‘Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning’ Movie Review: Tom Cruise and the Big Action Scenes Save the Day, Hopefully Not One Last Time! (LatestLY Exclusive)

Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning Movie Review: When Tom Cruise tells you to trust him... ONE... LAST... TIME... you do. When the franchise implies this could be his last run, well, that time, I'm not so sure. I mean, John Wick 4 killed John Wick, and yet he’s back for a fifth movie. And let me be honest here—I don’t want Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning to be Cruise’s swansong as the utterly indestructible Ethan Hunt. I’m not being greedy. I don’t want Cruise to keep risking his life to entertain me; the man is 62. But when he bows out as Ethan Hunt, I want to feel that emotional gut-punch of saying goodbye to that character. Which, honestly, I didn’t feel in The Final Reckoning. ‘Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning’ Movie Review: Tom Cruise Delivers Thrills Despite Bloated Runtime, Critics Give Their Verdict!

Not that I didn’t have fun with Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning. When both Cruise and the movie go bat-hit crazy, our euphoria also goes bat-shit crazy. There are two heart-in-the-mouth set pieces guaranteed to keep your eyes glued to the screen - the paisa vasool moments that deliver exactly what you came for. But do you really need a nearly three-hour runtime filled with nonsensical plotting, over-verbose exposition, and characters going theatrically hard in your face just to get to those moments? Not so much.

'Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning' Movie Review - The Plot Continues

The Final Reckoning continues from Dead Reckoning Part One, whose lukewarm box office showing prompted the team to quietly drop the 'Part One' title. It doesn’t matter, though - the plot still carries on: the rogue AI known as The Entity still wants world domination (or rather, termination). Set two months after the previous film, Hunt is now trying to stop The Entity from taking over nuclear arsenals across the globe - including India and its neighbour, Pakistan. ‘Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning’ Movie Review: Tom Cruise and the Big Action Scenes Save the Day, Hopefully Not One Last Time!

Watch the Trailer of 'Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning':

Everyone claims to want to stop The Entity, but deep down, nearly all the players seem to want control over it to dominate the world. The Entity’s former human ally Gabriel (Esai Morales) makes it clear - he wants to reshape the world in his own ways. The CIA’s goal? Pretty much the same. They want Hunt to find the AI’s source on a submerged submarine and hand it over. But what’s Ethan’s plan?

'Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning' Movie Review - AI Fears Not Fully Ratified

When Dead Reckoning came out, I wasn’t sold on the AI plot. I get the relevance - AI is everywhere now, from entertainment to journalism. People are asking Grok if a news article on X is real, when a quick Google search (ironically now cluttered with AI-generated answers and sponsored links) could have sufficed.

At least in Dead Reckoning, The Entity felt like a wannabe Skynet - an omniscient, omnipresent digital overlord that was tough to outsmart, which made it genuinely dangerous. In The Final Reckoning, it’s more like a computer virus - albeit with Ultron-level ambition - looking to trigger nuclear chaos so we can have a tense “will-the-world-end?” sequence while America stands tall. And it’s up to Hunt to save the day. Again.

Hunt is treated like a god here - everyone looks to him to do their work, including the villains. He’s even given three days to save the world. That’s literally Jesus-level storytelling. But why does the AI plot double as an Ethan Hunt nostalgia trip?

The film kicks off with a montage of past moments, trying to build up the emotional weight of his journey. But hasn’t he already been doing all this world-saving stuff in every previous movie? What's so damn special here?

'Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning' Movie Review - Heavy-Handed Nostalgia, Clunky Screenplay

The nostalgia is not only laid on thick - it clutters the screenplay. When the film isn’t busy being overly talky, it’s using flashbacks and visual aids to remind us what happened two years ago. Because, let’s be real, outside of the stunts, who remembers the actual plot details?

There are also some awkward retcons - connecting dots between films released decades apart, just to see if we’re still paying attention. A character is revealed to be the son of a former villain, a Macguffin from a previous film becomes integral to the Macguffin of this movie. The writing, unlike its star, just doesn't shine here.

'Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning' Movie Review - Stakes Without Emotion

In the meandering and frankly boring first act - and even parts of the second - The Final Reckoning tries to raise the stakes by killing off a major character. But it forgets to make us care. Sadly, it forgets to add that emotional weight to that character's exit - a problem that has been plaguing all the movies of this franchise.

The film is stuffed with too many characters who add little to the plot, even within Hunt’s loyal crew. He even adds new allies, one brought from years back in the franchise. But did we really need someone like the great Nick Offerman (sans moustache) playing a US general who simply glowers? Or Ted Lasso’s Hannah Waddingham as a tough Navy officer? Neither character really matters.

The ones who do matter are the returning Benji (Simon Pegg), Luther (Ving Rhames - whose final conversation with Hunt brings more emotional depth than all the nostalgia montages), Erika (Angela Bassett), and Grace (Hayley Atwell). ‘Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning’: Did a 1973 Dharmendra Film Use ‘Mission: Impossible’ Theme Before Tom Cruise? Here’s What Happened.

Look, I like Atwell. But swapping Grace in for a well-established character like Ilsa Faust, which happened in Dead Reckoning, still feels like a misstep. And I just couldn’t buy Grace’s almost-romantic chemistry with Hunt here.

Gabriel, the human antagonist, starts off with promise. We’re told he’s no longer under The Entity’s thumb and now wants to control it. That had potential. But like much of the movie, his character fizzles out without delivering much impact.

The thing is, if I have to nitpick, there is plenty to nitpick. The plot is ludicrous, and the supporting characters are weakly written, but these have always been issues with MI movies. What makes them a tad unbearable here is the runtime, which makes the film yawnworthy in places.

'Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning' Movie Review - Action Setpieces and Tom Cruise Save The Film

Thankfully, when it comes to action and ‘heist’ sequences, Cruise and director Christopher McQuarrie (who gave the franchise both its best and weakest entries) deliver. You can feel the energy pick up during the film’s first proper action scene midway through the second act - two fights, spliced together, in two separate locations. It’s smooth, smart, and exhilarating.

The film’s true highlights arrive a bit later—and they’re worth the wait.

There’s a fantastically tense underwater sequence that’s almost wordless, except for one word of pointed exposition. The music takes a haunting turn, the set design and cinematography tighten the tension, and Cruise gives his all. It becomes a near-claustrophobic experience that had me on edge, almost. 'Almost' because, of course, we know Hunt will survive. He has to make it to the double biplane stunt later. Also, the trailer did spoil how the sequence would end, even if it ends so very conveniently for the hero (and raises questions as to whether hypothermia and ocean pressure matter much to Hunt's existence). Mission Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One Movie Review: Tom Cruise Fights AI in This Breathtaking and High-Octane Actioner.

The biplane sequence in the third act is another stunner. It’s nearly flawless: Cruise once again risks his life, and the stunt choreography uses vertigo, zero gravity, and tight editing to max effect. It’s intercut with other characters doing their best to prevent global disaster—adding to the thrill. Still, it’s hard to ignore how it mirrors Fallout’s climax—just swap the helicopter for biplanes.

And Cruise is once again hanging on, not just to save the world - but maybe to save the very idea of theatre-going itself.

'Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning' Movie Review - Final Thoughts

So, where does that leave us? Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning isn’t the grand emotional farewell I was hoping it would be, nor is it the tight, relentless thrill ride the franchise has pulled off before. But when it works - when Cruise is doing death-defying stunts and the film stops over-explaining itself - it reminds you why this series still has a pulse on you. It may be bloated, baffling, and weighed down by its own convoluted and bland screenplay, but there’s still a raw, unfiltered joy in watching Tom Cruise defy gravity, logic, and time. Sorry for being greedy, I want to see him run more in a much better MI swansong.

(The opinions expressed in the above article are of the author and do not reflect the stand or position of LatestLY.)

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on May 17, 2025 09:01 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).