Mission: Impossible—The Final Reckoning took on the impossible task of connecting (almost) every element of its 30-year-old franchise with its supposedly concluding installment in an emotionally satisfying way. I don’t know about everyone else, but I think Christopher McQuarrie and Erik Jendresen pulled it off with flying colors. I mean, Tom Cruise helmed this series with the intention of bringing in a new director for every film, thereby making the ultimate product look like a patchwork quilt of action filmmaking. So, apart from recurring characters and throwaway mentions, you never really needed to do any homework before getting your mission briefing.
But after Ghost Protocol, and especially since McQuarrie took the reins, that homework became a bit of a necessity. And since The Final Reckoning demanded a lot from the audience in terms of knowledge of previous films, it got a little exposition-heavy and spoon-feed-y in the beginning. However, once it took off, there was no stopping it, and that’s when catching the Easter eggs and references got a bit tough. Hence, here I am with a list of all the self-referential and meta moments, with the exception of the most obvious stuff. If I miss any details, please feel free to let me know in the comments below.
Spoiler Alert
The IMF mission briefing: Almost every single one of Ethan’s mission briefings has been more elaborate than the last. But the one in The Final Reckoning took things back to the ‘90s with a VHS tape and a CRT TV. Also, it demonstrated the need to rely on retro devices to avoid the Entity’s all-seeing eye.
London: After stealing the NOC list in the first Mission: Impossible film, Ethan spent a lot of time in London. So, it was kind of fitting to have The Final Reckoning both start and end in London.
“I like the longer hair”: There has been a lot of discussion about Ethan Hunt’s hair across all the Mission: Impossible movies. In the first one, he had short hair. In the second one he wore his hair long. In the third one, he reverted back to the short hair. For the fourth one, it was really long. The fifth was somewhere in between. Then in the sixth and seventh ones, he kept it short. And for his final outing, Ethan has it on the longer side. Fans always struggle to decide which hairstyle is the best, thereby making this a very meta moment, but if Grace says that the longer hair suits Ethan the best, it’s the best.
The Rabbit’s Foot: When Ethan and Grace were caught by Gabriel right at the beginning of the film, Gabriel referenced Mission: Impossible 3 pretty explicitly. He reminded Ethan of how arms dealer Davian held Ethan’s then-wife Julia hostage and got him to steal the Rabbit’s Foot from Shanghai. Ethan saved Julia, retrieved the Rabbit’s Foot, and then handed it to Brassel, who was the IMF’s director back then. Ethan went off to celebrate his honeymoon, and Brassel never told him about what the rabbit’s foot actually was. Benji sort of theorized that it was some kind of technology that could bring about the extinction of humanity. Now, Gabriel finally revealed that the Anti-God program in the Rabbit’s Foot device that Ethan had stolen was actually used by the US government to create that early-days version of the Entity that wrecked the Sevastopol.
Rogue Nation callbacks: The whole fight sequence in Gabriel’s den during the first 20 minutes of the movie, and Ethan using himself as a human shield to protect Grace, was reminiscent of Ethan’s first meeting with Ilsa in the Bone Doctor’s torture chamber in Rogue Nation and Ethan putting his body on the line to save Ilsa from getting shot at the end of that movie. Ethan’s underwater mission to get the Podkova from the Sevastopol seemed like an evolution of the underwater digital ledger heist from the fifth film in the franchise. Also, the horror-themed submarine shenanigans in The Final Reckoning reminded me of The Abyss; James Cameron will certainly be proud of that whole sequence.
Ghost Protocol callbacks: Like every other artificial intelligence program, the Entity didn’t have any original ideas; it learned from everything that humans had done and presented it as its own. The Entity’s whole plan to bring about nuclear annihilation, as it’d lead humanity to a better future, seemed awfully similar to what Hendricks wanted to do in Ghost Protocol. If that’s the case, maybe it wasn’t a total coincidence that Ethan started calling Benji the “Team Leader,” as that was a title that was conferred to Ethan by Hendricks and was constantly repeated throughout that movie by Sidorov.
Fallout callbacks: Although the nuke constructed by Lane, Walker, and the Apostles was pretty complicated, it was still defused by the end. As for the nuclear devices created by Gabriel, it seemed like he, or whoever had created those contraptions used on Luther and then at the Doomsday Vault, had learned from Lane’s mistakes. Hence, unlike the ones in Fallout, Gabriel’s death traps had the ability to kill the bomb defusal expert even if he managed to prevent a nuclear explosion. The intercutting between the bomb defusal process and Ethan’s aerial pursuit in The Final Reckoning seemed like McQuarrie’s way of one-upping the finale of Fallout, which had Luther, Benji, Ilsa, and Julia defusing a nuke while Ethan piloted a helicopter to go after Walker, who was in another helicopter. Also, since McQuarrie had worked with Cruise on Top Gun: Maverick, I suppose the dogfight was a reference to that film, as well as the long history of biplane stunts, dating back to the 1920s.
Jim Phelps: The biggest twist reveal of The Final Reckoning was that Jasper Briggs’ real name was Jim Phelps, and he was the son of the villain of the first Mission: Impossible film, James Phelps. Since Jim went by the name Jasper Briggs, it was believed that he was the son of Dan Briggs, one of the protagonists of the TV series that precede the films. That’s been corrected by the revelation that not Dan, but James was Jim’s dad and he had left to join the IMF when Jim was only seven years old. Now, I am guessing that Jim isn’t James and Claire’s son. That’d mean James had a family that he abandoned before seeking immunity from his legal issues by signing on with the IMF. I mean, James seemed pretty despicable because of his actions in that film. But this retcon just made him even more horrible. It’s a good thing that Jim didn’t inherit any of James’ traits and decided to shake hands with Ethan. Well, given how the setting was so beautiful, with the picturesque hills and the sunset, I think Ethan and Jim should’ve kissed. I’ll make do with a handshake.
Erika and Bush: Erika was the Director of Central Intelligence before she became the President of the United States, and so was George H.W. Bush; Ethan boarded the USS George H.W. Bush while embarking on his mission to kill the Entity.
May 22, 1996: The letter to Admiral Neely, which had “May 22, 1996” written on it, followed by Neely saying she and Ethan both lost someone they loved on that date in Serbia, was a bit confusing to me. Yeah, Mission: Impossible, the movie that started it all, was released on that date. But I couldn’t make out whose death Neely was talking about. I am guessing she was referring to Maria, the woman who was killed by Gabriel, soon after which Ethan joined the IMF. I guess Neely knew Maria in some capacity. If you are aware of what Neely was referring to, please let me know.
Black Vault Donloe: Donloe was the CIA operative in charge of protecting the NOC list that Ethan stole from Langley. He failed at that task because Claire had spiked his coffee with laxative. In the first movie, Kittridge said that Donloe would be shipped off to Alaska, where he’d man a radar tower for the rest of his life. In his final appearance, Donloe was revealed to be on St. Matthew’s Island, with his wife, Tapeesa, keeping track of SOSUS activity. Donloe had kept the knife that had been dropped on his desk on that fateful day by Krieger, which he returned to Ethan. Ethan definitely felt bad for the guy, but it was nice to hear Donloe say that Ethan and his team’s heist had actually freed him from his monotony and pushed him towards the love of his life, Tapeesa. I also loved how pivotal Donloe was to the third act of The Final Reckoning. Now, this is how you do nostalgia-baiting without going into Disney-Marvel-Star Wars slop territory!
The knife fight in the USS Ohio: The knife fight between Ethan and Hagar felt like an homage to the knife fight that Ethan and Ambrose had on the beaches of Australia in Mission: Impossible 2. I mean, Ethan’s had several knife fights after the second installment, but something about the vibe of this one and the copious kicks to the head really reminded me of John Woo. Hence, I am calling it a reference to that iconic scene.
Christian imagery: Hear me out, man. There was a lot of talk about God and Anti-God. There’s a character named Gabriel. There’s a cruciform key. Somebody was talking about Noah and his ark, and instead of a flood, there was the threat of nuclear annihilation. The movie has “reckoning” in its title, as in the day of reckoning, where people will be held accountable for their actions. At the very end of the film, Ethan waved to a bunch of shepherds (take a wild guess who was a shepherd according to Christian mythology), while Luther essentially said that he was the messiah of mankind. So, if you know, you know.
