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“Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning” First Reactions: A Pure Cinematic Adrenaline Rush 30 Years in the Making

By The Credits  |  May 13, 2025

The first reactions to Tom Cruise’s eighth and potentially final mission as IMF Agent Ethan Hunt in Mission: Impossible—The Final Reckoning have arrived following a screening for critics and members of the press. The verdict? Cruise and his capable comrades Luther (Ving Rhames), Benji (Simon Pegg), and newcomer Grace (Hayley Atwell) have pulled off a sustained adrenaline rush of pure cinematic spectacle. In short, Cruise and co. have done it again.

If Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning is indeed Cruise’s last go-round as the unkillable Ethan Hunt, it will cap a remarkable run for both Cruise and the franchise that began on May 22, 1996 with the very first Mission: Impossible, beginning with the set-piece that started it all, that sensational break-in at the CIA’s Black Vault, which The Final Reckoning hat-tipped in a recent trailer. The Final Reckoning promises to thread all of Hunt’s work over the past nearly three decades into a cohesive narrative, while capping the franchise with one final stunt to rule them all. It appears that Cruise and co. have pulled it off. 

Early reactions are calling The Final Reckoning the kind of big-screen spectacle that the movie theater was born for. Cruise somehow tops his previous stunts, which have included hanging off the side of an Airbus A400m in Rogue Nation, a record-breaking HALO skydive, and his mastery of helicopter piloting in Fallout, with a fresh stunt for the ages. 

Cruise, director Christopher McQuarrie, and longtime stunt coordinator Wade Eastwood have cooked up a fresh course of lunacy for The Final Reckoning, which finds Ethan and his longtime IMF partners, Luther Stickell and Benji Dunn, trying to save the world from imminent disaster a few months after the conclusion of the last installment, Dead Reckoning. The IMF team is struggling to stop the remorseless Gabriel (Esai Morales) from gaining control of the rogue artificial intelligence The Entity. The cast includes Henry Czerny as Eugene Kittridge, Pom Klementieff as Paris, Vanessa Kirby as the White Widow, and Hannah Waddingham, Katy O’Brian, and Tramell Tillman.

Let’s take a quick look at the first reactions below. Mission: Impossible—The Final Reckoning will premiere on May 23, 2025.

Featured image: Tom Cruise plays Ethan Hunt in Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning from Paramount Pictures and Skydance.

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The Credits

The Credits is the Motion Picture Association's online platform that profiles below-the-line filmmakers and TV creators. Through in-depth interviews and coverage, we shine a spotlight on all the individuals who are indispensable to the entertainment industry and create the films and series we love.