like, yes, it is

a contrivance that, you know, you can only get in from the outside, you know, yes, of course it is, but it kind of, it comes up organically within the way the plot is written. Here it is, like, it is very much

dropped in, you know? Yeah, yeah, we must happen this way, so we have a set piece rather than we're going to build a set piece around this particular thing that has happened. Yeah, we meet Walker, you know, getting on the plane. Like there's no build-up. He's just, he's ready to go

on the plane. They do land, even saves Walker's life on the jump, and they do infiltrate the party in Paris. So Walker and Hunt follow a suspect into the toilets, someone they suspect to be John Lark. These toilets are surprisingly clean and pristine

for a huge rave. like this toilet set. It's all white and it really highlights the kind of dark suits of our heroes. They really stand out. I think this works well. So Walker, being a big burly man, knocks out the suspect with the mask-making machine, which breaks it. And so they have to figure something else out. There's a point where some French homophobes laugh at the men in the cubicle and they all leave singing Le Vion Rose together, like all French men do at parties. which is a normal thing for Frenchmen to do. I've actually highlighted this scene with the Frenchmen because I think it's an easy cut. I think this absolutely should have been cut and kind of speaks to the runtime inflation of this franchise. As I said, every film has been longer than the one that preceded it,

actually with the exception of Rogue Nation, which is slightly shorter than goes protocol. But the suspect wakes up and they fight. Now, this suspect was meant to be a cameo from a well-known actor. They have not revealed who it was meant to be, but the person couldn't do the stunts. So they just got a stunt guy. So they fight. Henry Cavill does this meme thing where he pumps his arms in preparation to fight.

Ilsa appears, Rebecca Ferguson, from the last film, and she saves Ethan by killing the suspect. So Ethan decides to go meet the White Widow without the mask, hoping that she's never met John Lark. The White Widow is, as I said, the lovely Vanessa Kirby. She turns out to be the daughter of Max from the first film. Now, this is only mentioned very briefly, but it does speak to what I've already mentioned, Christopher McCrory's obsession with continuity and bringing all these films together. I'm really emphasising this because I feel like, I haven't seen Final Reckoning yet, but I feel like it will become important later.

You know, that McCrory is obsessed with bringing back things from previous films. the franchise. Yeah, and I think the important thing to note here is that her character being the daughter of Max, and I'm not at all foreshadowing here about things and opinions I will have about later films. I'm definitely not foreshadowing. I think the thing, the key thing about this, and this is not a slight on Vanessa Kirby, I like her performance, I quite like her involved in her, like, she's good fun in this film, I think. However, The idea that she is the daughter of Max in the first film is of absolutely zero consequence to either film. Yeah, no, this is why I'm mentioning it here, because despite this brief mention, it never comes up again.

It's not important. It truly is of absolutely no relevance whatsoever. Yeah. We're not getting Vanessa Redgrave back as Max, so it never comes up again. You don't even get like some ridiculous vintage vintage. scene where, you know, we're doing Max 316 or whatever, or opening up, you know, it's just

Job 316, you know, or anything like, anything like that. There's like a fleeting reference to that in like a little... And that's it. It's completely pointless, frankly. Not even a photoshopped version of Vanessa Redgrave and a young Vanessa Kirby. Yeah.

But Ethan liaises with the White Widow promises to get her out alive in exchange for what she has. Because there's contractors out to kill Lark and by extension the White Widow. There's a knife fight and they escape with help from Ilsa. I think we discussed Ilsa in the last film, in the last episode. You know, there's a lot to say about Ilsa Faust's approach to femininity and the modern

blockbuster, go back and listen, but I think it's interesting that there's contrasting feminities in this scene of Ilsa and the White Widow. So this is very much heightened by Ilsa is wearing a pantsuit, like a sensible pantsuit. and Kirby is wearing a long, flowy dress. And there is contrasting approaches to femininity expressed through their clothing. But they are both, you know, highly capable women. So McCrory is very interested in writing competent women

who fit into the environment and aren't damsels in distress. I'll talk about this a bit more later. But, yeah, he's very interested in writing strong women. So the white widow reveals the plan to extract the asset that John Lark wants from an Arban motorcade. It's Solomon Lane, Sean Harris, and he has a beard now. There's a sequence where even daydreams about having to kill an innocent god to preserve the John Lark persona. And this was going to be more emphasised in earlier drafts of the script, where there was an emphasis on how he has to be John Lark and do morally questionable things

for the greater good and it was going to focus on how he has to preserve this John Lart persona and be John Lark this terrorist for a long time that's largely cut out of the film besides from this brief

brief bit but I mean Ethan Hunt has been doing morally questionable things from the start of this franchise like it's portrayed as new here because he's portraying a terrorist but he's always been

murdering people and you know doing extra judicial killings so Walker plants with the CIA director that Hunt actually is John Locke and as part of his argument he highlights how many times Ethan Hunt has been disavowed and cast aside by his government and so Ethan Hunt wouldn't revenge

which is a fair point he has been disavowed an awful lot they undertake the mission to break out Solomon Lane from this motorcade this visually echoes a similar sequence in Christopher Nolan's Dark Night where there is an attack on a motorcade It's a bit scary how much it echoes it actually

I've actually got a note here Right and I think this is the appropriate juncture to bring it up Please This really really does feel like The most Christopher Nolan influenced entry in this series There's so many bits where kind of like it really has for better and worse um adopted the Christopher Nolan

you know school of action cinema right because even the halo segment has a lot to it which I think feels quite um dark nightish you know like I'm thinking about the sequence in Hong Kong in the dark night it kind of there's a lot of overlap there in terms of how that's shot and the choices to go for I'm surprised that this is explicitly

similar as it is like it is very similar like I mean from the minute it starts happening in the cinema I was thinking oh this is a little bit like that the scene in the dark night it's interesting yeah so yeah in the dark night

there is a motorcade a police motorcade carrying a prisoner I can't remember is it the Joker I can't remember oh no no it's Harvey Dent and the Joker holds it that's right

but yeah there is a a blockage on the road so the motorcade has to be diverted to this kind of underground tunnel by a river and this is the exact same setup as we get in this film there's a blockade that means that he has to divert and blah blah blah yeah it suffers for me because it just highlights nolan's better grasp of communicating space through visual storytelling than mccrory who is not as good at communicating that as i said in the last episode and we'll continue to to say while he's still directed these films. It also suffers

from the fact that Ethan's daydream of the scene was filmed more interestingly than the actual scene. So Ethan's daydream is all, you don't have any sound effects. It's all non-dietic music while Ethan runs this heist

and kills this innocent man. But that is shot more interestingly and more engagingly than the actual scene, which is fairly standard sound effects. runs, guns, etc. So Sean Harris is back at Solomon Lane. Sean Harris didn't want to return

because he wanted the character to die in Rogue Nation. But McCrory and Cruz had determined that they had future ideas for him. They wanted him back as a long-running antagonist, which Sean Harris, again, did not want. So he's only back for this one film. But yes, during the heist to get him, Hunt goes off script to save the life of Lane's guards.

There's a good shot of water moving through the van to meet Lane as the van sinks in the river sand. I do like that short. That is a good shot. Benji retrieves Lane from underwater, Lufour extracts him on a boat, hunt and walker and escape on motorbikes. And there's a chase scene through the busy streets of Paris. Ethan goes the wrong way around the roundabout around the Arc de Triumph. And then as a gang are escaping, they're confronted by a cop.

Ethan begs her to walk away, but she doesn't, and she is ultimately shot by the white widows henchmen. So Ethan fucks up his undercover identity because he can't bring himself to watch a cop die. And again, we're into this thematic question of sacrifice, of whether this is a weakness or not on Ethan's part, whether he is willing to sacrifice one person, in this case a cop, for the greater mission, for the sake of the world. As a further escape, Lane is shot by an assassin on a motorbike and there's another chase through the Paris streets. The structure of chase upon chase didn't work for me. I thought that was a screenwriting problem.

You know, it's fun that Ethan ends up in a very ordinary boxy car zooming through Paris, but yeah, the chase on chase didn't work for me. I think the one thing during these chase sequences, I think the thing that worked for me about this, And I agree with you to like the Chase Sponcheate, that part of it. I can't really, you know, I can't really remember much about it. The one thing I do remember about it, and it kind of speaks to how much I enjoy Sean Harris in this role, to be honest with you, even here, right? And I'll come to kind of like once we get to the bit after this and things settle down a little action-wise for a while. Like some of the line deliveries he has, I just think are absolutely fantastic.

Yeah, he's great. But the thing that I really like in the sequence is this entire time where he's in like a flipping straight jacket and getting like, you know, driven around this car and seeing car suits, he's completely placid. He's super calm. Barely an expression comes across his face and it's just, there's something about it

where it's just in a, you know, in a series full of kind of like action and bombast and explosions and all dressed this, this placid, scarily quiet guy. And this goes back to kind of like what I was saying about his performance. in the last film when we were talking about Rogue Nation. I love it. I just think it's great. Yeah. No, I think he's great. He's really good in this role. And it's a shame he's not in more films.

The character of Solomon Lane is repeatedly referred to as an anarchist in this film, which is a very early 20th century moral panic around bomb-wielding anarchists. A very diffuse way of referring to an antagonist of capital, of capitalism. It's obviously not at all connected with, you know, actual political anarchism, Mikalba Kunin, Emma Goldman, Enrico Malatesta. But it's a very lazy way of, yeah, referring to... I mean, this comes down to, this is where, kind of like, you know, we've spoken about the politics of these films before, or the apparent apolitics of them, which I don't think is always particularly accurate, as we've discussed in previous episodes. but the thing that I find interesting about this is because you're right it is but like

I don't think it would even I'd have to go back and watch Rogue Nation again I don't think they refer to him as such in Rogue Nation No they definitely don't This feels like a bit This feels like a bit of a retcon right You know because like The whole thing about him

And the last one was like you know I'm killing to You know I'm killing to bring a right change or killing to bring a right It's like it's not It's not It's not anarchism that it's a very simplistic. It's very simplistic in the same

way that people kind of like, in the States will refer to anything to the left of you know, Paul Pot is the left of I don't know, I mean anything that they've seen on the news last week is communism. It's just weird. It's a very

simplistic reading of it and I think it kind of flattens out that it flattens out that character's motivations a little bit I think in a way that is not great. Yeah, it flattens the character and it's it's just this feels even more you know studiously apolitical than the previous films and because the baddies are just quote-unquote anarchists who just want to

get the plutonium cause to set off nukes and you know spread terror i mean we get a bit of larks manifesto but the idea of larks manifesto is like great suffering brings great change which isn't a coherent political philosophy and so we don't really get that kind of political insight that we got in even the previous film yeah even the previous film

but yeah ghost protocol even Rogue Nation had more political I don't know now to it here these are just you know bomb-wielding anarchists which as I say is a caricature

from the early early 20th century so they get Solomon Lane in the sewers and extract his microship like you would extract the microchip of a cat and he monologues a little bit about the syndicate and morality

and they put the microchip in a drone and they fly it away I there's a reason this little monologue he does there's a reason it's in the trailer I honestly this for me is like it's like about Sean Addis's like delivery here it just really

I really enjoy it and they actually opened the trailer for the film with it. It was like, you know, where it's like him kind of like taunting him with the, you know, your mission should you choose to accept it? I wonder did you ever choose not to? You know, it's like, he does it in that

horrible weasily vent to fallout of all your good intentions. Like it's, it's, I love it. It's so good. It's just, you know, this like little weasily weasily British guy is kind of like the sort of like the opposing force to kind of like all American action here.

It's just, it's great. I love it. He's real good. Like, you know, I'm criticizing to some extent Christopher's emphasis on continuity and bringing back old people rather than introducing new characters. But I do like Sean Harris as Solomon Lutton and I wouldn't be opposed to him

taking up a Blofeld, like, you know, arch nemesis role in the franchise, which he doesn't, but I wouldn't have been opposed to that. Yeah. No, I really like his performance. I mean, any problems I have with his, presence in this film or like some flattening out in the backyard. It's

a script thing, right? I mean, it's a role as has been written from it. I think you know, this little, this little section he has with the monolith shows like how good you could have, you know, how good, how well you could have utilized him with a slightly

you know, a slightly more thought out role, frankly a little bit like the last film. I think as a character like the performance was every bit as good and certainly this little monologue but I think might even be better than his performance in the previous film. I think he was a better written character in the previous film though. Yes.

Agreed. So, Ethan as Lark meets the White Widow by Notre Dame, where she demands that Ethan brings Ilsa to get the plutonium, and they arrange a meeting in London. Ethan meets Ilsa, where she says she's trying to kill Lane to gain her freedom from

MI6. So they go to London, they liaise with the secretary, Alec Baldwin, and they discuss their plan to disguise Benji as Lane. Baldwin reveals that the White Widow is working with the CIA and that the CIA thinks Ethan is John Lark. So Baldwin terminates the mission, but Ethan tranquilises him so he can go through with trading Lane. Then Walker reveals himself as John Lark to Solomon Lane and berates him for his complicated plan. Then Walker realizes too late that he's been tricked and the lane he's talking to is actually Benji in the mask.

And Baldwin was in on all this as well. And then, just as it looks like everything's working out, the lights go out, and the CIA director deploys a team to bring them all in. And then the CIA team are revealed to actually be on John Lark's side. I forgot about that last bit. Yeah. There's just one too many twists in this scene. Like, I like a twisty scene, but there's just, there's like one too many. And it becomes like the scene in community, an episode of community, where there's just one too many.

That's exactly what I was about to reference there. Yeah, and the Dean is like holding his head because he can't take it all in. And it just got a bit like that, where everyone has fought through all these things to get to this point so that they can have the twist. And it's slightly too much. Yeah. I'm going to have to try and cut those two together now. Yeah. The Dean is reacting to the CIA team coming out and being on John Lange.

But in the fracas, Walker stabs Baldwin in the tummy. Lufa manages to plant a tracking chip on Walker and Lane gets taken. So then there's a chase across London. Ethan chases Walker into a funeral service at St. Paul's. There's a chase across some rooftops and across the Thames. There's some good kind of classic Ethan Hunt reluctance to jump out of an office window onto Blackfriars Station Roof, which is good,

gets into the kind of discussion of aging and the representation of aging in action films that we've discussed in previous episodes. Also, just, again, like, it's easy to forget how versatile an actor Tom Cruise can actually be. Yeah, because he's funny.

Because he's funny. Like, he has comedic timing. Like, when he says, like, I'm jumping. out a window, you know, it's just, it's very easy to forget that with the more recent iterations of these films. Yeah, no, I like it when Cruz is leaning into that more comedic aspect of Ethan Hunt and that more comedic aspect that he can bring to it. So this is a good chase scene for that, but it also emphasizes his kind of aging and stuff.

So Kelvin K. Jinde writes a book chapter called Tom Cruise as Ethan Hunt, Virtuous Masculinity, and aging heroes in Jerry Action Cinema to the term I've not heard before but I guess refers to the kind of aging action heroes like pre-spoilis, Swartanegas, the Leicester Stallone, who are still doing

action films despite being quite old men. Or the likes of Liam Neeson who didn't even start doing it until it was already pretty you know. But Jinday observes the evolution in the representations of aging heroes, especially Ethan in Mission Impossible. So the modern aging hero focuses on social connections, self-sacrifice, and action

beyond violence, rather than beating people up, rather than using his muscles and running really fast and punching people. And for Ethan, this transforms into sacrifices, like his choice at the end of the film to end his relationship with Julia and to, you know, give in to his sense of responsibility to the world. and it also leans away from kind of it leads into the big stunts that Ethan does in this film and in later

later episodes in the franchise where he is not the big burly man doing action he is doing things despite his aging body so ultimately the chase scene concludes when Walker escapes into the tape modern and a helicopter picks him up from the top of the spire along the way Walker threatens Ethan telling him he'll kill Julia and Ethan has to watch his Walker and Lane fly away.

Lufa explains that Lane and Walker will use their plutonium cores to make two nuclear bombs that need to be disarmed simultaneously. Lufor also explains the deal with Julia to Ilsa and he makes Ethan out to be some messianic global saviour figure. This is feeding into what we got a hint of in the last film, but Macquarie and Cruz at this point are mythologizing Ethan Hunt in a way that's more egregious

than like James Bond or Jason Bourne he is a savior for the world you know he's the only person standing in the way of total destruction of the world now this messianic view of Ethan Hunt you know where he's not just an ordinary guy

will continue in the next films so I think I'll talk about it more in the next films but you do start to get the hint of cult leader vibes which very much jives with Tom Cruise's real life personality. Yeah and I think this particular

treatment of the Ethan Hunt character and the positioning of them I think like you I'm going to talk about it more in the next episode right because I think this becomes more important for it becomes more important for the next film

I think also not to jump ahead because between the recording of the last episode and the recording of this episode, I have seen the Final Reckoning. I know you haven't seen it yet. I think it becomes especially important over the course of the next two films, right?

Which are ostensibly a two-parter slash ardent. We'll get into that where we come to them. But I have a problem with this, and it feels at odds with what I think, right? And I do try my best not to criticise films for not doing things that I think they should rather than things like. but I do think this is a misstep.

Yes. But it's not a misstep that it's kind of like gently dipping its toes into the water like Macquarie and Cruz for that matter because, you know, I mean these are his films in terms of creative force, right? It's not their kind of like, you know, tiptoeing into it.

They jump in with both feet on this, right? It becomes a big theme through the rest of this film and particularly the ones after it. And I think it's a misstep and this is where it starts really. Yeah, I criticize that in reckoning at the time, so I'll come back to it. Next episode, probably. But yes, they had a tracker

on Lane, which allowed them to follow him to Kashmir in India. So Lane and Walker intended to detonate the bomb in Kashmir, which would irradiate a huge source of fresh water for India, Pakistan and China, killing millions. So the gang arrive at an emergency medical camp in Kashmir and even bumps into Julia, played by Michelle Monaghan from Mission Impossible 3, and her new husband Gary, played by some guy. Wes Bentley. Sure. Best known for his funny facial here in Hunger Game series.

Hunger Games, that's where I know him from. Yes, I remember. Yes, so Julia realizes that she was sent there by Walker and Lane, and she has this terrifying realization that she's just here as kind of bait for Ethan Hunt. They discover one of the nuclear bombs is on a... comms tower and walker starts the 15 minute countdown on the detonator and heads to a helicopter hunt grabs onto a second helicopter and takes off after him there's some complicated set up with the bombs need to be disarmed simultaneously but also the detonator needs to be disarmed and the detonator is

going off with Walker on the helicopter and blah blah I do have a quote I maybe this is explained in the film and you can help me out here it's like I it's like it's like it's like it's like The diffusing of the bombs thing, right? That's one of these things where, in the moment, watching it as it's happening in the cinema, it's just like, oh, no, a bomb, they must diffuse it. Oh, no, time pressure. And it's like, it's fine. You kind of go with it. Looking back on this with a more critical eye, why did this need to be this complex?

Why could there just be one bomb? Yeah. It's a nuclear bomb. Like, you totally need to, you know. the last scene it's like the the scene in the sewers it's just too complicated and it's just don't need for it to be that complicated it's ironic though you know mccory was first brought in on ghost protocol to make the the ghost protocol scripts less complicated and smooth it out and now we've got to this point where mccrory is making these two complicated scripts i said before i think mccory

is a competent director i think he's a better director than he is a screenwriter and that he is been given so much screenwriting power over this franchise is a misstep because he's he's he's not that good at it he's fine but he's he's he's a better director than screenwriter in my opinion yeah i don't know i can't quite figure that this i would because i say i still think of chris recording my head as the writer of the usual suspect so in my head he's a better screenwriter and he is a director but like that was a long time ago now right so i don't know how relevant that. Wes Bentley, the paper bag, a plastic

bag kid from American Beauty. That's what, that's, that was his initial thing. Oh, okay. Yeah. Sorry, I was an absurd. I remember because it was annoying me. I was like, I know that I didn't first see when the Hunger Games. What was it? That was it. He was the plastic, guy who fills the plastic bag in American Beauty. Anyway.

Okay. Husband Gary, who we don't have to worry about, because he's barely in it. He's just, yeah. He seems nice. He seems fine. Yeah. he's a doctor or something yeah but it's um

what are we talking about sorry I've gone off on a Wes Bentley digression we're talking about McCroy a screenwriter versus director of the complications of this action sequence but I think yeah no that was it it just it feels needlessly complex you know it's like it does

it's just because it's already quite complicated like you know Walker has the detonator and hunts going after him and needs to get it and they need to like a certain level of complexity to bring the moving parts to get okay fine but it's just like I keep going back to why to you know and like to the extent

I've not really internalised what was actually going on with the bombs and I've seen this film I think three times now yeah I feel like if you've written yourself into a place where there were two bombs two nuclear bombs in the same physical location you can easily smooth that out

and just make it one nuclear bomb in one location Yeah, yeah Because at least all these massive And I feel like it's just I'd love to know what point they decided on that Because the only thing I can think of as being The mechanic for it is

That Benji and Ilsa get separated Right Because one's looking for a bomb And the other Or in fact are they even looking for No, because Luther's already found one And they've split up to find the other one Yes, Luther and Julia

disarming one So they get some time together to talk about Ethan and their relationship. Meanwhile, Benji and Ilsa are going after the other bomb, and they go into, like, Solomon Lane's cabin, and Lane ties up Ilsa and whatever. Two bombs, more or less the same place. Yeah, it's too much.

There's too much. So, yes, so Ilsa does get... Ilsa is going after the other bomb and gets tied up by Solomon. Solomon Lane, who she used to work for. They don't really get into that dynamic in any interesting way. But Macquarie had written, Mara Macquarie had a rule for his writing, which is that women cannot be damsels in distress. And he almost took that too far, he says. This is him talking to the Hollywood reporter.

He says that he didn't want Ilsa to end up in the situation that she did, where she was a damsel in distress, where she's tied up and helpless, and a man has. has to save her. So what he did in the end was he puts her in that situation, but she gets herself out of it, which is his cheat for working around this damsel in distress rule that he self-imposed. So he ends up with the five strong women in the film, which he says are Ilsa, Erica Sloan, played by Angela Bassett, Julia, the White Widow, and the Parisian cop from the previous scene where she gets shot. He says that all the women in this movie own the scenes that they're in, and they're all there throwing Ethan off balance. They're not people

who look to Ethan with any sort of dependence. They're not looking to Ethan for protection or to solve their problem. His game is thrown off by each and every one of them. That's what he likes so much. And I think that does come across, you know, in fairness to him. I think he does write these women characters well, and they're

not damsels in distress, and they do have their own rules, you know, independent of Ethan. So I think In fairness, he is good at that and it is a change for this franchise from the doldrums of the misogyny of the second film.

But we get the kind of second big action stunt sequence of this film, which is the helicopter chase where Hunt is chasing Walker in the helicopter and Henry Cavill and Comcruis are both actually in helicopters, leaning out the side of it and shooting at one another. Blah, blah, blah. It's good. I really do feel the lack of a good

heist scene in this film, though. Yeah. Yeah, so it ultimately ends up with Ethan and Walker crashing onto a cliffside and fighting over the detonator. Even pulls a big hook down onto Walker's face, and Walker falls to his death in a fiery explosion. Quistram over Corey has said that one of the things that fans berating for

is killing off Henry Cavill's Walker so quickly, because he could have been a good, long-term antagonist like Solomon Lane and frankly I agree I'm not you see the funny thing I'm not sure I do agree with that

because yeah I'm talking wrong I like Aval in this film I think he's really good but I go back to his introduction with Erica Sloan right admittedly when we still think he's you know just a sort of you know he's just a sort of

you know he's on the protagonist's side but he's an annoying you know an annoying suit or whatever as like, you know, he's a blunt instrument. I think that's what he is, right? I don't like Cavill's an actor. I don't think he can quite carry off scheming in my view. No, that's fair.

Which I think is needed for that sort of thing. I enjoy him in this role. I think he's one of the more memorable one-shot antagonists that we've had in this series. I'm not sure he fits in that kind of role. no I think you're right he is more interesting as a foil to Ethan Hunt than he is later

when he's fully just the general arc anarch anarcher terrorist what have you guy yeah I can see your point so at the last second they cut the wires of their respective bombs and Ethan disarms the detonator they're safe and the bombs are diffused and even

save the world again he's on the cliff side like a Messiah figure exhausted and having having disarmed the detonator. So the CIA director sends helicopter to save Ethan from exposure on the mountainside and he gets a moment with Julia to get some closure. So there's a scene in a hospital bed where, I don't know, Macquarie is kind of subtextually apologising for the franchise's treatment of Julia. The scene where Lane gets handed over to the White Widow to go back

to MI6, effectively freeing Ilsa. This was meant to be the last scene in the film but test audiences preferred the scene where Ethan's in the hospital bed, even though Tom Cruise didn't want to end the film in a hospital bed, you know? And so the CIA director tells Ethan in voiceover that he was right. He used his right to care about one life against millions, you know, and this theme of sacrifice and Ethan Hunt being unable to do that, make the hard decisions is concluded with Erica Sloan saying, yeah, you're right, it's good to save people. It's good to care deeply about your which is the major theme of this franchise now. Spy Friends.

Exactly. But yes, and that's the end of Fallout. Ultimately, I find this a little unremarkable. I think there's a lot of great action in this, but it really does feel to me like the franchise is starting to repeat itself and stagnate. So we get a lot of continuity. We get a lot of returning characters that McCurry brings back from previous films, notably Julia and Solomon Lane, who are in that very first dream sequence.

And I think that's to the franchise's detriment. I think there's also a lot of characters just reiterating information that's already been given, especially about the bombs and disarming them. We hear about this set up with the bombs multiple times. and I find the script very flabby, very complicated, the antagonists have unclear motivations. It's all competent, but I just feel like I don't see what everyone else sees in this film.

I don't see this as the franchise high point, which as I've already said, I think, is Ghost Protocol. It's good, but it's not special for me. I think I'm largely with you. I think I'm more positive. You're more positive, it sounds like, yeah. However, I would agree with you that I don't believe this to be the franchise high point. And I think it comes back to, it comes back to Macquarie as a director again, right?

And, you know, maybe this says more about my personal preferences and what I look for in truly memorable cinema more than it does him as a director, right? I'm perfectly willing to accept that. but again it's a little bit what I said about Rogue Nation the last time it's it's aggressively competent

you know like I can't find I can't really find fault with a lot of it but there's nothing that really makes me lean forward in my seat and go geez how did they do that or wow what did they do it why did they do it that way like there's nothing that makes me

you know in terms of kind of like visual storytelling, visual action shot choices that kind of like really kind of like add to an emotional reaction to something that's happening I just don't feel it you know and the thing I will keep coming back to is I will keep coming back to

the you know ridiculous Dutch angles that De Palma was using the first one I'll keep coming back to the kind of like the camera movements that Brad Bird was deployed in particular the Burge-Khalifa sequence in Ghost Protocol. You know, mission possible too for all of its problems. Like, you know, it was very stylistically driven by what John Wu's sensibilities were as a director. And the problems of that film, actually, for mere the script, rather than really how it was shot.

So Fallout kind of sits in that same area as Rogue Nation. where it's like the action sequences in particular I think the ones that I'm probably thinking of in this film in particular probably the helicopter chase and the bathroom fight sequence right or probably the standout ones for me they're really well done but that's all I can really find I can say about them

you know I there's nothing I can't think of anything that happened in the helicopter chase that I thought was inventive or different it was just it was engaging it was well done, you know, and that's not to say that, you know, like, I don't want people coming out and just, like, thinking that I think this is a bad film. It's not. It's a good film. It's a really good, fun, engaging film. Yeah. I just don't know, I just don't think it's, I just don't think it's that interesting, you know? It's the one, I, I don't know how likely

I am to re-watch this, you know, in future years. I will re-watch the first one. I will rewatch ghost protocol I don't know if I will this one you know which says something when there are these elements that I've said I like like Sean Harris as the villain like you know like there there are definitely things I like

but it just doesn't feel that memorable to me yeah it feels flat it feels flatter than the previous films it's just a little more I don't know lifeless that's something missing that

McCroy doesn't bring to it like you say the previous films had those directorial stamps they had you know De Palma's stamp on it John Wu's stamp on it even JJ Abrams stamp which is not a stamp I enjoyed but

it was there and yeah this this feels like a flatter version of Rogue Nation and it just just doesn't quite work no not that it doesn't work

but that's the thing it does quite work yes that's it like you know it's a little bit like like one of the and in a way it's interesting right because it starts to echo

the very kind of like action cinema it almost sits apart from right so we spoke about you know being franchise domination in the box office section up front right and one of the things that started to annoy me about the Marvel films

which I think are relevant here purely because of the concept of a long-running series in an interconnected universe which this film is now starting to try and do is when you have such an established set up I think the lack of risk-taking and I realize this is a ridiculous thing to be saying

about the series where a man is hurling himself out of airplanes and off cliffs and things but I mean like cinematic risk-taking with form rather than kind of like, you know, what you're physically doing to kind of, you know, then shoot on screen, is, you know, when you have such an established base, like, the idea that you take more visual or narrative risks is what makes them interesting. Yeah. And I think this, the CES has started to fall into a pattern where it had just engaging enough story in Ghost Protocol, because we're talking about Ghost Protocol, because we're talking about Ghost Protocol. and there's a lot I like about ghost protocol but I don't think necessarily

the plot and the narrative was one of them like it's fine, it does its job right? Essentially it is not evolved from there if anything it is devolved or de-evolved whilst also becoming visually less interesting

and when you have things like you know crew strapping himself to the side of the plane or the helicopter chase here or a lot of the extremely competent action scenes, it can get away with it, but it doesn't make it an interesting film. Like it says to me, what would you say, right?

Because this film, as we record now, this film came out seven years ago. Yeah. Right? Which is actually, if you think a step back, it's actually quite a long time. It's surprising. What would you say is the single most remembered image from this film? Because I know what I think

is. Is it? I mean, probably like Henry Cavill pumping his arms. Exactly. That is exactly what I would. I think the single most iconic image from this film is Henry Cavill reloading his arms. Right.

The single most memorable part of this film is an off-the-cuff inventive thing that happens in a split second and is then gone. Right. And as I understand it, he just, he did it. and then he was asked to repeat it for later takes. Yeah, improvised because he'd been punching a lot and kind of needed to move his arms to warm up. Yeah, and loosen himself a bit, right? And there's something about that

which speaks volumes to me. The most memorable thing about this film is a off-the-cuff piece of improvisation, which is different. You've not seen that before, and that's why it's memorable. Like it or not, and I think it probably speaks to a little bit about what we'll talk about in the two films after this, right, you know, Tom Cruise hurled himself out with an airplane.

It sounds horrendous on my part because, like, I'm not going to hurl myself out of an airplane anytime soon to entertain anybody, but... No. Like, so what? We know he's a madman. We know this. You know, so that to me, I actually think it's important little... microcosm there the fact that the most memorable image from this film is a tiny little snippet which was improvised right and i think that says a lot about the way that the film whilst engaging whilst interesting and really competently done and it's it's riveting to watch it is ultimately not that innovative it's not that memorable you know and it does sound a bit harsh like the way i'm phrasing it i'm sounding more harsh about this film than my feelings that are actually, you know, the harshness of my statements here don't line up to how I feel about this film. I enjoy this film. I like watching it, but it's just, there's something

about him. I'm just like, I'm not that, it's not that interesting to me. Yeah, a moment of improvisation from a new character as well. So I've seized on Henry Cavill as an interesting and new character to this franchise because he is a new character, because he, brings something new and fresh. Similarly, Vanessa Kirby as White Widow does the same. Bringing something new and the franchise at this point really needs it because I think it's stagnating. And this is, I mean, this is the path of franchises, right?

This is what we have discovered doing the Alien franchise, the Jurassic Park franchise, the Mission Impossible franchise. That franchises reach this point where they begin to stagnate and narratively repeat themselves. and it's not engaging and the interesting ones are the ones that take the bigger swings so

your Prometheus is your Jurassic worlds kind of they take bigger swings they change the dynamic a little bit in a way that is interesting and I think we're stuck on a trajectory now in the Mission Impossible films

where Christopher McCrory is just playing it safe He is bringing back old characters. He's referring to previous plot points. The narratives, like you say, are all fairly similar and fairly stayed. Because we've reached a point where they're playing it safe. They're green light in the next film before they've finished production of the other film because they know that they will just do the same thing and they will play it safe

and it will just be another iteration of the same thing. I mean, this is franchise filmmaking, right? this is Hollywood blockbuster filmmaking, you play it safe, you play conservatively, you make the same thing. Yeah, and it's at a point now where I think the, even

the marketing of the film is reliant upon the thing that Tom Cruise did, right? Because I remember, I remember during this, like the fact that he broke his ankle during production, you know? So I haven't seen Final Reckoning, as I've said, but I saw a post on Blue Sky with someone saying, you know, the marketing for this is so similar to previous films, because all I've seen is Tom Cruise hanging off a biplane.

But we already saw the marketing for Rogue Nation, where he's hanging off a jumbo jet. So, like, surely this is just a step back? Like, this is the same thing, but smaller. Yeah. And I think But at the time of recording this I've written a review of the final reckoning So I have views on how this goes

And I think we'll talk about it more than the films after this But I think what is clear with this film is It's very well done But in terms of the trajectory of the series It's hit a plateau at this point Right In contrast to a lot of other critics

I don't think this is obviously better than Rogue Nation not frankly I would be tempted to put Rogue Nation ahead of it right we'll see what I end up doing when we actually get to the rankings

but it's like it's not obviously better to me right if somebody was to turn around tell me they'd prefer Rogue Nation yeah okay fine but like I don't think there's daylight between the two right so regardless of whether you

what you think about this run of 4, 5, 6, right? The post-Abrams trilogy, let's see, right? Regardless of what you think the relative quality is of each of them, right? I don't think we're going in a good direction at this point. I think it has plateaued, and this is kind of like, for me, and certainly it seems that way, based upon critical and box office reception,

this kind of feels like the last hurrah. Right, yeah. This is the last one that kind of, like, got unqualified, largely unqualified adulation. Yeah, I saw a letterbox review of the final reckoning that said, Love the Mission Impossible franchise, glad it ended with Fallout. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, no, it's an interesting way.

I have odd feelings about this one. I like it. I really enjoyed it in the cinema. I do think it's a well-made film. I just ultimately don't think it's that I don't think it's that interesting a film and I really do

struggle with this idea that you you know a common thing with blockbuster cinema I think less so in the circles that I've kind of like spoken to a film about in recent years but I think at large there's this idea kind of like you know some films it's okay to

you know just turn your brain off and enjoy it right and I really struggle with that notion right it's you know particularly when you're doing with films of this budget and these resources I'm sorry it's okay to want better it's okay to want more right um and there's just with this it's like there's not there's not a lot to glom on to like I find myself even thinking that like I find the the politics of this film I don't

find terribly interesting it feels like a repeat of ghost protocol and rogue nation It's like I said, there's nothing... Nothing feels particularly innovative about this, you know? Like, we're talking about people hurried themselves out of airplanes, and it's impressive. It's like, I've seen point break. Yeah, they did that. You know, it's like, you know, it's like, you know, I'm not saying it's not impressive, but it's just, it's not, it's not new.

We've not, we've seen this sort of thing before. So, I have an odd one with this. I don't know quite why it gets, you know, the unadulterated praise praise it does. I like it I don't love it. True. Yes, agreed. Like I said, it's good but it's not special for me. Yeah. You know, ghost protocol is special and Rogue Nation has really

tight special moments but this is just good. It's good. But the thing is even Rogue Nation right it turned like me saying I find you know, I don't find this film fallout as interesting Like, even Rogue Nation, which I think suffers from some of the same, this is the thing, you see, it even feels ridiculous calling them issues, but suffers with some of the same sort of like, you know, shortcomings or lack of, lack of ambition, maybe, in narrative or something that this film does. Even then, it still had more interesting things. Like, you had that whole thing going on with, you know, MI6 being the ones who established the syndicate and kind of like British, you know, British, you know, British, and like the deep state. reading ahead. There is more interesting stuff going on there, which maybe the film doesn't

focus on, right, which is entirely the film's prerogative, and I wouldn't expect that type of film to do that, but there is something interesting underneath there. There's not here. There's not, or if it is, it's a repeat of something it's already done, right? Even the idea that kind of Walker, Cavill's character, or, you know, as John Lark, right, has this manifest and this, so, like, you know, he's like a zealot of some sort, basically. You don't really, like, you know, we never see it. Like, the only thing you really get out of this manifesto is, like, you know, this, for great peace there is to be great suffering thing, right?

That's it. Like, it doesn't really do anything with it. So, it's a case of, it's just, it is a, it's very well done, but it is a much less interesting version of, the least interesting films in the series. Yeah. You know? No, you don't even get the more complex politics of even free.

And it's just, it just feels lacking, it feels a bit flatter. Yeah. And that's when, like, you know, if somebody's not going to a mission possible film for, you know, the political undertones and, like, what political currents are informing the narrative choice, that's fine, right? Like, you don't have to. But I also think, just from an action sample, it is that. it is also starting to be a less interesting version of what went before. It's like I say, the

halo jump is impressive, but like it's obscured with CGI weather effects and things that don't make it particularly kind of like memorable. And again, I come back to the most memorable action part from this film is something that is not any of that. It's an off-the-cuff

improvisational moment that is reliant upon like a spark of invention. A very small trivial one, no doubt, but it's, to me it speaks volumes. that that is the iconic image of this film. Yeah. And I think a lot of this discussion

will bleed over into our discussion of the next film, which is Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning, Part 1, which is also directed by Christopher McCrory, written with Macquarie and Eric Jenderson. But yes, this is another Christopher McCrory entry, and it comes out in 2023. Again, there's more inflation of runtime

because this is longer still. but I think like a lot of the issues we've raised with this film will become compounded in Dead Reckoning Part 1 I haven't re-watched it yet I think you have but yes we'll have similar discussions maybe next time on the next episode so yes

do we turn for that next episode when we discuss Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part 1 as we continue our look through the Mission Impossible franchise You're going to have to start calling it Dead Reckoning Part 1 or somebody's going to show up and bundle you into a van, Simon. I am looking at Wikipedia

where the title on Wikipedia is written as Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part 1. I went to a cinema and I saw a film called Mission Impossible Day Recording Part 1 I'm looking at the poster which says Mission Impossible Day Recreckning Part 1. We'll fully get

into this discussion in the next episode. The funny thing actually is the funny thing actually I'm jumping ahead here with the kind of like the retight of the same but I was putting these films into like a ranking like you know a provisional one

we'll publish it with the last episode here but like I'm one of these dwebes who pays for letterboxed right so I can choose the poster that is kind of like to swayed because I can't do that but I do pay right but the thing that I find funny

funny about it is if you go as a mission possible the final reckoning half of the boasters still say Dead Reckoning Part 2 on it. It's just like this little switchroo

they tried to pull off is just like an absolute non-starter. It's just gonna, honestly I am enough of a, like, I'm anal enough about these things that this is going to annoy me for decades.

The fact that one of these films is called Dead Reckoning Part 1 and there's never a part 2. It is going to annoy the shit out of me. And I, like, I wouldn't put it past them. to revive this by doing

one of these interquale things by making Dead Reckoning Part 2 retrospectively but yeah I'm going to be watching it on Netflix because it recently came onto Netflix yes just checking on Netflix it's called Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning

on here so it's tough I'm not on board with this forced Mandela effect bullshit I'm not on board with it this is what I went saying I went incredibly not. I saw Dead Reckoning Part 1. Yeah, I saw

the title card. Like, you know, it's... Actually, you know, actually, you know, that's something I should do. I should re-watch it. I should re-watch, now that the final one is out, I should re-watch Dead Reckoning Part 1 to see if they've changed the title card actually. Well, yeah, I can report back on that

after watching it. But similarly, have you seen that the marketing for Thunderbolts, the MCU film, is now going by new Avengers, like there's even cinema listings calling it the New Avengers. Yeah, I saw that, because I saw a report

where somebody just referred to it as Thunderbolts, colon, the New Avengers. Spoilers for anybody who's not seen Thunderbolts, by the way. Spoilers put out by Marvel, put out by Disney's marketing board. But this is the point. What are we doing here? No, this is a little

hang up of mind, though, is like annoyance about film titles. Like, the other thing is that, what was the tip? The one that really annoyed me in recent history was the Zach Efron like Ted Bundy film Shockingly evil, vile in something and it could not decide

whether it had, one, it couldn't decide whether it had commas in the title, right? And then even when it had commas in the title, I saw different versions where one had an Oxford common and another didn't. And I'm like, I don't have strong feelings about which one you should choose, but just pick one.

and stick with it and these like this series has been given me a hard time because like you know colons and dashes all over the place because of the mission colon

impossible being the core title it's like yeah it's grammatically incoherent and possibly nightmare you know on the Tom Cruise film we've got an edge of tomorrow live Daria Pete situation where they seem to have

no this is not the first time he's trying to change the title it's funny though it's like because that one I feel like live, die, repeat everybody said

oh that's the better title no it's not yeah I think the edge of quite good because he's always on the edge to it like you know

I don't think I don't think them are particularly good you know no I don't think I don't think one is obviously better than the other

it's like you know yeah anyway yes with that long digression into grammar and titles during the

closing moments of this episode, we tank our commercial commercial viability. I would say that's what you paid the subs for, but people are getting this genius out into the world for free. Yeah, so that's... Yeah.

We're interested in the fans. We're not interested in the money. So tell your friends, tell people, we spend by word of mouth. We don't do any promotion for this. And if we did, we change the name halfway through. busy one of my alternate commas and films like, yes

we're too busy setting up a feed that we call the xenopod and then changing the name later to Take One Present and having a subseries on that same RSS feed because we're just as bad as anyone else at marketing

but yes do continue to subscribe to the Take One Presents feed do go to Take OneCinema net to read more follow us on Blue Sky Jim J.R and Simon XIX on all the socials

and yes follow us there and tell your friends and review and subscribe and whatnot and we will be back next month to discuss Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part 1 thank you for joining us and thank you Jim

and we'll see you next time bye-bye You know,