Mission Impossible five! (Spoilers)

Mission Impossible is a series that begs the question; when will the mission be impossible? We’re five movies into the series and so far every mission appears to be completely possible. Very difficult yes, nearly impossible for sure, but not actually impossible. I know this because Ethan Hunt keeps completing these so-called impossible missions.

Tom Cruise is once again back as Ethan Hunt, secret agent and all around hunk of a man. I’m amazed at how the series manages to continue shocking me in the cold open. Be it fake Ethan Hunt in Mission Impossible II, the opening scene in MI:III, and of course the Kremlin mission in MI:4. We’re lulled into a false sense of security as Ethan finishes his mission stealing nerve gas only to get to his debriefing and oh my god not even the briefing is safe! The first of many bruh moments.

Ethan is of course joined by William Brandt which is the last time Jeremy Renner is in the series. Apparently Renner’s lack of appearance in subsequent films is due to his scheduling conflict with some indie film series called the Marvel Cinematic Universe. His character is still alive so they can always bring him back now that the MCU is bombing in just about every conceivable way. Simon Pegg is back as Benji Dunn, Ethan’s trusty tech guy.

Ving Rhames is back to actually have a part in this film. His appearance is more dignified than his glorified cameo at the end of MI4. Alec Baldwin is here as Alan Hunley, director of the CIA. Baldwin will be in Mission Impossible: Fallout and then never show up again, I’m assuming he dies in the next movie but you never know. He’s probably been too busy filming Boss Baby.

Anyway, the important thing is that Ethan has a new enemy. Where do you go after the villains we’ve had before? A team of villains. Even better, let’s do the evil IMF who have beards and shit like the mirror universe in Star Trek. Well not that far. But they do fight off the evil IMF known as The Syndicate. The Syndicate is a group of disavowed spies from various branches led by Solomon Lane played by Sean Harris. Harris is back in Fallout as himself so I’m assuming this isn’t the last we’ve seen of The Syndicate’s storyline.

But the point is that The Syndicate is just as competent as IMF, MI6, and more because they are made up of members of said intelligence agencies. Oh and Ethan is being hunted down by the CIA again because they’re pissed about that whole data theft in the first movie and have had the IMF dissolved as an agency. Ethan of course is on a bit of a personal vendetta against Solomon Lane because Lane keeps beating him at every turn. He’ll need the help of this film’s sex icon Simon Pegg.

I’m just kidding, I’m talking about Rebecca Ferguson as Ilsa Faust. Now Ilsa is also in Fallout, so I’m pretty sure these are going to be directly connected with one another. Damn she is gorgeous, and deadly to boot. Ilsa Faust can crack a dude’s neck between her thighs and frankly that doesn’t sound like such a bad way to go. She’s also a deeply complicated character with emotions and motivations. Is she a double agent? A triple agent? A quadruple agent? I have no clue!

The gadgets are on point as usual, including a pamphlet that is actually a laptop, the usual retina eye pieces, sports cars with fancy gadgets, an ID system that analyzes one’s walking pattern, and my personal favorite; the flute sniper rifle. I love the ongoing joke that Simon Pegg never gets to wear the masks since in MI:III he’s not a field agent, in Ghost Protocol the mask machine breaks and in this movie the mask would be useless. I hope Simon gets to wear the mask, but I’m also confident that they’re just making a gag and the mask has been played out and won’t be coming back at all. Who knows.

Everyone who has seen the subsequent films, I know. I’m disappointed that Jeremy Renner never comes back, the guy really started working his character in this movie. It’ll also be disappointing to see Alec Baldwin go away after the next movie. I didn’t quite like Sean Harris as the big bad guy, although that might be because Philip Seymour Hoffman made such a grand presentation in 3 that he really set unattainable heights for future villains.

Anyhow, what I’m trying to get at is that Rogue Nation is yet another fantastic Mission Impossible film. I’m glad I threw aside my 25 year old grudge to start watching this series.