The Big Picture - The ‘Mission: Impossible’ Mailbag, and Movie Rankings

Episode Date: July 18, 2023

Sean and Amanda discuss the dramatic effect the SAG-AFTRA strike will have on the movie industry (1:00), before opening up the mailbag and answering any and all questions about the 'Mission: Impossible' franchise (15:00). Then, they do the impossible work of ranking all seven installments in the franchise (1:10:00). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, media consumers. I'm Brian Curtis. And I'm David Shoemaker. We're the hosts of The Ringer's Press Box podcast. Twice a week, we have a free-flowing conversation where two old, old friends talk about media and sports and a little politics. Plus interviews with guests like John Krakauer

and Jamel Hill. Funny stuff like the overworked Twitter joke of the week. Join us every Monday and Friday on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. I think that's right. Get groceries delivered across the GTA from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express. Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points.

Visit superstore.ca to get started. I'm Sean Fennessy. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about making the impossible possible. Today on the show, we will be answering your most pressing questions about Mission Impossible, Dead Reckoning Part 1,

and our favorite film franchise, which is, of course, the Mission Impossible franchise. We're going to rank all seven films they've shown us thus far in this series. Amanda, how are you doing? Is that like a broad question? Or is that a Mission Impossible question? It's a question of friendship.

That's really nice of you. You told me to put all of that away. So we record this podcast because... Then just lie because you're on a schedule you're on universal schedule even though universal can't work with mine separate conversation i'm great i'm really happy to see you how are you i'm just dandy i'm on i'm on the verge of an oppenheimer screening yeah've still got... I better be if anyone's fucking listening. Okay. Bringing the heat,

as always, Amanda Dobbins. Amanda, let's keep the heat up, okay? Yeah. Because before we get into Mission Impossible... Yeah, yeah, yeah. We should probably talk about some news. Some massive news.

I actually... So I have a question to start this segment that is also Mission Impossible themed. Okay. Which is, right now,

in this moment where we are recording, where is Tom Cruise and what is he doing? I don't know. I know that he was literally globetrotting to get to as many screenings as possible before the strike kicked in. And I believe that once the strike kicked in, he was struck by lightning and was no longer allowed to do what he loves to do, which is sell the shit out of his movies. And or film stunts for those movies.

That's right. We talked about this on Jam Session a little because, but it's like, I don't know how Tom Cruise exists outside of jumping off of things for film and or promoting that film. It wasn't always this way. Once upon a time, he was just training to bare-knuckle box to perform in Far and Away, Ron Howard's period drama, starring his soon-to-be wife, Nicole Kidman.

But for almost 20 years now, he is, like, completely tied to Ethan Hunt and performing his own stunts and just, like, giving weird interviews about how to turn off motion smoothing and how he likes popcorn and buying tickets. I think for the next

however many months that the SAG after strike lasts, he will be in the giant glass box that Solomon Lane was captured in at the end of the fifth Mission Impossible film. I thought you were going to say that he's in like

the giant glass box that always houses like the cape from some weird Thor movie and the arc light lobby. They're the same thing. weird Thor movie in the Arclight lobby. They're the same thing, yes. They're the same. They're breathable. And you can just like pause

and take a photo with Tom Cruise in the glass box. Well, now that would be an attraction. I know. And I don't know if that would violate the SAG strike. We should talk about that though because that is just extraordinarily

important news in the world that we cover on a regular basis. I believe it was last Thursday, right shortly after we recorded our podcast about the mission impossible film that SAG decided to go on strike. Um, this is obviously happening simultaneous to the writer's guilt of America striking. The reason for the strike is very obvious, which is a demand for increased and better working conditions and pay across the industry specifically as an after effect of the great Netflix correction that happened streaming altering

really how all of hollywood works and so the actors which is a large one of the biggest unions in america um has stopped working and that means that hollywood effectively has halted production in large part and according to insiders those who understand this space i highly recommend people listen to the town they've been doing a bang-up job covering this series of events on that show. But it doesn't really seem like this is going to get resolved until September, October, November. This morning, I heard December 1st, which was the most grave prediction I've yet heard. Now, we can talk about what this means and what the ramifications will be for us, for our purposes, covering the film industry and film releases here on the show. In general, what are your thoughts about the SAG strike?

It's a bummer. I think it's a bummer for everyone involved, but it really seems like it's a bummer for the many members of SAG who could not get a contract and who seem to have some pretty, from my perspective, legitimate concerns about getting a contract and working conditions that reflect the dramatic way in which the industry has changed in the last five to 10 years.

It also stinks as people who like to cover movies and movie stars. And I don't say that in a way of blaming actors or people going on strike. It's just that it will mean fewer movie stars, fewer premieres, the different way of talking about how these movies are released. And, you know, we'll feel that loss pretty immediately, especially since we cover movies. And I was a little surprised. It seemed like it was not going to happen

until it was really going to happen. I don't know if you had like a similar... Cynical bastard that I am, I thought it was going to happen. I do think that there is a little bit of merit to the cynicism that the studios were waiting as long as possible to delay it so as to promote as many summer blockbusters as possible. of like this, you know, TV season as it were in the streaming world where a lot of shows that were premiered around the time to get under the Emmy window are just kind of like concluding their runs. Right. And so now effectively all promotion has basically ceased. You'll see some directors give interviews because of course the DGA did reach an agreement with the studios. But, you

know, hearing your favorite movie star on a podcast or on a late night talk show or on the red carpet, no dice. That's over. That's not going to be happening until there's any conclusion of this issue, which is a big deal at this particular moment in history, because we have the two strains of Hollywood movie making. There's, of course, the big studio system, and then there's independent filmmaking. And independent filmmaking is really reliant on the fall festivals, which are just around the corner. In fact, you and I will be attending fall festivals. And I don't know what those fall festivals will be like. You announced on the last episode that you will, in fact, be going to Venice at the end of this summer, you think?

I sure hope so. Which is very exciting for you. Though, you know, again, it's like I say that because I was really looking forward to going to Venice and seeing movies, but I really do understand why people are striking

and why people will not be on the red carpet in Venice. And that's like, I really get it and I'm not trying to, you know, play a violin for myself because they won't be there.

Well, Venice in particular is a festival that does rely on star power. It has become one of the most glamorous of the film festivals, and they are already announcing they're launching Challengers, which is the new Zendaya to promote it because it is a mid-tier drama, sports drama, something that doesn't get made very often. I think this one was made because she's in it. Yes. And Zendaya is like a world famous movie star. One of the only movie stars we have under the age of 40, but also 30 in her case, and is also a red carpet sensation and so having zendaya in a glamorous setting like venice you know looking you know amazing as she always does brings attention to the movie in the

way that well i in a different way don't worry darling got a lot of attention at venice last year because everyone did look glamorous and also they all hated each other and uh allegedly spit on each other it's a great point of contrast though, because obviously those controversies, even if the film was not beloved, did draw attention to the movie and made people aware of it and excited about it in some ways. That movie actually ultimately did pretty decent business, all things considered. This year, I'm going to Telluride as I usually do. And Telluride is a more low-key affair than Venice and is usually seen more as sort of an ampus playground. It's where a lot of Academy voters go, but it's where a lot of campaigns for best picture tend to start.

But there's still, I mean, one of the great things about that festival is you will always see famous people just walk in the street. I think I told you last time I was there, I just, Claire Foy, just walking down the street by herself wearing a giant hat, you know, like it is that kind of a place. Last year, one of the medallion recipients was Cate Blanchett. They celebrated her entire career and the work that she did and her extraordinary work in Tar. This year, there will not be any recipients of the medal who are in SAG or are in the WGA in all likelihood. And so what does that mean for that festival? Can these festivals sustain themselves without this star wattage?

It's a big question. Obviously the strike is meant to draw attention to these critical issues for the actors, for the writers. They're going to be successful in doing so if they are sort of like reducing the awareness of the apparatus of putting movies out into the world. And that's really why they're doing what they're doing. This is, I mean, in a perverse way, it's fascinating. I mean, we've just never seen anything like this. There's never been a work stoppage quite at this level in this industry before. The general release of movies, I think, will be less affected, at least for a period of time, though this does kind of dovetail with some of our Mission Impossible conversation because there are a lot of movies that are slated for next spring and next summer that, in theory,

have completed production and should be okay. But those movies often necessitate reshoots. And if you haven't gotten your reshoots in under the wire, your movie might not be coming out when it thinks it's coming out. Now, TV is a whole other kettle of fish, and I'm sure Chris and Andy on The Watch will do a great job explaining the issues there. TV is going to be halted as soon as like October, like anything that's planned for this fall could be meaningfully impacted. But for movies, I don't know. Like, do you think we'll see like a radical shift in what our expectations for 2024 were going to be? Well, it depends a little bit on how much the promotional limitations affect the studio's plans or how much willing they're willing to seed on those. I mean, Barbie is another movie that got a huge amount of promotion in under the wire and we have seen

Margot Robbie in every Barbie outfit like in history for like the past two months and you know we've been talking a lot about how just unavoidable that has felt Ryan Gosling has also been out there like talking about how Ken's job is beached like 8,500 times I love the man I love everything he does, but like they could have given him a second quote to work with. Anyway, that movie is now tracking at over a hundred million dollars.

We're going to talk about it later this week, but like that is a big deal and people are aware of it and they are aware of it because the marketing has been everywhere, but also like really star driven. So that's another one where if the marketing plans are reliant on movie

stars and, and you and I always hope that they are because we really like movie stars, you know, like I want to see these people out there because I like them. And I, um, and I like movies that are made with movie stars and movies that honor like that type of personality. So I, I think that they are deserving of you know like to be compensated for that value but also like I like seeing them so if the studios understand that and they don't want to release a movie without that marketing then maybe they have to push things I I don't know whether they will I don't know whether they're you know Byzantine budgets allow for that but if movies are released without those movie stars,

it kind of starts feeling like the streaming thing of they just go into the ether and nobody but us knows about them. And that's a real bummer. It's a broadly unanswerable question, but I am quite curious to see if the box office is meaningfully affected just over August, September, maybe even into October, because those are months when there are fewer pre-made, pre-identified brands

coming out in theaters too. Barbie needs Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling, but it could get away with just being Barbie. You know, the creator in September, if it doesn't have John David Washington

and Allison Janney pushing it, it's a harder sell. To think nothing of the smaller dramas. You know, I saw the trailer for The Holdovers today, the new Alexander Payne film. Alexander Payne is kind of an identifiable brand, I guess, for lack of a better word. You know what you're getting with one of his films,

but it's going to need Paul Giamatti to sell that movie in some ways. And if it doesn't have it, what expectation can you have for a movie like that? I don't know. It's very interesting. We're going to see how it plays out. There is certainly a case that actually both of these unions

striking at the same time might actually scare the studios into a kind of action. I hope that happens. I hope that this is resolved and that everyone is fairly compensated. That's my expectation. I completely agree.

Bob Iger seems to feel differently. Yes, he gave an interview that seems unwise. And also is rebuilding his yacht uh yeah so i heard um it's just shocking yep bob how is your yacht looking these days uh it's beached unfortunately okay see we lost it this past week much like all the rain all the weather yeah exactly me can't me and ken were on the beached yacht together uh do you think that do you guys think that Dead Reckoning Part 2 will come out in 2024 summer?

No. No. God damn it. Well oh this is this is when you're like God damn it. Well I feel like

I knew what was coming. I don't get to meet Zedan! Zed is okay! Was that on your bucket list? No it wasn't. I just knowing how they work

and knowing that like a lot of it is on the fly and that's like McHugh and and Cruz's style for how these movies get made it just feels like there's no way that they shot everything so far like wasn't Amanda just telling us that there was like Tom Cruise was landing in people's backyards in the UK like three days ago he does so when he can't do that you know it's like his life's project yeah and now his life's project has stopped so what is Tom Cruise doing

like I just he woke up today yep and what did he say and then like how did he fill his day i like i can't imagine what are you talking about he has to go see oppenheimer and barbie this week this is a huge week for tom he's going to the movies that's what we're all going to be doing not today so he spent like 12 hours like you know comparing seat availabilities at various cinemas. Like, how did he fill the time? He likes to go from cinema to cinema on a Friday night. I don't know if you've heard that. I just, what does he do?

I don't know. Maybe he's like windsurfing. Okay. You know, I actually, I'm looking down at the street right now. He's actually sprinting down my street. I see. So I see him. Yeah.

Just staying in shape. What else is he doing is he playing Wordle maybe he's into Immaculate Grid do you think he has a phone do you think he uses do I think he has a phone

I mean like he obviously like has a phone but like do you think Tom Cruise like uses an iPhone he's fixing his motorcycle

yeah I was like but like do you think he knows about apps you mean like you get at Applebee's no I don Tom Cruise. Do you think he knows about apps? You mean like you get at Applebee's? No, I don't. But I don't think he knows about that. I don't think he knows about that either.

Half-price appetizers are the bedrock of my marriage to Eileen. I'll have you know. Listen, I was not slandering them. You know that I love an appetizer, past or otherwise. I'm just talking about, so Tom Cruise is handed an iPhone. He's maybe an Android guy. Okay. Tom Cruise is handed an iPhone. He's maybe an Android guy. Okay. Tom Cruise is handed an Android.

And he does what? Do you think he's ever placed a call for himself? I certainly do. No, he hasn't. Someone hands him the phone. A phone call? And is like, hey, Tom, you know, I've got McHugh on the line. He wasn't born in 1830.

No, well, like in the last 40 years. I bet he also. 40 years? You don't think in 1987 he wasn't calling up 1830. No, I, well, like in the last 40 years. I bet he also. 40 years? You don't think in 1987 he wasn't calling up, I don't know, John C. Reilly to talk about dailies for Days of Thunder? Hell yeah, he was. 30 years. Okay. I don't think that he has, maybe he calls, he called Paul Wagner direct.

Maybe that's like the last time. I think he takes the phone and he's like, he waits for it to start saying your mission should you choose to accept it is to get to barbie within the next 25 minutes and if he doesn't hear that voice if he doesn't hear henry cherny's voice then he hangs the phone out and throws it down the street we're doing a mission impossible mailbag and i hope tom's okay i need him to conclude this this pair of films if not the entire series which I think we'll talk

about a little bit based on your prognostications last episode Bob do you want to get us started on this mailbag sure

were people excited I don't know if we've done a franchise themed mailbag before people were excited a lot of really good questions one theme

which we will get into at some point is why didn't we talk more about Ilse Faust? So I guess we'll get there when we get there. But the first question, a lot of existential questions about the existence of Mission Impossible and Tom Cruise's relationship to it.

So we'll just get those out of the way to begin with. First question comes from Oscar. This is one of the franchises most tied to a singular star. Is there any way for these movies to continue if Cruise leaves after Dead Reckoning Part 2? Should future films pivot to more of an ensemble cast or try and bring in an equally big star what do you think about this since you suggested this in the last conversation did i suggest just that it could happen oh well i mean the studios are ghouls they always try you know nothing ever dies

you know that so but you did suggest tom tom's character, that Ethan Hunt, could expire at the conclusion of Part 2. Yes, I did. Though, I've had some more thoughts about that. Okay. Do you want me to do those now? Whatever you like. No, I'll do that later. Here's the thing.

Bring in an equally big star. Who? Exactly. Who? I mean, Denzel Washington? Okay. It's a pretty short list. I know. There's no one else. Denzel Washington? Okay. It's a pretty short list. I know.

There's no one else. And Denzel could do it. But someone else asked us, David asked, what mid-30s actor now has the star power and personality to lead an action franchise successfully for 25 years plus? David, I don't know. I don't think there is an actor that has the star power. Yeah. No one will ever have the star power that Tom Cruise had.

Exactly, an equally big star. I do think that there are some people who could be entertaining in these parts. Sure. I think, actually, you know, you made reference to the po-faced action of Extraction 2. I think if you plugged Chris Hemsworth into this series... Chris Hemsworth, he was on my list as well. It would work. He would be very charming.

They wouldn't be the Ethan Hunt movies, and we wouldn't have the same emotional and sort of, like, bizarre sort of extra-textual relationship to Tom Cruise that we do with these movies. Right. But I like Chris Hemsworth and I like seeing him in movies and I think he's a great action star. So I would welcome that. But to think that he could match what Cruise brings us. Yeah, no one can.

It would become a very different thing because also these movies have become so tied up, not just in Tom Cruise, but like in Tom Cruise doing ridiculous shit. And I think we'll talk about that when we talk about the rankings and kind of what the idea of Mission Impossible is to us. But it's like Tom Cruise does X is really defining, I think, for especially the back half of these movies. So to replicate that is it is forgive me impossible. I do think you could do like a ensemble cast movie. Yeah. You need to space it out. So you really like you. I think that if you're going to continue with franchises, you need to give like five or ten years of breathing room just to let everyone you know forget or have some space I know that capitalism will never allow that or Paramount

but then you'd need like a mid-twenties actor and I just don't know I've thought about this in relationship to the franchise that as you said has been giving Mission Impossible some anxiety which is John Wick. John Wick is attempting a spinoff next year Ballerina starring Ana de Armas and I don't know if I care about that as

much because I care about Keanu. I like Ana de Armas a lot, but the movie is called John Wick and I'm showing up for Keanu. I'm showing up for the world and the fights and the gunfu and all that, but Keanu is holding me, is tying me to the ground in that series this feels pretty similar to me now if you said the next film is hayley atwell simon pegg bing rames palm clementief joins the team and jeremy reiner comes back and then let's say one other person let's let's find one other exciting i zazzy beats i was gonna say lashana lynch. There you go. She's great. Because she's been graded to other action.

Are you excited? I'm nervous. Because if you're replicating everything but Tom Cruise, then you just feel the lack of Tom Cruise. It's like the third act of this film when he disappears for a while. And you're like, where's Tom Cruise? I think there was a very clever version of this with X-Men First Class, which was a period piece that featured a couple of faces that you remembered.

It featured Michael Fassbender and it featured James McAvoy. You were like, I know those guys from the other X-Men movies. But the rest of the cast was sort of like, because it was a 60s set period piece. No, I loved that movie. They were X-Men before? Most of the other people, there are some similar characters, but they're different ages, and so they're played by different actors.

So, like, Nicholas Holt is Beast in that, and Kelsey Grammer's Beast in the Bryan Singer movies. So, like, can you meaningfully keep the framework and the tone with one or two familiar faces and then replicate? It's just really hard to do. It's really hard. You saw this a little bit with Pirates of the Caribbean, too, and they struggled with this. and then replicate. It's just really hard to do. It's really hard. And I think it's...

You saw this a little bit with Pirates of the Caribbean 2 and they struggle with this. It's really hard to do as like a continuation, you know, because then you have to explain the other person's absence

and you're just always living in the shadow. Okay. So a time jump or something would be different. What if they get Alec Baldwin back? Alec Baldwin is Ethan Hunt's dad in Mission Impossible

Dead Rex Part 3. Did he not die? I don't think so. He did die. Oh, he did die. He got shot in the tunnel. He got stabbed. Stabbed in the tunnel.

Oh, jeez. That was a bad beat. Man, Cavill. He was a bastard, huh? Yeah, he really was. Great mustache, though. Good villain. He was a good villain.

Inspo. What's the other one? I think it would be straight up like impossible for someone to try it keep using that word don't mean to it's okay but it would be a fool's errand for someone to try to be like tom cruise's in these movies and so a continuation with the same cast and just plugging and playing someone else it'd be like trying to bring in whoever was Tom Brady's replacement on Patriots and trying to do that with all the same team. It just doesn't work. A lot of people suggested

that maybe a Rebecca Ferguson backstory go back in time with her character, but it's just a completely different... It's hard to tell whether that would work or not because her character works because of the mystery shrouded in it in those movies that she's involved in and so I don't know

it's a really interesting question I don't think I realized the weight of the Ilse Faust hive which is not to say that I don't care about her because I

do I especially do in her first appearance in the film which is quite striking but I agree with you people like this is the future of the

franchise I didn't know that that was a discussion point I didn't know that either people seemed very fixated they were frustrated yeah they felt she was fridged yeah I agree with you. People are like, this is the future of the franchise. I didn't know that that was a discussion point. I didn't know that either. People seemed very fixated. They were frustrated. Yeah.

They felt she was fridged. Yeah. Which I'm not so sure that that was the case, but maybe it was. I don't know. It's impossible to know. I guess we'll talk more about Ilsa in a minute. What are some other questions related to this first one? We talked a little bit about this question.

Alfie asked, how would Paramount inevitably attempt to carry on the franchise? I think that that's just so hard to really know if we don't know who's signed on to be part of the franchise. But a very important question here from Jack. What other actors do you think could pull off running

at Tom Cruise's level? Is there a single one? At his level, there's no one. I saw the movie for a second time and Tom Cruise running in venice with the score just going was just very moving i i was like through the towards the canal yeah but i mean they're just he's he is running and also when he's running um in abu dhabi like above the

the airport they just give him a lot of scenes to just run in like wide shot with the score matching the import of it. And I thought that was really beautiful. One of the funniest little moments in that movie is when everybody disperses at the party in Venice. And Tom races around the corner to help Hayley Atwell. And she's been trapped by two henchmen. And he frees her and then they capture him and she runs away which is just a great little moment and then shortly after that he leaves the party and we see him racing exiting the party right one of those many wide shots that are he looks great I mean he's just got Usain Bolt energy I mean he's just

like I am still the fastest man alive it's he's in his 60s. It's poetic, yeah. It's remarkable. So no one. The answer is no one. Maybe Usain Bolt? Do you think he has Usain Bolt energy? I think he's looking like he's giving a little more effort than Usain looked.

It's a fair point. It's a fair point. A lot of arm pumping. A lot of breathing. That's true. The ergonomics are really on lock as he ages. What about an aging

Starling Marte? Is that an accurate comp? Yeah, that's not bad. Okay. He's a New York Mets woefully underperforming right fielder. Okay.

So we're back down on the Mets again? We certainly are. We're not back. We're so down. Unbelievably down. We were back like three days ago.

It was like nine days ago, but we came back and then we were shot in the face. And we are inoperable at this point. Yeah. The John Wick at this point. Yeah. The John Wick 4 explosion gun.

Yeah. They used that on all the Mets fans. Okay. Yeah. We've been had. It's been tough. Ty asks, How much star power do you think Tom Cruise still carries?

Are people coming to these movies because of him? Or because the last four of these have become very reliable action films? Feels like a bit of both to me. I agree. I think actually whatever could be perceived as like the underperformance of this weekend which we'll talk about momentarily i think has says more about the fact that like where this franchise sits in the hierarchy of people's minds um and that cruz is still cruz but he's not the cruz of maverick because no one is because that was not repeatable in any meaningful way. I do think people do what you said, which is they come for that one to two massive stunt that they're relying on in this franchise.

Yeah, I do think that there is like a meta knowledge of Mission Impossible as Tom Cruise does X that extends beyond like our podcast banter that in general people are like, can you, can you believe this? And the marketing really leans into that, of course, you know, all the behind the scenes of the motorcycle, this and that. So I think they're pretty closely linked, but the fact that it's Tom Cruise doing insane action, set piece, whatever, which are executed like an incredibly high level is also essential to the appeal. Agreed. Alex asks,

which stunt from any of these movies would each of you be most willing to attempt in real life? I think each movie has one stunt that is incredibly memorable. I am willing to attempt none of those stunts. Yeah. I'm not jumping out of planes. I'm not hanging from a plane. No. I'm not walking across the surface of the Burj Khalifa. Yeah. I'm not free climbing anything. No. No free climbing. It's certainly not in Mission Impossible 2 style either. I'm not climbing on those rocks. I'm not having the motorcycle chase of Mission Impossible 2. I'm not dangling inside a tube in a closely guarded CIA office. I'm not, I mean, I'm certainly not getting on that train in this movie and I'm not doing that motorcycle jump.

I'm not getting into that helicopter fight, nor am I having that bathroom brawl. No. From the last film, from Fallout. I'm not dangling anyone else or myself from a plane, a la Mission Impossible 3.

No. I'm not doing that underwater test. Definitely not. No way. From Rogue Nation. No way. But here Nation. No way. But here's what I'm willing to do.

Okay. I'm willing to, in the aftermath of completing my job, meeting up with my boss for a meal to discuss my performance. And then during that discussion,

if a aquarium explodes, I'm willing to jump out the window. That is the one stunt that Tom Cruise has done in these movies that I would at least try. Now, I don't think I would do it as elegantly, nor would I be photographed as beautifully as Brian De Palma did. Right. Have you read that that's like one of the most dangerous ones that he did

because they couldn't really time when the water would explode, so he didn't know when to jump? I did read that, but I have not been warded off of it because as quote-unquote dangerous as that sounds, it's have not been warded off of it because as quote unquote dangerous as that sounds, it's not more dangerous than hanging off a plane. Sure. That's true. Would you try any of these stunts?

Yeah. I have one that you haven't mentioned. Tell me. The Vatican heist. I will go to Italy and wear robes and a little hat if I have to. And get in and out of cars and climb through vents. You're not really a hat person. And talk to people.

You know what? I have become a hat person recently. I mean, not at work. I once bought you a hat. Yeah, I wear it a lot. Yeah, great. Not in front of me. Well, like I said, I don't wear a hat at work.

Well, maybe you should try. You know who's wearing a hat right now? I wore a hat. Bobby Wagner. You are wearing a hat. You look great, Bobby. What is that hat? Thank you. Petco Park. Where the San Diego Padres play wearing a hat. You look great, Bobby. What is that hat? Thank you.

Petco Park, where the San Diego Padres play baseball. Okay, sure. I wore a hat over Fourth of July weekend. I bought that at the gift shop at Descanso Gardens. Was it like a big hat? Yeah. Yeah. It was a lady hat.

But it was actually a gardening hat that I bought at Descanso. Shout out Descanso. The train is back. But it had some Audrey Hepburn energy to it as well. Top five times you guys have both worn hats in the last year. I am just like Amanda, which is that I am always wearing a hat when I am not at work. On the weekends, when I'm in dad mode. Yeah.

Mom mode is like very... Let loose. Wear a hat at work. Who's going to stop you? I have a bucket hat. So Knox and I can have matching bucket hats. I have, you know, my garden hat. Yeah.

I have several baseball caps. Can I, now that we're talking about this, something has just occurred to me. Yeah. I want to share with you. My daughter had her second birthday last week and we had a lovely party at our house. Amanda was there.

It was fantastic. And we got her a cake, of course. And our friend, Annie Greenwald, took a picture of me cutting the cake. And in the picture, um, my hair is gray. It was gray. And in the picture, I was like, that is the oldest man who's ever lived. And, um, I, that now I'll be wearing a hat at all those parties going forward too, because of how we're approaching white in the photo.

It's quite scary. No, but that's a lighting issue, you know? A lighting outside on a beautiful summer day. With like the photo. It's quite scary. No, but that's a lighting issue, you know? A lighting outside on a beautiful summer day? With like the angles? In the natural light? It was a warm summer day. It was. No, it's like the angles, you know?

You can't, like, here's the thing. Most photography, like good photography in the world is manipulated, right? Okay, yeah, you're speaking my language. People are controlling, including all cinema yeah you know people are controlling including all cinema that's right that's right so but roger deakins that's what i'm saying so that was just saying they're liars no that was just an off-the-cuff iphone so it's you know the angles and the reflections yeah gordon willis a charlatan where's your robert l swit okay all right okay can i tell you what stunt I would do

yeah I would be I would be willing to be handcuffed to Hayley Atwell driving a $150,000 BMW around the streets of Rome great answer

I would the first part definitely for me definitely the first part okay what's our next question that's a good question Anthony asked what auteur

would you want to direct a future Mission Impossible film? I wrote down a bunch of these. We also got a question, what director from the run of Mission Impossible do you wish would have taken a stab at it too? Which I forget who asked that one, but that might be a good one to fold in here too.

Meaning come back after doing one? No, no, not come back, but who during the time that Mission Impossibles have been releasing movies since the first one could have taken a crack at an installment to now? That's a good question. Were any of the names that I wrote down here on your list? No, but you wrote

your names down first, so I just wrote down different names. Okay. That's why you're the best. Here are the names that I wrote down. And I will answer that question that Bob had too. And I guess this kind of sort of is answering the question in a way because Catherine Bigelow and George Miller were the two people who jumped out to me.

One, Catherine Bigelow, one of the great action directors the last 30 years, we know can do stunts of this magnitude. I think, I don't know where Catherine Bigelow is. It's been a long time since Detroit came out. I think that was 2017 that that movie was released, which is before we even were talking on this podcast. And George Miller is working on Furiosa, of course, the forthcoming Mad Max movie. You could imagine in 1999, if you would have just put the Babe or the Happy Feet movies down for a minute and just picked up Mission Impossible 3, we would have been in

a good spot. You said it, not me. That would have been nice. I also wrote down Gareth Evans, the director of the eight films, and Bong Joon-ho, who, you know, we don't necessarily think of as an action director, but he did direct Snowpiercer, and he did direct a monster movie in The Host. Let director Bong have a shot.

I love it. You think he would do it? I don't know. He wouldn't do it. He would not do it. He hates capitalism. Are you kidding me? That is true.

But maybe he likes Mission... He has a sense of humor. Who do you think should do it? Well, I know I always say Steven Soderbergh, but Steven Soderbergh. Yeah. That's an obvious one. Did you watch Full Circle? Not yet.

I don't know. I feel behind. It was a busy weekend. It was a busy weekend. It was a busy weekend. I was solo parenting. I liked it. Okay.

It's starting very slow. Okay. I would say. I wrote down Gina Prince-Bythewood. Yeah. I thought of her as well and a man named

James Cameron he would have been my answer to that to that question that Bobby just asked but also you know we talked about how we gotta go

underwater on the next one do they have the gym technology on the line because if they don't it's not gonna be up to my standards really good question I don't know

okay Bob who do you want anybody you wanna see make one of these I don't know it's like it's there are see make one of these? I don't know. It's like there are directors who I think would take in like an interesting style to like Lorene Scafaria. But like I don't know if the huge action set pieces are like there's so few like attempting to direct. There's so few directors who are attempting to direct movies like with that big of an action set piece right now.

It's funny because McQuarrie before these movies didn't really have any experience doing this kind of thing. I mean, he's primarily known as a screenwriter. He made movies like The Way of the Gun, very talky kind of films. And the person whose name we probably should be saying more often on these conversations is Wade Eastwood, who is the sort of stunt coordinator, helps design the stunts on these films. He's a longtime stuntman. There are a number of other people that I'm sure I don't know who work on these movies, but he is one who I do know who has a big impact on how these movies are made. You know, directors don't do all of the work of making those set pieces work. They have teams of people that make those sequences work. And so if you took someone like Lorian Scafaria, who's great at filming a kind of action

in Hustlers or a kind of explosiveness in dialogue in episodes of Succession with a Wade Eastwood, sure, good work. I accept. What's next? Zach asks, not sure Zach, Amanda, I don't think. If you had to be handcuffed to any Mission Impossible character, who would it be and why? Easy, Hayley Atwell, aka Grace. Number one, because you're handcuffed to Hayley Atwell. Number two, because you're not going

to be handcuffed that long because she's going to get out of it. But she may leave you handcuffed to a car. That's fine. At least I was handcuffed to Hayley Atwell.

You know what I'm saying? It was worth it. Well, is this just a question of like, who am I horniest for in the Mission Impossible films? I don't think so. I don't think anyone needs to hear that power ranking. It's just like, who would be the least in the mission impossible films i don't think so i don't think anyone needs to hear that power ranking it's just like who would be the least offensive person

like i don't think you want to be handcuffed to philip seymour hoffman's is it which so it's which character it's not which actor yeah mission impossible character it's right there in the text this is very challenging because the female stars of this movie is the hot Olympics. Yeah. I mean, Emmanuel Bear, Tendiwe Newton, Paula Patton, Michelle Monaghan, Rebecca Ferguson,

Vanessa Kirby, Hayley Atwell, Pom Clementeve. I'm sure I'm forgetting people too. That's like upsettingly hot. That's like too many hot people. And I don't know who, I don't know if it's Cruz or somebody,

but the taste is obscene. But how about this? What if it was just Simon Pegg? I mean, what would you guys do together? Let's talk about movies. Okay. I love movies.

Yeah. We just make some pods. Okay. You know, Simon, we're handcuffed together for 12 hours. He cares about his friends, so that would be nice. He certainly does. And he's given me so much joy over some pods. Okay. You know, Simon, we're handcuffed together for 12 hours. He cares about his friends. So that would be nice. He certainly does.

And he's given me so much joy over the years. Okay. He seems to be really in the pocket of big mission. He's like, no matter what happens, this is great. I'm really happy this happened to me. He seems to be quite pleased to be a part of it. My thinking on this one is that I need to be handcuffed to someone who's going to protect me because I'm not going to do very well in the Mission Impossible universe.

My big takeaway from rewatching all these movies before doing this podcast is that I would die within the first 30 seconds of every film. Same. Yeah. Do you feel like you're at the height of your athletic prowess? Yeah. You do. And all I need is a little hat, you know? Why didn't you list yourself for an actor who can run like Tom Cruise? I've never been weaker. I've never been less physically unfit in my entire life. And it's only going to get worse. I can't believe it.

I can't believe it gets worse from here. 41. I'm almost 41. I know. And I got to get it together. Who knew having a little child would destroy me? I didn't either. But I really.

It's not harder than pregnancy, but it's a close second, so... I can't relate. Yeah. I can't relate. It's tough. What's next, Bobby? Michael asks, who is the best villain from the franchise?

Which actor do you wish could have played a villain in the franchise? I think I didn't read that second part of the question. Yeah, I didn't either. That's so funny. I think that... I was having the exact same thought exactly as you said that

I was like oh shit we've been spending a lot of time together lately I think I have a two part answer okay I wonder if it's my two part answer

are you serious I have two names written down I prepared in a separate document so we can see I think the most menacing person in this movie is Sean Harris, is Solomon Lane. Oh, interesting.

Okay. Not the same two-part answer. I think the best villain is Jim Phelps, John Voight in the first film. That is my second part of the answer. So what is your first part? I don't see him more often. Yeah, I just don't. He's menacing and it's nice.

Let me ask you this. Yeah. What's the rabbit's foot? I don't know. I have no idea what's going on in Mission Impossible 3, except Ethan is trying to choose between civilian life and saving the world. You know, it's Jesus at the crossroads. So it's very compelling and also goes to Italy.

And Philip Seymour Hoffman, he is very menacing. I think I like that performance see this is the this is that's what's different well first of all what's his character's name I don't know that's this is not that's that's a problem Sean I'm gonna I'm not that's not a failure of you it's a failure of the film yeah well the mythology of Mission Impossible I have to tell you does not always add up to me. This is why when you were perhaps fairly picking nits about Dead Reckoning Part 1, I was like, have you seen these movies lately? They like barely hang together.

That is true. But I went, I told you, I went back to see it a second time with my heart open. Yep. And I laughed more and enjoyed the set pieces more. And it wasn't even that I was confused, though I don't really think anything makes a ton of sense. It's like, how does Gabriel become an emissary of the entity? Like, is he just answering like a job interview? Yeah, Craigslist. You know, like what, you know, and it's like, so if he he works for the entity but he's not of the entity so but like why can't they just outthink everyone like i don't understand any of that i actually think it was zip recruiter now that i think about it no no no he was just

spending so much time on the cr reddit the cr heads reddit okay oh that the entity found him i honestly would have enjoyed seeing all of those scenes. That said, when they were doing all of the interstitials with the stakes and whatever, and that face-off in Venice at the weird party. The party in question is the party. Right. That was great stuff. I just didn't care at all. You're killing me.

I was just absolutely... You're killing me. I was trying to focus to pay attention. Might be the best scene in the movie. It is wildly not the best scene in the movie.

I love that scene. You're an insane person. The best scene in the movie is obviously the chase through Rome. But like that's fine. It is. It's delightful.

Okay. I couldn't even make myself focus on the hogwash. That's how little I care about it. There's a meme being crafted by someone out there right now, which is you with a very normal-sized head

and me with a giant-sized brain talking about the best scene in the movie. I think we all know it's when there are eight words of dialogue about AI and hard close-ups on beautiful people's faces. That, to me, is cinema. That's all I can say. That's just a terrible take that's such garbage watch the good the bad and the ugly and tell me i'm wrong you simply cannot i just i guess

you care about sci-fi more than me it has nothing to do with sci-fi it does it has everything to do with filmmaking which is that we're looking at the people it doesn't just have to be about the action of everyone in a tiny car handcuffed doing silent comedy i like it it can be in second place okay here's the other thing so i close-ups of vanessa kirby's visage she's really beautiful i can also watch the crown for that anyway someone pointed out and i can't believe i missed this on my first reading that gabriel's name is gabriel do you know the role that gabriel plays in the bible um yeah he's the angel whose wings are clipped essentially right and he like falls from heaven no that's paradise lost what am i thinking of um that's that's paradise lost that's the john dunn epic it's great that you read some literature but um you know in the bible not an angel? Yeah, he comes to Mary and says, hey, you are having a baby who is God's baby.

Baby, right. The angel. Also, who does Gabriel kill in the backstory? What's her name? Maria. Yeah. Right. It's all right there.

It's so obvious that I'm embarrassed that I missed it the first time. Amanda, you have a great future as like a Breaks Plot YouTuber. Thank you so much, Bobby. This plot unlocked by Amanda Dobbins. You'll never believe what comes next in the Bible. Thanks, Bobby. Do you want to help me launch that channel? I got you.

Okay. I think we'll make great stuff together. I'm just looking over our P&L here. That is not in the Reader's Business Plan, that channel. So you'll have to fill out a side business form. I did want to point this out when we were discussing it because obviously there are major messianic themes in the movie. Memorably, Christopher McQuarrie, in 1986,

he left the United States and he worked as an assistant at Christ Church Grammar School in Perth, Western Australia. That's very cute. And there are Christian themes in his works. I mean, as there are in much of, you know, Western. But not so overtly in our action franchise. Yeah, sure. And this is like really, it's like using, it's saying the thing, like a crucifix, Gabriel and Mary. Except in this case, Gabriel, bad guy, kills Mary. So are we supposed to think it's like a reverse Jesus and Ethan lives forever? That was why I was confused that Gabriel was Satan, you know, that he was the angel who had fallen. I don't know.

That's really cute though that you remember Paradise Lost. Good job. It's all a blur. Everything I read when I was 19 is gone now. It's all an agglomerated mass of characters. I can't believe you just blew by... Unless they were in a movie made by Morton Scorsese, and then I know everything about them. I can't believe you just blew by reverse Jesus. Does that mean Tom is reverse Jesus, or Gabriel is reverse? No, Tom.

So it's like Jesus instead of dying. Because reversed Jesus is the Antichrist. Okay. Well, I think it's a plot wise. It's a reversed Jesus. Oh, inverted Jesus. It's inverted Jesus. Right.

So he lives, he defeats, he gets the crucifix and the crucifix doesn't take him down. He uses the crucifix to save the world. Yeah, hell yeah. And then lives forever and makes 40 000 more mission impossibles now we're talking there we go that's how they sold it in the room they were like we got the verse jesus with the cruciform key let's live forever baby i love it

jesus sounds like something that tony hawk X Games. However, I just want to point out that that would make the cruciform basically the Holy Grail. No, it would make it the crucifix. But also, the Maria character was seemingly a romantic partner of Tom Cruise, not his mom. You guys know I agree. That part was very underbaked to me i didn't really get that i guess she could be mary magdalene yeah i'm trying to breathe bring some deep reading to the text yeah i appreciate it i just got confused about gabriel for a second there i'm with you i'm with you on the whole christ mythology it's great great stuff incredible

work by the guys who wrote that book um and they were men were they not bob and thus the patriarchy runs through our systems forever and ever i don't recognize anything not written by women i stand by women thanks so much bobby uh women do be talking and they do be writing do they not remember when you were like i love women talking anyway that was a good movie i don't next question bobby amanda on a plane ride just a month ago bob accused me of not liking women and i was like sir that's actually not what happened at all sit right down and basically out of nowhere we're just like i love women that's not what happened i grew up

i was raised by women i live in a house full of women both of those things are true i support i support women i mean i do. What movie were we talking about? I don't remember. Was this in one of Sean's... Probably Predator. 78, You Can Have It All, Amanda rants. No, but this like, I think this was before Takeoff, maybe? Before our 10-hour flight to London.

Just to give you guys a sense of how the energy was going. So let's put it all on the table. Sean in the middle seat yeah it took 12 minutes before I had to say you don't understand I am the son

of a single mom I have two sisters I was raised by my grandmother I have a daughter I also have a wife my closest colleagues women

except for CR but he's a feminine type it's all true it's really beautiful what you're doing for the new masculinity and for women thank you closest colleagues, women, except for CR, but he's a feminine type. It's all true. It's really beautiful what you're doing for the new masculinity and for women. Thank you. Ethan Hunt and I are doing well when it comes to the new masculinity. Bob, are you in? Have you decided whether you're a part of the new masculinity? I thought I already said, yeah, I thought you already included me.

Okay, great. Bob's in. On the first pitch, you were like, you're emotional. You experience emotions. You're in. It's me. It's Bob. It's it's Ethan it's Charles Holmes who else gets in this is the counter valence to the cool guy club the new masculinity who said

that emotions can't be cool I didn't say that but I'm just saying you did when did I say that when Michael B. Jordan was upset that he got dumb it was

he did it in public at a Lakers game courtside it was the venue that was not cool. Oh, I see. We can't control our feelings. So behind the scenes,

you like a weeping man. Well. You know, you don't. That's the thing. There's a difference between crying and weeping. I don't really think I like a weeping woman either.

You know who wept? Jesus. I'm just desperately trying to ask Aqib's question. Aqib, while the movie is still making a good amount of money, it's falling well short of what it was tracking. What's the main reason for this, especially since Maverick was such a huge hit? Did all the Barbenheimer hype make people forget MI7 was coming

or is it something else? I have to ask you a follow-up question to this question. Do you care about tracking? No, I don't. Why would we care? Tracking kind of feels like polling where it's just like it's broken. I agree. We show up every election day and we're like, oh, oh no, something else happened. And it's like, maybe our models don't totally work. Well, even for us, and especially, you know, the whingy, like, concern trolling I do about everything in movies, which I know is pathetic. Even then, I don't really care about tracking. We don't spend time talking about tracking.

Tracking is, it's illusory. It's not, it's nothing until it's something. I guess we talk a little, we do talk about marketing and tracking informs marketing or is seen as a little bit of like a report card on awareness. And I did cite the Barbie tracking like 20 minutes ago and I'm aware of that, reply guys. But that's only, I guess it's like a tool of awareness and we do care whether people know about movies. I see those as two different things.

Okay. I think marketing and awareness are critical. Tracking, I think, is deeply broken different things okay i think um i think marketing and awareness are critical tracking i think is deeply broken because the box office is extremely strained and confused right now and some places don't have very many movie theaters and others have a plethora of movie theaters some movies don't play in certain cities and others do like we're not at a moment because of the disrepair of the theatrical model where these things are should be as reliable as they once were in the case of mission impossible. Um,

I think it's interesting that there was not the mega post Maverick bump that many people, including the trackers suspected there would be, but we said it in our conversation last Wednesday, this is a mid tier action franchise. The idea that it was going to make $500 million worldwide in its opening weekend, it's insane. It was never going to do that. And it doing $80 million or whatever in the US, that's pretty good.

That's really not bad. It's more or less what most of these tentpole movies have been doing for the last three to four months. So it's pretty standard. The big question here, and this is also true for barbie and oppenheimer and it is related to what we were discussing with the strikes happening this year is will any of these movies have legs because the big downturn in the business to me has been movies inability to play basically beyond the fourth week and i mentioned this to you last week and you kind of rolled your eyes at me without actually saying anything on the show which i appreciate but i was like the

most interesting story in movies to me right now is Elemental, like kind of still kicking ass like five weeks later. And part of it is because there's not a lot of movies for kids to see. But it's like, its drops have been like 11%, 13%. Like it is kind of grinding out. Maybe not a profit, but it is doing pretty well. And Mission Impossible needs to do something like that to be considered a big success i do think the children's movie audience is slightly different in terms of its rhythm than like the horror tentpole audience and i even though mission impossible is a tentpole it's for a slightly older audience and that the older person market um i speak with authority here uh is is slightly different and and possibly has longer

legs just as people kind of like mosey their way to the theater it doesn't have like the desperate opening night fervor that a superhero movie or or or and at this point like a horror movie where everyone goes and the first weekend has a good time and then bounces and we saw the precipitous drop of insidious this weekend, for example. I think the other thing about the Mission Impossible movies is this movie has an A Cinema score and it has like 95% on Rotten Tomatoes. Like it is, people like it. I think there's certainly some criticisms of it,

but it's been very well received, which is pretty different than say Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, which it seems like most audiences just don't like that much. And if they don't, that means the lifespan of a movie like that is going to be fairly short. Look at The Flash. I mean, The Flash, I saw this weekend that it's going to ultimately make less money domestically, not even adjusted for inflation, just straight up than Ryan Reynolds' Green Lantern movie.

Wow. Which is bad. I mean, that's really bad. Also, just once again, Ryan Reynolds' stock rising everywhere. Yes, it's bad. You love Green Lantern movie. Wow. Which is bad. I mean, that's really bad. Also, just once again, Ryan Reynolds' stock rising. Yes. You love Green Lantern. He's back.

Have I seen Green Lantern? I don't know. Peter Sarsgaard plays a guy with an exploding brain. Oh, good for him. Just like Mission Impossible 3. I always wondered

how they afforded that lovely townhouse in Brooklyn. Maggie Gyllenhaal and Peter Sgird. I don't know. I love them both. There you go.

I do too. I kind of don't care as long as they make another Mission Impossible movie. Should I take that attitude towards

all box office? You say that as though Dead Reckoning Part 2 is on the line here and it's not, right? It's not on the line. They'll make Part 2

regardless. It's already been greenlit. They already spent money on it. Whether or not there's another one, I guess is maybe we'll keep talking about that as we go through the mailbag.

What's next, Bob? We have three more questions. The first comes from Bill. If you could bring back any character from a previous film, who would it be? Bill Simmons, thanks for asking. Any character from any previous film in the history of cinema?

What if we brought back Rick from Casablanca for Dead Rex part two? Would that be good? I don't I don't think that's what Bill meant but you could take it that way if you want to there's not a lot of dead characters I got

one good bring back Leia Sidhu who just gets shoved out of the Burj Khalifa yeah after one scene that's a great call thank you so much and she had a great she's an assassin yeah

man I forgot about her on the list of this it's a show call. Thank you so much. And she had a great, she's an assassin. Yeah. Man. I forgot about her on the list of, it's Smoke Show United. It's really very beautiful. Unbelievable, the collection of performers. Relatedly, you know, I feel like Josh Holloway really didn't get a fair shake in that film. That's true. He had one scene where he fell off a roof. Sort of a theme of Ghost Protocol.

And people who aren't Tom Cruise. Very true. Well, many people asking for Renner. Many people want Renner to come back. Yeah, that's the obvious answer. Yeah. And I do think that there would be something, I don't know, kind of interesting about him coming back after his personal physical challenges, even though I don't really understand his character or the supposition that he was going to be the future of that franchise.

That was always very strange. Who else? Dewey Scott from mi2 no did you know do gray scott was originally cast to be wolverine but he couldn't perform his duties because of some other opportunities he was afforded and so they went with hugh jackman i didn't know that sean oh you're welcome okay do gray scott i believe he's a star of uh what's that movie called ever after with uh yeah isn't he the male lead? Yes. With your girl, Drew Barrymore? Yes.

Do you watch Drew Barrymore's TV show? I watch clips from it from time to time. Clips where? Primarily on Instagram. I see. How is it? Is it good? It's definitely like Drew Barrymore's essence

distilled into a talk show. One of my favorite influencers regularly goes on the Drew Barrymore show. I'm really happy for her. What's her name? Her name is Katie Storino. Okay. What does she do?

So she is, she has a line of like, I guess beauty products, like, but more like deodorant and I use her deodorant. It's wonderful. I really recommend Megababe if you don't know about it. And then. Stop trying to get free shit. She's like a force for good. She also, I've quoted her before, she invented the phrase dusty movie

to describe like a genre that's not just Westerns, but she's just like, sometimes boys just want to watch a dusty movie and I really don't like them. Are you sure she invented that? No. Okay. I'm not sure, but she introduced it to me.

Okay. And sometimes she goes on a Drew Barrymore show, and they like each other. And that's really nice. This has been a worthwhile... You asked, and I had an answer. Yeah, I'm curious. I've never seen one second of it. It's remarkable to me that someone who is a full-blown movie star, circa 2005,

hosts a midday talk show. Here we are, you know? You're either selling athletic wear, or you're hosting a daytime talk show. Would you be happy if you were the host of a daytime talk show here we are you know you're either selling athletic wear or you're hosting a daytime talk show would you be happy if you were the host of a daytime talk show no it too much interacting with people oh i see yeah would you sure what about late night sure yeah when i was in sixth grade um thanks for asking each um Each person in our class needed to do a proper show and tell presentation.

In sixth grade? In sixth grade. And it was sort of a test of performance in some ways. And my presentation was how to be a game show host, which I swear to you, I almost completely improvised

because I had not prepared the homework. And I got an improvised because I had not prepared the homework. And I got an A+. And I'm happy to announce that I am a game show host. So, yeah, I could do it. I don't really like interacting with people either, though. There's some challenges. There's a lot of booking and managing people's schedules and then their personalities.

But you don't do that when you're the host. No, but somebody's always running late or somebody's always got a conflict. people's schedules and then but you don't do that when you're the host no but like somebody's always running late or somebody's always got a conflict and then somebody's bringing their energy and you have to mediate

everything and everyone's like it's just it's a lot it's a lot of interacting with people would you invite Tom Cruise onto your show

yes of course what would you talk about remember did you ever watch the Rosie show speaking of sure daytime

yeah I remember how Rosie was just like obsessed with Tommy. I do. He came on like 14 times and that was a good bit. It was a strange bit. It was a really strange retrospect, but I still enjoyed it. It was fun.

Okay. Big question. A lot of people want to know this. What's the question, Bob? This comes from Tree. Please talk more about the Ilsa twist. I've been turning it over in my mind, reading various bitter online reactions

and fan theories that it could be a fake out. And it felt like the first pod barely delved into the potential controversy surrounding it. Isn't there controversy? I don't accept any failure for anything that's going on. I didn't kill Ilsa. I didn't create the controversy. Why didn't you talk more about this thing on a podcast it's super funny that's really that's a great bit i i try to take responsibility for the things i get wrong and live and on this

one i'm happy to talk about it now but i don't accept any past failure on this one subject. Okay, that's helpful. I don't think it was an illegitimate choice for that character to die. I think that there was like a sacrifice that needed to be made to show the magnitude of the villain, right? That that was the purpose of that was to raise the stakes on this movie. I would say Ilsa lasted two more movies

than I expected her to last anyway when we first met her. There was no expectation that she would be a part of Fallout until we saw it. Just like there was no expectation to be a part of this movie until we saw it or learned about who was cast in it. And so I didn't, I didn't, people being bitter because they thought that Ilsa was the future of the franchise, I think is kind of wishful thinking and not realistic. I do, I mean, I love Rebecca Ferguson. Anybody that's heard me talk about Dr. Sleep

knows how much I like Rebecca Ferguson. She's sick. When I went to see it a second time, I realized that I had transposed the hat from Dr. Sleep onto her death scene in Venice. That could be a hat for you. That could be a hat option. A nice little top hat.

Okay, thank you. And you could siphon the energy of young children. That would be great. Okay, very strange. Anyway, she's not wearing a hat as in this death scene. She has sort of like a, I mean, she's in costume. It was not a masked ball either, which I think is a missed opportunity in terms of the themes of the franchise. Are you sure you want to move on from harvesting necromancers?

Are you sure you want to get away from that so quickly? Remember when you made me see that movie? It was great. Was it? Anyway. You should check out the director's cut. It's like 40 minutes longer. You're kidding me.

Yeah, it's great. All right. I'm not going to do that. Okay. So I just didn't think that Ilsa was enough in the IMF to then be the savior of IMF. You know, she just like shows up every once in a while. It's like, hey, MI6 doesn't know what's up. So can you help me? She's not in the IMF. Yeah know, she just like shows up every once in a while and is like, hey, MI6 doesn't know what's up, so can you help me?

She's not in the IMF. Yeah. Sorry, guys. She's homies with Ethan. They're cool with each other. I think it's a nice idea. Can I tell you

a really funny thing? I really related to Rebecca Ferguson while watching some materials in the promotion of this movie because, you know, in the opening sequence,

which we barely spoke about, where she's reintroduced to us, she's in a desert of some kind, I can't remember which desert, and she has a key or one half of the key, and she's being pursued,

and Ethan is going to meet her, and we think she's been shot and killed, but when she's manning this very large automatic sniper rifle, she's wearing an eyepatch, and do you know why she was wearing an eye patch i don't because she doesn't know how to wink or close one eye while leaving the other one open oh i don't either neither do i really oh we've

talked about this before isn't that crazy yeah you're making the face that i would be making if i had to do the same that's the good eye i eye. I can't really like, I definitely can't wink and I can barely close one eye while leaving the other open. Now they're really mad they didn't video this one. People always ask me, they're like,

how do you produce a podcast? And I tell them, you tell the host to do a bunch of stuff that people can't actually see and talk about it. Well, I'm sure many other people are afflicted by this,

but she very amusingly explained how, I think on set, McHugh was like, I've got it. An eye patch. So you have this incredible visual and we never think about the fact that she's just But she very amusingly explained how, I think on set, McHugh was like, I've got it. An eyepatch. So you have this incredible visual and we never think about the fact that she's just wearing an eyepatch. I mean, I guess you could say like she's in the sandstorm.

I gotta be honest, in the whole realm of things that I was asked to focus on and invested in Mission Possible Dead Reckoning Part 1, I was not fixated on the eyepatch. It was easy for me to skip over it too, but having watched that video, it made a lot of sense. If Ilsa comes back fine that looked like a pretty declarative death to me I like the prequel idea Bobby was that your

that was your like spinoff idea no that someone wrote in with a question about that like whether you guys thought that that would work and I didn't include it in here

but since she's MI6 like that becomes Bond-ish which these movies are always like obviously, in dialogue with. It's very funny. The speech that Tom Cruise gives Hayley Atwell in the Italian prison before she runs out and abandons him is pretty much exactly the speech that Ava Greene gives Daniel Craig on the train in Casino Royale,

like down to the orphan bit. It's just like a character reading slash assassination to establish chemistry. And you know what? They stole it and it works. Yeah, it's fine, right? It's fine. Bob, were you upset? Having, I wasn't as upset in the moment as I am now having just recently watched 5 and 6.

Because of how critical she is? Her character is pretty sick. She also has like a real go-to move where she like climbs up on the person's shoulders and like breaks their neck. No one else is doing it like that. That's part of what was so great about that fight sequence was they kept showing her trying to do it to Gabriel and she kept failing. There's one time when she climbs around his shoulders and he just throws her down, which was like,

when that happened, I was like, oh, she's going to lose. It was like in professional wrestling, there are moments like this when someone has a finishing move and the wrestler attempts the finishing move and it has no effect on their opponent

and everyone's like, oh my God, what? It's like how when Max Scherzer tries to throw a fastball this year, it just gets cranked. No, it's like when he tries to throw a slider and he hangs it.

That's been the issue. And just like when, throws the slider and he hangs it that's been the issue and just like when you know the rock tries the people's elbow and somehow Stone Cold Steve Austin rises and is like

that doesn't affect me at all I'm Stone Cold you know what I'm talking about can I submit my own question yes

is Gabriel a human I believe so okay so just a human being you think he's like a 3d printed i don't know they erased him from the you know dubai scene but were they erasing our collective memory or were they erasing our ability to see him because we're seeing him through video okay so so he just like signed an employment contract with a fake entity. Like a, like a. No, a real entity.

Like real, I know. All right. Like a, just AI. He was like, sure, robot, I'll work for you. I'm not even sure there was a contract. The robot just took him over. But if the robot can take him over, why can't it take everyone over? I mean, one thing we haven't talked about is that the movie is a subtle commentary

told with a Christian perspective on cult and how people who are not assuaged by the Christian faith are cultists. Like that is a reading of the movie. And that Gabriel is a leader of the, he's a Lieutenant of the cultist. And I think that's like a fair and accurate way to read the movie. And that a lot of times these are questions people ask when they're like, why did you fall behind this group of people or that group of people? You know, if what if you if you are i don't want to name any particular cult because who the hell knows is listening but if you were nexium is a good example if you were like the right hand woman to the leader of nexium people will ask themselves like how could that rational normal seeming person fall in line with this monster like i it really does feel like a commentary on

that kind of a thing and there's not like a work agreement or an nda it's just like they become intellectually and emotionally connected and curious about what the future could be if they throw themselves over to this greater force i think that's what they're trying to do you don't buy that but it's just like good computer so can't the computer then take it over like that's what I keep tripping on but the the gospels is just like an idea

a book that has ideas about how to live your life and the way you should live your life so I think the it's kind of the same thing the thing that people are struggling with

and I struggled with this a little bit too though is that they kind of did that better in five and six like the syndicate was that but actual people yeah

but only for spies and Solomon Lane but Solomon Lane was kind of like that better in 5 and 6. Like the syndicate was that, but actual people. But only for spies. But Solomon Lane was kind of like a better splinter cell. But he was going to take it, yeah, public. See, I mean, candidly, I disagree. I thought Sean Harris was amazing in that movie, in both of those movies, but the syndicate I always thought was kind of mediocre.

Because it was an offshoot of Ghost Protocol. But it's just like, why does the computer need humans? You know, if it's so powerful and it's going to get, you know, anticipate everything. I think because in certain circumstances. Why can't it just like take over Tom Cruise's car and crash it? I think, well, I think that what the reason that it needs humans now is because they need a human to steal the key or to prevent Ethan Hunt from stealing the key first because he is like the like the the probabilistic outcome is that Ethan Hunt will stop this computer maybe so they need someone in the real world to stop him from doing that before it totally takes over especially when he becomes aware of the fact that if you go analog you have

a better chance to defeat it and that's what that's what IMF tries to do at the end of the movie they're like we're going offline no one answered the question, why can't it just take control of the safe car and crash it and kill them both? So, when you're watching the first six movies,

and you're watching the first six movies, and it's like, why don't they just put a bullet in Tom Cruise's head? Right. Yeah. I mean,

there's a sequence in this new movie that's like, where he could have just been shot in the face. I mean, that's true in every action movie, I guess.

It's a reasonable question. I don't know. Okay. It's hard to logic out the villains of any of these movies, in my opinion. That's true in every action movie I guess it's a reasonable question I don't know okay it's hard to logic out the villains of any of these movies in my opinion that's true okay we're running out of time

so we need to we want to just do this last question oh I forgot we have to rank them yeah we have to rank these movies yeah this is the final question that we got here in the mailbag it comes from Travis it's very important if you could put on a Mission Impossible style mask

and impersonate anyone at the ringer for a day, who would you choose and why would it be Chris Ryan? It would definitely not be Chris Ryan. Just imagine the day you could have, you know? You go to La Cologne, you greet your friends, you get a sweet green, you, you know, move some cars because you always have a parking situation.

Here's the thing. No one would ever buy that I was Chris Ryan. Now, you may be thinking to yourself, that's exactly right, Sean, because you lack the charm, effervescence, and wonder that Chris Ryan brings to the table. But I have a counterpoint to that point, which is that I'm six feet tall.

And they're not adjusting for height. I've wondered about this in these films. They're not adjusting for eye color. Well, that was very notable in the Vanessa Kirby. But they are. Blue to brown. Yes, but they are adjusting for voice. Yes.

Whose voice would you want is an interesting question. Oh. Hmm. That's a good one. Hard to argue with Brian Curtis. Hmm. Great podcasting voice. Great podcasting voice.

Yes. Great broadcaster voice. Lots podcasting voice. Yes. Great broadcaster voice. Lots of gravitas. David? Who would you want? I mean, you know, it'd be fun to put on the Bill mask. I don't know what I would do with the Bill mask. I can think of a few things.

I won't be revealing any of those things. Would you ever attempt to break into a bank vault if you were able to assume someone else's personality? Get their safety deposit box? No. Okay. Not a thief, huh? No, it's just like, again, it seems like a lot of hassle

and how do you know what's in there, you know? Good point. Good point. What could be in there that could be so gruesome? Or just like a letdown, you know? Just like a hat that you don't have to wear. You want to rank the movies? Oh, that was for me?

I thought that was for Bobby. It's for both of you guys. We're here on the podcast. We're all potty together. I don't have an answer for this. I don't need to be anyone else at the ringer. I'm good. I'm good just being me. That's beautiful for Bobby. It's for both of you guys. We're here on the podcast. We're all potty together. I don't have an answer for this. I don't need to be anyone else at the ringer. I'm good. I'm good just being me.

That's beautiful, Bobby. Mission Impossible movie rankings. There's seven of these movies. The original from 1996 directed by Brian De Palma. The second film, Mission Impossible 2

directed by John Woo, 2000. Mission Impossible 3 using Roman numerals this time from 2006 directed by J.J. Abrams. Mission Impossible Ghost Protocol, 2011, directed by Brad Bird. Mission Impossible Rogue Nation, 2015, the first Christopher McQuarrie film. McQuarrie's second film in the series, Fallout, from 2018.

And of course, Dead Reckoning Part 1, also directed by McQuarrie. I know for a fact that two is last. I agree with that. I know that someone on the internet did a thing and they cut some things out and it's art. And I think it's great to have projects on the internet. And, you know, all respect to John Woo. I just don't think it's a match with the Mission Impossible style of, you know, movie making. And I rewatched this.

I tried watching it on Friday night and fell asleep. It is not the best John Woo movie. It's not the best movie John Woo made in Hollywood. It's not the best movie John Woo made in the last 30 years. Like, it's just not, it's not, to me, it's not a fit because Wu does maximalized vision that is his vision

over everything else. And I think the directors who have been most successful have been able to, for the most part, subsume their styles to the scale of the stories with one notable exception,

which we'll get to. Two, I think also, two has a decent villain, which is sort of like a counterpart of Ethan. Like, Dewey Scott's character is sort of like, I know everything about Ethan Hunt, which is a good idea. But he's not a, the actor I don't love.

I do like, I do, I do think Tandy Wynood is good. And the, like, meet cute in the car after the party is amazing. That scene is really cool. But it just kind of turns into like you know opera music

gun shootout doves flying like you know all the woo tropes which doesn't really fit with the rest of this series in my mind.

So I say two last. Bob any any any counters to that? I agree. That doesn't work because it feels like

it's trying to I don't know it just it feels like it's trying to i don't know it just it feels like it's trying to be so different and no one seems comfortable with that yeah i agree um it's also just a very strange cruise era in retrospect just like yeah long hair i've been filming eyes wide shut for eight years while my marriage falls apart and also vanilla sky i was like really strapped into two for the first 10 to 20 minutes and then after that it just kind of loses me i thought the villain performance was like exceptionally bad actually like like going for something that was almost a parody of like a like arch villain that just didn't work in this franchise i don't think

yeah i like the character but not the actor who's doing the part. Okay. I think Mission Impossible 3 is the second worst movie. I agree. You don't think so, Bobby? I don't think so. I really like Mission Impossible 3. I think that it visually is such a hard shift away from 2,

which is very orangey. It starts when he's climbing these cliffs, and it's very dusty. And then Mission Impossible 3 is like, oh, we we're taking a dark kind of fucked up turn and all the shots are very gray and it's very stylized in that way it's like i think that's when bad robot comes on if i'm not mistaken yeah i and it looks like tv to me i don't know it does i i like the connective parts of mission impossible 3 more than the stunts agree uh even though i do enjoy the vatican stunt as previously discussed. I think the writing and the dialogue

is really good. Yeah. Because it's JJ and I just think his visual style is not muscular enough to... And you see what happens

when you get like a very visually oriented filmmaker in Brad Bird coming along right after this. I do think that he, you know, creates the Michelle Monaghan character, which is kind of critical

for keeping Ethan's story going. He seems to be pretty good with Cruise. I think Cruise is good in three. Yeah. There's just like all of these remnants of JJ's experience as a creator, like casting Keri Russell. That's a great sequence. The Keri Russell sequence

is amazing. But it's, you know, him playing on the felicity core and greg grunberg showing up at the party and it's him kind of like wish casting his universe into a mission movie it's effective it's definitely not bad and he does get as amanda said that amazing philip seymour hoffman performance but like i wish i understood who that character was and what he wanted other than money. And why he's at these gala events and why he's such a sour prick. And I don't really know.

And I don't know what the rabbit's foot does. Does it activate a nuclear device? No, no, no. It's a bioweapon. It's like a disease that if it's released, it could kill a large percentage of the world. What do you think is worse than this? This is going to sound like a crazy hot take,

but I'm not huge on Ghost Protocol, personally. I would say that it's, I was going to put it at five. Same. I would too.

That's not crazy. I mean, obviously the Burj Khalifa is amazing, insane, can't believe it happened. Wonderful. Everything else's like kind of junky looking honestly and again like cgi was like really not where it is it's not where we want it to be now if we want it to be anywhere at all i don't know that i do but it certainly

was not where it needed to be in 2011 plus you, you know, like Jeremy Renner is very good, but he's just sitting in the movie being like, oh, wait, I don't get to be in this anymore? Okay, like it's pretty awkward. I think that I mostly agree. I think there are a couple of visuals that are pretty interesting. I do think the sandstorm is kind of fascinating.

Some of it works, some of it doesn't visually, but the kind of close-up stuff of Cruise and the sandstorm is kind of fascinating some of it works some of it doesn't visually but the kind of close-up stuff of cruise and the sandstorm is kind of amazing um i thought it was weird that actually in dead reckoning they used a sandstorm i was like we did this already and in a much greater scale the burj khalifa sequence sets the mold and the expectation for the rest of the series going forward so it's really important. That I agree with. And I think it works really well. Although I actually think the stuff that happens

in the Burj Khalifa afterwards with the contact lens and the printing the nuclear codes to me is like more edge of my seat filmmaking than him. I know it's like hilarious from a Tom Cruise biographical perspective that he's climbing the Burj Khalifa and like swinging into this window.

But I thought that that was like a little bit campy the way that he like doesn't really stick the landing it didn't really feel very Ethan Hunty and I don't know that that

sequence didn't work as well for me on a second watch as it did the first time I saw it and I was like this is unbelievable I had the same reaction as both of you guys I feel

similarly to me it would be three then then Ghost Protocol because I just don't think I think it maybe is like your mileage may vary on how much you like or don't like, say,

Philip Seymour Hoffman. If you're like, he puts it over the edge because he's giving the best performance in this entire series. Maybe you would say that's five instead of six.

But the bottom three feel kind of set to me. But we love the McQuarrie movies. Can I say the prison break to open Ghost Protocol is pretty badass. It's like balletic, but also like in your face and aggressive too. Like it's pretty great.

I feel good with it at number five. Okay. Ghost Protocol at number five. And then we've got a Brian De Palma movie and three Christopher McQuarrie movies. I think Dead Reckoning is next. Oh, interesting. I think. I think it's between Rogue Nation and Dead Reckoning is next. Oh, interesting. I think. I think it's between Rogue Nation and Dead Reckoning for me.

For me, it's Rogue Nation. Is four. I think so. See, I never would have guessed this based on our conversation. I'm really just here for the absolutely ludicrous set pieces. Okay, okay. And again, I texted you guys when I was re-watching Rogue Nation and I was like,

I do not understand what's happening. And I do not think that right now I could tell you the plot of Rogue Nation. Rogue Nation has so many little cool details though. Like the bone doctor. Yeah, but like going into the record shop and then the smoke filling the record,

the listening booth. Oh, that is cool. While watching the attendant get killed. You know, I mean, it sets the template for the record, the listening booth while watching the attendant get killed. You know, I mean, it sets the template for the Macquarie. Like, here's your mission. Should you choose to accept it? Stuff the way that he does it slightly differently. It does introduce Solomon Lane, who's a great villain.

I don't know. This is a tough one. I really like Dead Reckoning a lot. I feel like more than a lot of other people. I feel like I'm like highest on it. You do like it the most. Yeah. But.

I mean, okay, so. But Fallout and One are like huge movies for me. Same. We'll get there. What are the other set pieces? I mean, him hanging onto the plane in Rogue Nation, right? Opening set piece, yeah. What else am I forgetting?

I mean. Well, there's a big shootout which leads to solomon lean in the glass box oh right yeah unbelievably satisfying film pretty cool ending oh you know the other thing about rogue nation is that one of the major set pieces is the underwater i held my breath for six minutes i don't care i think it's really boring i like that so so that was... What's your take? Dead Reckoning or Rogue Nation, Bob?

Rogue Nation, but kind of with some space. Really? Over Dead Reckoning? Yeah. Okay. I rewatched Rogue Nation last night

and I agree that it's like kind of confusing what's going on because they haven't quite revealed. So like the way that Rogue Nation and Fallout are paired

is interesting in the context of talking about dead reckoning because it feels like they cut dead reckoning off at a point where they didn't they like didn't choose to cut rogue nation story as short as they chose to cut dead reckoning story so i'm having a hard time like balancing those two things in my head because rogue nation ends in a very satisfying way. And I think I alluded to this when we talked about it on the pod last week in that they put them in a box and it's like the movie's over. And even though that villain comes back in the next movie, you didn't necessarily know that that was going to happen when you finished watching Rogue Nation. I think Dead

Reckoning's action is better, but I think the movie itself is a more satisfying watch for Rogue Nation. I am personally as dubious about the syndicate as a good villain as I think the movie itself is a more satisfying watch for Rogue Nation. I am personally as dubious about the syndicate as a good villain as I think many people are about the entity as a good villain.

So that to me doesn't I think there's just a better physical manifestation of that villain with Morales versus Harris and who you like better and who seems more

sinister. But I. There's also the opera showdown in Rogue Nation. Yeah. I also just want to point out that we forgot the Kremlin scene in Ghost Protocol, which is really good. Oh, that's amazing. The Kremlin break-in scene. So I feel good about where he put Ghost Protocol.

With the sliding visual. Yeah. Yeah, that's pretty sensational. That's fantastic. I think that the opera scene puts Rogue Nation over Dead Reckoning. Now, I reserve the right to reframe this when we make an episode about part two. Because I think it's possible that the success or lack of success of part two dictates how we feel about part one. Because if it ends as satisfyingly as Rogue Nation ends, we might feel like those two movies paired together make something really special.

And they don't have a ton of reason to think that it's not going to be successful other than the writers and actors strike and the complete dissolution of the movie business around it. But nevertheless. I'm okay with this. If you guys want to put Rogue Nation at three,

I'm okay with it. It's pretty tight for me. I don't share the close thing. The only thing that I want to say is that I'm still just absolutely shocked and dismayed at your assertion that

eight people staring at each other at a weird like disco in Venice is better than the Rome car chase scene. Which is just

some of the best filmmaking. Popeye till I die I am what I am. Okay. If you can show me in close up Pom Clemente's face and Hayley Atwell's face God bless. filmmaking pop by till i die i am what i am okay if you can show me in close-up palm clementine's

face and hayley atwell's face god bless thank you thank you for your service okay um okay so dead rex for rogue nation 3 i think we we we may want to revisit this at a later date but remembering the incredible nature of the opera sequence, Puccini. Many people pointed out that missed opportunity when Ilsa is killed, not hit us with some Puccini on that bridge, you know, to kind of close the loop. That would've been cool.

I liked that this, the score, I really liked what they were doing in Venice. And also like, frankly, Nessun Dorma, like gets plenty of play and it's like almost a little over the top that they're doing it.

Disagree. Listen, I love Nessun Dorma. Pavarotti doing Nessun Dorma is the of play. And it's almost a little over the top that they're doing it. Disagree. Listen, I love Nessun Dorma as much as... Pavarotti doing Nessun Dorma is the pinnacle of culture. I don't disagree. Okay. But, you know, it would be a little much. It's Nessun Dorma as sung by Luciano Pavarotti. And then it's me alone watching Paul Schrader's Blue Collar for the 18th time.

Okay. Two. Three is one of the Mission Impossiblear for the 18th time. Two. Three is one of the Mission Impossible movies we're about to name. Okay. Four. What's four? Drew Barrymore talking to your favorite influencer. Five is me watching Ford vs. Ferrari on a plane by myself on a red eye while everyone else is asleep.

Can I tell you something really funny? Sure. I talked to the director Christian Petzold today. Absolute genius. One of the funniest interviews we've ever done on the pod and he was like i was watching a movie on the way here he's like starring my favorite movie star you know who it is julia roberts i was like wow where's this going and he was like i watched a movie it was about him and it was about her and george clooney she has a daughter she's getting married to a man who makes seaweed

and he said i gotta tell you bad movie but you know what we need bad movies I was like this is a guy who made Phoenix yeah it was great alright let's get the final two we do need bad movies this is the big fight

we do need bad movies we need bad enjoyable movies big fight is Brian De Palma's 1996 masterpiece Mission Colon Impossible

and the 2018 Wonder mission impossible dash fallout uh it's like choosing between my two sons i'm really torn it's really tough i'm not i'm not like coming in hot with a you know it must be this it must be this or i leave i they're very different films i really do feel that that Fallout is also a masterpiece. And rewatching all of the films and seeing Dead Reckoning twice just solidifies that for me. It's the balance of, I guess you don't care about the syndicate as that much, but there's something about shady network of individuals who want to ruin the world that I, I'm like, okay, I can understand that and I don't

need to think anymore about it and now I can just and Ethan needs to stop it and you can do spectacular things which he does that's the case for Fallout yes but then I obviously re-watched De Palma's original which I have seen many times and I'm like oh god this, this is so good. It's so good. Sets the template. You know, action wise, 96 is different from 2018. How good does that train sequence though look for 1996? It looks okay. Oh my God. For 96? You gotta fix your TV.

You're killing me. My TV is fine. I just have standards and taste. Do you have motion smoothing on? No, I don't. You are the person who has motion smoothing on no i don't you are the person who has motion smoothing on in all of your homes yes for like four years you did and we would come over to watch like the emmys or whatever and you'd be like here we go no i don't have motion smoothing

on don't say that out loud um i i chris will back me up i think the original is number one but it's really close i number one that is that is theboxd answer, but I don't know if that's like the true answer. Well, I gotta go see Oppenheimer. You can't be hurting me in this way. I'm on the brink of Oppenheimer here. What's the letterboxd answer? Don't bring that up again. It's just like, obviously, it's like a De Palma classic.

It's great filmmaking. It's also popcorn entertainment. There's the, you know, iconic scene with him lowering down into the tube and he's sweating. And it's really good. Toast. Toast. But also, Mission Impossible Fallout is insane. All of the things that they do.

Yeah. It's amazing. Yeah, I agree. And they got it all on film. Yeah, I agree. Big fan. I don't, you know. They got Henry Cavill loading up both biceps like they were howitzers.

He jumped out of planes. He punched people on cliffs and chased in helicopters and motorcycles. By the way, that's the other thing that I love about the connection between Dead Reckoning and the first film is those damn Gideons. The Bible being where the truth is. Okay. Not a mistake. Here we go.

This is how he solves the case and he realizes it's Jim. He sees the printing of the Drake Hotel in that Bible. It's really good. I'm not mad if we put it at number one. I don't know if I think that's the honest answer, but obviously it's a hugely important movie to me. So Mission Impossible 1 at 1 is okay. Bob, are you okay with it?

Of course I'm okay with it. I mean, it's really... Do you disagree? That was the year that I was born. Yes, 1996. I'm not sure you I mean it's really were you born in 1996 do you disagree that was the year that I was born yes 1996 I'm not sure you're qualified to weigh in on this but are you

you can't know what it was like to be 14 in the movie theater and watching that film this is true but you can't know what it was like to be 22 seeing Mission Impossible

Fallout you know that's true I can't it's really true but at that time when I was 36, I think I was turning 36 like the day it came out,

I had the soul of a 22-year-old. Not like now. Because of Mission Impossible Fallout turned back to clock for you because of how sensational it is. I prefer Mission Impossible 6,

Mission Impossible Fallout. So that's sort of a two against one situation here. Then you guys got it. Then you guys got it then you guys got it the same way we got rogue nation at three for that reason i don't know it feels very hard to compare it feels like trying to compare like a 2015 ferrari and like the craftsmanship of that versus like a 1950s ferrari like you can't have one without the other and so it just matters like

what whether you think that the template, the foundation setting is more important or whether you think the height of the building is more important. But it's not just saying Fallout is... Oh, I have to take Dr. No over Skyfall.

Like, Mission Impossible on its own. On its own. It's tremendous. It's sensational. We're not saying this with anger. It also has Emmanuel Bear.

Quite stunning. We're not saying this with anger. We're both just saying in our guts that fallout is sort of the peak of the did you see the mcquarry promise to bring back the cia functionary who was sent to alaska whose office was broken into in the first film in the next in part two i did so they brought back kittredge and now they're going to bring back that other guy i

can't remember what is uh what is his name like dunlow i think it's dunlow uh donlo donlo okay you got you guys can have it fallout is one mission i knew we're gonna end here because you guys just your recency bias is so weak and you don't respect the history of cinema but nevertheless brian's is giving us so much told you i told you that was the letterboxd answer what does that mean I was here in 1996. I turned 12. Yeah. And I loved the movies. So.

Were you wearing a hat at that time? I don't really. I wasn't a hat person as a kid. It's like a, it's my mom phase, you know? Well, we've done great work here, but I got to go see Oppenheimer. So thanks for everything. Bob, thanks for your work on this podcast. You're welcome. I want everyone to know that editing an episode of The Big Picture

is kind of like diffusing two atomic bombs at the same time. Okay. That's what I do to do this. Red light, green light. Later this week, it's happening. Here we are. It's Barbie, it's Oppenheimer, it's Barbenheimer. We're going to talk about both movies.

I've seen Barbie. As have I. Oh. Yeah. Oh my. I know. We didn't even communicate about that. And perhaps we sh Barbie. As have I. Oh. Yeah. Oh my. I know. We didn't even communicate about that. And perhaps we shan't

until we sit down in the chair. Okay. Should we even do an outline? Well, you'll do one anyway. I certainly will. Should I share an outline with you? 40,000. You need to share the history part.

I didn't read any Oppenheimer history. So. I read half of American Prometheus. Did you read the important half or like just his job? We didn't get to the, we didn't get to the big event, unfortunately.

Section two of the New Yorker is grandparents or so and so. Great. He took great interest in learning about electrons. Anyhow, I mean,

biggest episode of the year. We'll see you then. Thank you.