Movies - Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning: Ethan Hunt’s Last Mission, Cinema’s Ultimate Goodbye

By Sabine, 21 may 2025

Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning, the explosive final chapter in the legendary saga carried to the brink—and often suspended in midair—by Tom Cruise, is now showing in theaters. It's a long-awaited, dreaded, and hoped-for conclusion, in which agent Ethan Hunt is confronted with his demons, his mistakes, and above all, a new kind of threat: the Entity, an all-powerful and elusive artificial intelligence capable of manipulating both reality and virtual reality. To save humanity, he will have to dive into the shadows one last time... and face his own past. This new installment, the eighth in a saga that began nearly three decades ago, doesn't just string together spectacular action scenes—although it does offer the most breathtaking, precise, and daring sequences in the entire franchise. It also takes the time to revisit the Mission: Impossible universe as a whole, with numerous references to previous films. We see familiar locations, key characters, and even narrative details that take on a whole new meaning in light of this final mission. This isn't just an action movie, it's a vibrant, emotional, almost introspective farewell that brings to a close a journey that began in 1996. To mark this momentous release, the entire saga is being rebroadcast on channels 6ter and M6. So, is it really necessary to rewatch everything before discovering The Final Reckoning? The short answer: yes, a thousand times yes. And we promise, our article is guaranteed spoiler-free.

From the very first minutes, the film sets the scene: it will be a mirror image, a game of reflections and echoes with the past. Forgotten faces resurface, places steeped in memory are revisited, and certain dialogues resonate like delayed answers to questions asked twenty years ago. The first film, directed by Brian De Palma, is referenced several times—the very film that reinvented American espionage through the prism of a cult series from the 1960s. Emmanuelle Béart, Jean Reno, the masks, the self-destructing messages, and of course Lalo Schifrin's musical theme, still as electrifying as ever. It's impossible to forget the cult scene in the CIA's white room, where a weightless Ethan Hunt skims the floor in church-like silence. It's a sequence that has become legendary, etched in the collective memory as a model of controlled tension.

Then come the other pillars of the saga. In the third installment, directed by J.J. Abrams, Ethan faces Owen Davian, a cold-blooded arms dealer played by the late Philip Seymour Hoffman. The MacGuffin: an unknown weapon, referred to by the enigmatic name “the rabbit's foot.” This installment marks a more personal, more emotional turning point, with the introduction of Ethan's private life. And in Ghost Protocol (2011), the fourth installment, the threat becomes global: a nuclear war to be avoided, a skyscraper to be scaled with bare hands, and a breath of adventure reminiscent of a post-modern James Bond. The enemy, Kurt Hendricks, embodies an apocalyptic vision: for him, humanity must be destroyed in order to be reborn better. But in this mission, it is the trail of a woman that must be followed, not that of a weapon. The saga begins to change tone, to take on a greater perspective, to inject more vertigo than ever before – literally.

The direct link to Dead Reckoning – Part 1 (released in July 2023) is obvious. Revisiting this film is almost essential to grasp the complexity of the Entity, this new antagonist who is neither human, nor locatable, nor predictable. It is an artificial intelligence free from any form of human control. At its side are two key figures: Grace, a thief as cunning as she is elusive, brilliantly played by Hayley Atwell, and Gabriel, a mysterious killer from Ethan's past, played by Esai Morales. The duo brings a new, tense, ambiguous dynamic to the film, in which the past and the future intersect dangerously.

In The Final Reckoning, Tom Cruise – 62 years old and still ready to defy the laws of gravity – pushes the limits of what is possible once again. On motorcycles, trains, cliffs, and in free fall, he performs breathtaking stunts that pay homage to a time when action was still physical, palpable, and human. But above all, the film does something rare for a blockbuster: it slows down, contemplates, and takes stock. Looking back, Ethan Hunt – and Tom Cruise along with him – seems to tell us that every mission, every mask, every betrayal mattered. It wasn't just a race against time. It was a life. A struggle to preserve something intimate in a world gone astray.

For 30 years, this saga has managed to reinvent itself without ever betraying its essence, thanks to visionary directors (De Palma, Woo, Abrams, Bird, McQuarrie) and a star obsessed with perfection. Ethan Hunt has become much more than an action hero. He is a witness to a dying breed of cinema, one of real risk-taking, narrative flair, and respect for the audience. Mission Impossible has never been just a franchise. It's a love letter to spy movies, adventure, sweat, and pace. And with The Final Reckoning, Tom Cruise bows out in style. Not with a bang, but with rare elegance.

Hats off to the artist. And thank you for mission accomplished.

Synopsis : 
Our lives are the sum of our choices. Tom Cruise is Ethan Hunt in Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning.

Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning
Directed by Christopher McQuarrie
Written by Christopher McQuarrie, Erik Jendresen
Based on Mission: Impossible by Bruce Geller
Produced by Tom Cruise, Christopher McQuarrie
Starring  Tom Cruise, Hayley Atwell, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Henry Czerny, Angela Bassett
Cinematography : Fraser Taggart
Edited by Eddie Hamilton
Music by Max Aruj, Alfie Godfrey
Production companies : Skydance Media, TC Productions
Distributed by Paramount Pictures
Release dates : May 6 , 2025 (Tokyo), May 14, 2025 (Cannes), May 23, 2025 (United States)
Running time : 169 minutes