The Final Reckoning: Mission Impossible's Last Chapter

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
How's it?
I'm Alex McCauley.
I'm Max Vosberg and I'm EricaKrause and this is excuse the
intermission a discussion showsurrounding the blink of an eye.
Today's pod is all aboutMission Impossible, the final
reckoning, the presumptive finalchapter in the Tom Cruise Ethan
Hunt impossible mission force.
The three of us will discussthe film's pros and cons, the
critical and financial receptionto the movie, and present our

(00:31):
categorical review on thisepisode, which continues on the
other side of this break, if youchoose to accept it.
Okay, how are we doing today?
It's a good day here in thePacific Northwest, really funny
for those of us.
You know I always want to kindof continue to leave breadcrumbs

(00:51):
for people to maybe go back andlisten to previous episodes If
you've been watching the Last ofUs.
The Last of Us is reallyspotlighting Seattle in a funny
way right now, and so when Ilook out and see like a gorgeous
pacific northwest afternoonright now, but then I'm coming
off of watching like, uh, whatis it even called now?
Lumen field where the seahawksplay and it's like a refugee

(01:12):
camp in the last of us, um, justkind of funny stuff.
Weird, weird times right now tobe consuming, uh, pop culture
in the pacific, I would say.

Speaker 3 (01:24):
Lumenfield.
So you're saying Lumenfield inthe show is prominently shown as
as a camp, oh yeah, and and ishas like the jungle taken over
all of, like downtown Seattle orthe rainforest, I guess.

Speaker 1 (01:42):
Yeah, for the most part it's still very populated
by these different factions, thewolves um, if you're watching
the show or kind of the groupthat has taken over seattle, so
but yes, I mean, everything islike bombed and depleted and
mother nature is starting totake it back the space needle or
sky view, as we talked lastweek.

Speaker 3 (02:03):
Is that still standing in the show?

Speaker 1 (02:07):
Have we seen the Space Needle, Erica?

Speaker 2 (02:11):
I don't know, I'm not sure.
Well in the game.
I don't know that we do.
We might see it in thebackground, but I haven't
watched the finale yet of theLast of Us.

Speaker 1 (02:20):
I feel like maybe when they first show Seattle in
present time, there's someone upin the Space Needle using it as
a sniper tower lookout area.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure we do getthat.
So, yeah, but no, how are youguys doing?
Like I said, beautiful day,we're getting close to
summertime, it was just MemorialDay weekend, so what's new with

(02:42):
the two of you?
It was just Memorial Dayweekend.

Speaker 3 (02:45):
So what's new with the two of you?
You know beautiful and warmdown here in Southern California
.
Yeah, great holiday weekend.
Got to go out and see somefilms this weekend.

Speaker 1 (02:59):
You're kind of burying the lead here, Max.

Speaker 3 (03:01):
What.
You had a fucking birthday.
Yes, I turned uh 35 yesterdayand, uh, that was, that was very
fun.
Got to go see godfather parttwo on the big screen.
Um, I also got to meet up andsee.
I can't remember if we we enter.
Did we interview izzy lee onthis show, or was that just?

Speaker 1 (03:24):
on, silver Screams yeah.

Speaker 3 (03:26):
Yeah, silver Screams.
We interviewed a filmmakernamed Izzy Lee a couple years
ago for her short Meet Friend.
Her West Coast premiere for herfeature was this weekend here
in my neighborhood, so I got togo to the local theater for that
as well and meet her IRL inreal life, which was really fun

(03:47):
and a great turnout for thatfeature.
Very exciting for Izzy.

Speaker 2 (03:55):
But yeah, just another day.

Speaker 3 (03:57):
Yesterday was just another day.
It was all good I get one stepcloser.
As our friend Tim said, I'mhalfway to 70.

Speaker 1 (04:14):
erica, how are you?
I'm good not so happy to behere.

Speaker 2 (04:18):
We can tell no, just nothing, a lot nothing to report
on.
I had a very busy weekend justworking and went and saw our
movie yesterday and yeah, justreally just hustling,
unfortunately.
So that's nothing exciting toreport on my end.

Speaker 1 (04:40):
Well, let's do some reporting then on the film for
today, of course we are talkingabout Mission Impossible 8, the
Final Reckoning.
The box office performance overthe Memorial Day weekend
typically the start to thesummer blockbuster movie season
yielded some pretty solidresults for this film, although
it did get demolished by anothermovie here that I'm going to

(05:03):
mention in just a moment.
But the numbers on MissionImpossible over the weekend,
which I just pulled the actualFriday, saturday, sunday numbers
for were 64 to a million.
So that's obviouslyunderwhelming.
The film has crept up now,including the Memorial Day
totals, to $79 million totaldomestic with a $206 million

(05:26):
gross worldwide.
So that's much more what TomCruise and McQuarrie and
everyone who financed this filmthat's what they want to see.
The movie that just crushed atthe box office this Memorial Day
weekend was the new Lilo andStitch film, which hit to date
and we're recording this on onTuesday May 27th.

(05:47):
Um, so same release, samerelease window, has grossed $182
million domestically and 361million worldwide, like my
goodness, and I can tell youfirsthand experience Lilo and
Stitch.
For the last five, six, sevenyears because of, I think, its

(06:08):
presence on Disney Plus, there'sbeen a lot of shows, sort of
like mini movies, if you will.
It's stayed in the in inrelevance with with pop culture
and what kids are consumingright now.
Kids are consuming right now.
So I think that this movie isnow capitalizing on this new
generation right now of likeelementary aged students being

(06:29):
to that point at that age where,like they are so jacked for
something that they feel likethey still have grown up with
because they've got a lot of newcontent from this Lilo and
Stitch universe, now they havetheir own movie, and so that was
obviously reflected in thisincredible weekend performance
from Lilo and Stitch.
I don't know if you guys wantto touch on that at all.
I know you are both aunts anduncles respectively, so I don't

(06:53):
know how much Lilo and Stitchplays a part, sort of, in your
extended families, because youthink the franchise is ripe for
a revival now.
But I'll give you two secondsto touch on that because we
probably won't talk about Liloand Stitch on another future
episode.
But this box office performanceis incredible.

Speaker 3 (07:13):
Well, I believe it's not the first time Tom Cruise
has lost to Lilo and Stitch inan opening weekend.
I'm pretty sure Minority Reportcame out the same weekend as
the original Lilo and Stitch andgot crushed.

Speaker 1 (07:28):
Interesting.

Speaker 3 (07:29):
As well.
So Lilo and Stitch are a thornin Cruise's backside, I would
believe.

Speaker 2 (07:37):
I'm sure the holiday weekend had a huge part in that
too.
In that too, um.
But yeah, I've been hearingsome, some buzz around this
movie, specifically just somecontroversy about the, the story
, how they changed things alittle bit.
It's been a really long timesince I've seen the original
lilo and stitch.
My nephew fucks hard with thesoundtrack and we're trying

(08:01):
really hard to push the movie onhim, but he's not really a
movie guy.
Like it's hard to get him tosit still for it.
He's only four, but the, thesoundtrack is played often in
our household.
So, um, I I want to try to getout and see it, but I've just
been seeing a lot of weird stuffabout, um, just the whole plot

(08:23):
of lilo getting taken from, likeI don't remember exactly what
happens, but I think, um,there's, there's just some
controversy.
You'll I might have to do alittle bit more research on that
if you're interested.
But you're saying lilo's likebeing trafficked uh, no, I mean,
I don't know, I haven't seen it, but uh, there's a part where,

(08:46):
like in the original movie, youknow her older sister I think
it's her sister, right um, she'sgetting taken away because she
should.
She's not supposed to be herguardian or whatever, but she's
fighting for her and doesn't letit happen.
And then I guess in the newmovie she, they, she just kind
of gives up custody of of lilo.

(09:07):
That's just what I've read allover the internet.
People are kind of up in armsabout it and there's just been
some significant changes and, um, there's a couple accounts that
I follow that just are, youknow, just really against the
whole live action remake thing.
You know, just feels a littleunnecessary, and there's just
it's obviously a huge thingthese days, but I don't know, I

(09:31):
haven't seen it, so I I can'tsay too much, but it's, that's a
maybe that's what people aresaying well, and just to correct
myself before uh, my segmentbefore what I said turns into
people are saying MinorityReport outgrossed Lilo and
Stitch by like 400,000.

Speaker 3 (09:53):
Not by much, they were both over 35 million, but
Minority Report just beat themout back in June of 2002.

Speaker 1 (10:09):
So Tom Cruise won that battle andlo and sish wins
this this weekend quiteconvincingly, yeah, um, okay.
Well then some of the specs.
Just going back to missionimpossible, the final reckoning,
before we get into some generaloverview, the film's being
received in a lukewarm fashion,I would say, by a lot of critics
.
User databases are a little bitmore positive on the film.

(10:33):
Right now it sits at 3.6 onLetterboxd, 7.6 on IMDb, 79% on
Rotten Tomatoes and it actuallyhas an A cinema score, and so I
think that there is a bit of adivide on this movie.
We can get into, obviously,throughout our seven categories
while we review it, what wereally liked and maybe what we

(10:56):
thought was maybe a too long.
Did it need kind of scenecritique, kind of stuff, but
overall maybe just talk aboutexpectations first going into
this film and then that canmaybe lead us into did Final
Reckoning meet thoseexpectations?
So, erica, I'm really curiousas to what you have to think
about this film and sort ofmaybe where you think it fits

(11:19):
into the Ethan Hunt MissionImpossible lineage, because you
are not as invested in thisfranchise as perhaps max or
myself yeah, um, yeah, like Ihave not seen hardly any of them
except for fallout.

Speaker 2 (11:35):
And then I did see dead reckoning.
Um, fallout was my intro tomission impossible.
So I mean I just was like, isthis what I've been missing out
on this whole time, like sohyped on that?
Um, so this one, I think I meanI know that dead reckoning was

(11:56):
not nearly as exciting or itjust wasn't as good as fallout,
but I still had a fun time withit and I really, and I did enjoy
it.
But, um, I had this expectationand this is totally just my,
this is on me, um of it beinglike, okay, if this is, if this
is the last one they do, they'rereally gonna go all out.

(12:18):
You know, this is gonna be likethe mission impossible movie
and and I like to see thosefranchises kind of come full
circle and um, and kind of wrapthings up in a big way, and I
was really excited for that.
And so, um, my dad and I wentand saw it in imax yesterday.

(12:40):
Um, did it live up to thoseexpectations?
No, um, I, I had a fun timewith it.
It was a really slow start.
Um, I think that it was alittle too long for me.
Um, I would have maybe nickedoff like 30, 45 minutes of it.

(13:01):
Um, overall, I I did have likea decent time.
Of course, like in the end it'skind of hard not to, but, um, I
don't, I think maybe myexpectations were a little a
little high for it.

Speaker 3 (13:18):
Yeah, similarly I.
I think I had this on my mostanticipated for the year.
I am a Mission Impossible like.
I mean sweaty, like I just Ilove these movies.
I rewatch them often.
I fired up the first one justlast week before going to see

(13:41):
this new one.
I do agree that it does feellong, especially that first hour
and 15 minutes probably.

(14:01):
It is a lot of explaining whatthe entity is and what the
stakes are, and I understandmovies have to do that, because
not everyone goes and sees deadreckoning, especially when
you're doing a, a direct sequel.
But the final reckoning justtries to be too many things at
once.
I think you know it's it's thisdirect continuation of a
previous entry, whereas you knowa really great thing about

(14:25):
Mission Impossible until, like,christopher McQuarrie really got
involved was like each thing,each movie was like its own
flavor of movie right and itsown mission.
But it's also, you know it's aclimactic showdown against a
villainous AI.
The AI, you know, is facelessand I think sometimes that can

(14:48):
be a problem.
Even though in Dead Reckoningwe had the character Gabriel as
kind of the surrogate to the AI,in this one he like is just
completely crazy and is not istrying to stop the or trying to
control the AI as well.
So he's like a secondaryvillain to both the AI and Ethan

(15:11):
Hunt.
I think you know it's trying tobe a character send off to to
Ethan Hunt, to Luther, to Benji,to a lot of characters that
have been in these movies.
You know Luther's been in everysingle one with Ethan Hunt,
which is Ving Rhames' character.
It's also trying to be a fullseries retrospective.

(15:36):
Right.
There's lots and lots of clipsfrom previous Mission Impossible
movies edited into this film,which I'm never.
Personally, I think that youjust shouldn't do that, because
that just makes the audiencethink of those past films and A
can take you out of it but alsomake you want to go watch those

(15:59):
and make you think of those andremind you of your feelings.
It's almost like a.
I know they're trying to playon nostalgia, but I feel like it
works against the film usuallywhen it does that.
And then it's also a metacommentary on the state of
cinema and the world at large,right With AI and internet and,

(16:21):
like you know, there's a littlebit of this.
You know the AI has thisfollowing.
That's kind of MAGA-like andwe're trying to touch on
everything and I just don'tthink all of it really lands
well.
I think the biplane stuff issome of the best stunt work

(16:45):
we've seen in these movies.
It's incredible.
But I just felt that at firstthere's a lot of war room stuff
and we'll get to kind of youknow too long, don't need.
But there's lots of people inrooms talking about the end of
the world and I think it justdrags it down a little bit and

(17:09):
it doesn't feel as fun as someof the other ones.
It also another like nitpick Ihave, and I don't know if we
want to get into nitpicks, butlike there's a.

Speaker 1 (17:21):
You're cooking.
Keep keep going.

Speaker 3 (17:23):
There's a moment, the show is yours but like there's
a, you're cooking, keep, keepgoing.
There's a moment the show isyours.
There's a moment where ittotally kind of like throws dead
reckoning, you know, in thegarbage when the russians show
up and they're like, oh, we haveanother key.
Like the whole point of deadreckoning was to get the
crucifix crucifix key, but the rthe Russians had a copy.

(17:45):
This whole time there's justsome silliness going on here and
there's some blatant mistakes.
At the end of that biplanesequence, gabriel says his last
words are like I have the onlyparachute, and then he meets his

(18:05):
demise, which is great.
And then the next scene is TomCruise, like jumping out of the
plane with a parachute.

Speaker 2 (18:13):
I thought the same thing.
I saw that scene and I was likeno, that's not true.
He said there's only one.

Speaker 3 (18:19):
Listen again.
That's nitpick.
That's movies Like.
Sometimes, you know, parachutesjust appear out of out of
nowhere and then ethan hunt hasto.
That has to happen, right,because ethan hunt has to get
out of the plane, get down tothe ground safely.
Um, I also, just, you know, Ifelt I didn't think hayley
atwell was was as great as shewas in dead reckoning I.

(18:42):
There was like some chemistrythat was weird and off between
her and Tom Cruz.
There was no.
Like you know, they had thatgreat car chase and like the
magic and the sleight of handand they try and they try and
you know, tie that in and that'swhy she has to be in the cave
to to grab the, the, the glowingbox or the USB drive that

(19:04):
they're going to trap the entityon.
Um, but she just felt, you know, she's not Vanessa Kirby, she's
not Rebecca Ferguson, there'sthere's no sexual chemistry in
this one, right.
Like where is the white widow?
She was on that train in deadreckoning and she shot stuff,

(19:24):
stuff for this movie and thenthey just don't put it in this
film.
I think she was missed dearly.
But you know also locations andI understand that.
You know the Bering Sea.
That's cool and we areglobetrotting right.

(19:46):
We start in Britain, we go to,I'm guessing, somewhere in
America where this war room is.
We go to the Bering Sea, likethe Arctic right, and then we
end in South Africa.
But I just never felt thoselocations.

(20:06):
You don't feel them like, youknow, when we're in Dubai in
Ghost Protocol, or when we're inFrance in Dead Reckoning or
when we're I don't know.
There's just some stuff missingand it felt, felt.
This movie felt more than theothers.

(20:27):
And I know this is how theyconstruct all these movies.
They think of the stunts andthen they write around them and
this one just felt very, veryobviously built that way.
Has mccorry said that?
His crew says yeah, yeah,mccorry.
Mccorry has said that inmultiple interviews and and so

(20:49):
yeah, uh, for me personally,this is it's.
It's not my favorite, mi, youknow it's.
It's a great.
And again, like the underwatersequence, the airplane sequence,
those are the two big stuntsthat are happening here.
They're really fun watch, buteverything else around it just

(21:10):
did not work for me.
So it's towards the bottom ofthe list for me when it comes to
the ranking of the MissionImpossible movies.

Speaker 2 (21:20):
I had a big problem with the way these men in the
movies pronounced the wordentity.
I don't know what that wasabout and I'm sure no one with
that doesn't have ADHD wouldn'tpick up on that, but I swear on
my life.
There was five different men inthere saying it like entity and

(21:41):
like they weren't pronounced.
And they're just like entityand I'm like it's entity.
They're just like entity andI'm like it's entity.
Like, just say like pronounceyour t's.
It drove me, sorry, that's.
That's my major nitpick.
I was waiting to say that thiswhole time that's funny.

Speaker 1 (21:55):
So I really like this movie.
I think that this movie, um isbetter than dead reckoning.
Uh, part one whatever we'recalling these Dead Reckoning and
then the final Reckoning.
I think that what we get inthis movie is more like what we
get in Mission Impossible 1 andMission Impossible 2, with a

(22:16):
stripped down version of just aclassic cheeseburger no fixings.
We don't need avocados, wedon't need, you know, some crazy
sauce.
We'd need like two really solidset pieces.
We need Ethan hunt, tom Cruise,in the center of every frame.

(22:37):
I'm not going to buy his sexualchemistry with anybody in any
film ever, and so I don't needthat.
I was so impressed with howmccorry and whoever else ever
else worked on this script,aside from like nitpicking and

(22:58):
saying like well, this doesn'tmake sense, this is a continuity
error or whatever.
But how they were able to takewhat I'm sure was like one dead
reckoning story and then splitthat up, because Tom Cruise, one
of the most powerful people inHollywood, if not maybe the most
powerful right now they'restill not going to let him make

(23:18):
a five and a half six hour longmovie.
Had they would have, maybe wesee something else, but the way
that they were able to splitthese two movies.
I give them a lot of credit fordoing that um and for keeping
the train on the track as wellas they did, because, like, at
the end of dead reckoning, Ithink that the cgi on just you

(23:40):
know, mentioning of trains here,of that, that's the kind of
stuff that takes me completelyout of the movie.
The first 30 to 40 minutes ofthis scene, everything that
happens in London, basically Iam with you on there on that
point, both of you that like,let's just nix all that stuff we
don't need to do.
Like the South park throwbackepisode of like member remember.

(24:03):
Like we don't need to do all ofthat, um, or if we do, we don't
need to include the clips.
But this is a two hour and 50minute movie.
And once we're out of London,everything that sets up for the
Bering sea exploration.
I love all the stuff in the warroom and I think that that has
a lot to do with the characteractors that are coming in to

(24:26):
play these bit parts.
Um, I really I really enjoyedall of that stuff.
The absurdity of it all and howyou have to suspend your
disbelief when going into thesemovies is nothing new in this
film.
That's nothing new.
We've been doing this from thejump and so, like I'm not in I'm

(24:47):
not in a mission impossiblemovie, sitting there saying that
like I need this to look likejust to think of something
recent.
Like I don't need this to looklike alexander or alex garland's
uh warfare.
Like I don't need to think that, like every single person on
set went through days and weeksof of training for this.

(25:08):
Like I mean tom cruise doingsix stunts and I need crazy bad
guys.
And we get crazy bad guys inacross the dead reckoning span
and I'll get to the entity laterbecause I actually think that,
while we can draw parallels tomaybe the recent political
climate or what's happening withmovies right now, that stuff

(25:28):
will probably actually agepretty well in 10 years and in
20 years.
When people look back and studythe 2020s and say what movies
were making commentaries or whatbig budget blockbuster movies
that are seen by millions andmillions of people on a holiday
weekend are actually talkingabout this stuff.
I think we'll point to a movielike dead reckoning, and and and

(25:48):
the final reckoning and say,well, they were doing it here a
lot Like the way that at theturn of the century, when the
internet was really becoming athing.
What are we doing now?
We're going back 20 years andwe're saying, like damn, the
matrix was really on this.
And now I'm not trying tocompare the Final Reckoning to
the Matrix, but I am just sayingthat like that's not a bad
thing to be making an attempt todo a meta commentary in the

(26:13):
moment.
So I do kind of actually reallyappreciate the entity as this
villainous character in thismovie and their shift to focus
on the entity as opposed toGabriel.
So I don't know, we can getinto it, um, because I think, I
think this these will ourcategories are going to lead to
a bunch of other really goodconversations here, um, so so

(26:34):
our first one is that it's beena long time now since we've done
just a seven category review,um, so so we'll do a good job
we'll try to do a good job here,listeners of explaining each
category before we introduce it.
The first one is top of thelineup.
So we take a batting order inbaseball, basically, and we

(26:54):
structure different charactersfrom the film every now and then
we've done some like cast andcrew members, and so that's also
on the table, but we have alead-off hitter, a lead-off
character, someone who we wantto like, help us move the story
along or maybe introduce us towhat's going on, carry out the
themes, like you kind of wantyour lead-off batter to be like.
This is what our team's allabout right here.

(27:15):
They embody us, um, and sothere's.
There's kind of your lead-offcharacter.
We have our on deck person whothen can sort of move things
along, hit for a little bit ofpower, have some scene stealing
moments, but isn't like the starof your movie, usually a pretty
solid supporting role.
And then in the hole is yourpower hitter.
That's who you want, like theycan drive in, runs, steals not

(27:37):
only the show but like carriesthe entire movie.
And then a pitch hitter, sosomeone who comes in and maybe
for two scenes, maybe fivescenes, maybe they're on screen
a lot but don't have a ton ofdialogue but do a lot with a
little.
So that's your pitch hitter.
So four different spotlightshere.
We'll start with each of ourlead off batters, our lead off
characters.

(27:57):
Max, who do you have in thisspot?

Speaker 3 (28:00):
I have the stunts Like this is what the Mission
Impossible movies are about.
This is what gets me in thetheater.
We are here to see the stunts.
In this film we have anunderwater sequence which is
deep sea, diving in the BeringSea.
Then we also have the biplanechase which has been all over

(28:23):
the marketing with the yellowand the mustard and the ketchup
plane, uh, in south africa.

Speaker 1 (28:30):
and listen, those, those moments, those sequences,
fucking rock those are like twohours of the two hour and 50
minute runtime.

Speaker 3 (28:39):
They are both very long.
Yeah, they're probably like 30minutes each, I would guess.
And yeah, they're cool.
I will say I think anytime theydo underwater stuff in Mission
Impossible it takes me a littleout of it because underwater

(29:01):
it's just like they are in atank, but it's still cool to see
, you know, tom cruise put onthis crazy dive suit and you
know dive um, but the airplanestuff him holding on like doing
like chin-ups on the biplanewings is is fucking awesome,

(29:22):
it's really awesome.
And he's 60 fucking I thinkhe's 62 when he shoots this or
61 um, it's, it's justincredible.
Uh, and I've also heard him talkabout, especially with that
biplane sequence, like it's him.
You know, there's a pilot inthe, in the, in the cockpit.
He's on the wing and then theyhave cameras mounted.

(29:44):
So he is.
He is not only acting as EthanHunt, but he is the
cinematographer too.
Right.
He is playing to each cameraand having to know, like a,
where the plane is in the flightsequence but also where the
cameras are.
So a is not spiking the camera,we're not looking straight into

(30:05):
the lens, but we're.
The cameras are.
So A he's not spiking thecamera, we're not looking
straight into the lens, butwe're playing towards it and
we're doing this while we'reflying at high altitude, low
altitude and very fast, and it'sincredible.
It's absolutely incredible.
So the biplane sequence againit is when put up against some

(30:27):
of these other amazing stuntshe's done over the years in
these movies, it's right upthere.

Speaker 1 (30:35):
Who's your lead off, Erica?

Speaker 2 (30:37):
Well now I think, did I do this wrong.
I chose a person.

Speaker 3 (30:41):
Yeah, yeah, I always break the rules, you know.

Speaker 2 (30:44):
Okay, okay, well, I chose Tom Cruise shows a person
yeah, yeah, that's I.
I always break the rules, youknow, okay, okay, well, I chose
tom cruz.
So I mean to me, he, he is theone who's setting the this, this
five, these particular, or thefour that we're going to talk
about.
I feel like tom is in two ofthem.
For me, because this movie isso surrounded by him, you know,

(31:07):
and good point, everybody elseis really just a very minor part
of the story.
I mean, you have all of hislike you know, his little crew
that he goes around with, andthey're great, but tom is is the
story.
He is focal point of all ofthese movies.
So that's, that's my lead off,but he's also another one for me

(31:30):
.

Speaker 1 (31:33):
I have the character William Donlow, played by Rolf
Saxon, here in my lead off spot,because he is the ultimate
legacy character in what isultimately a legacy film.
Where this movie starts withthe flashbacks.
It starts by showing us thingsthat have happened in the movies
before and again.

(31:54):
I'm out on that, but I think,as many different franchises
have shown us, a way to reallytap into that nostalgia.
Not that that's a good thing,it can be very baity at times,
but when they brought back thewilliam donlo character in this
movie something I had no ideawas happening I don't know if
he's featured in any of thetrailers um, he's not, he's not

(32:17):
I.

Speaker 3 (32:18):
I had no idea either.
It was a great surprise so it'sa great surprise.

Speaker 1 (32:22):
And then what I really appreciate about the
performance and the writing forthat character is he has a lot
to do.
Actually, it's not just whenthey are up preparing to get the
coordinates for this.
Uh, what is it called here?

Speaker 3 (32:40):
the sebesta pool off of his floppy disks from the
year 2000, um, or 1994, excuseme, 1994, right, 1994, 96 96, 96
um, and but I guess the the theevent where the sub sunk was, I
think, 2011, 2012, okay, Ithink is what they say.

(33:05):
But yeah, he's been up in thearctic since since the lengthy
breach.

Speaker 1 (33:10):
yeah, yeah, yeah, so, so again, just the way that
they construct all of thatreally funny, really smart, um,
you know to.
Basically it plays off again ofthis whole like destiny.
Not like humans as beings onthis planet, we have our own
destinies that cannot becontrolled by, by artificial

(33:32):
intelligence and that haveexisted in a time when, when the
, the influence of social mediaand computers and everything,
wasn't as great.
Because all of all of theevents of Ethan Hunt's career in
the MIF you know they do areally good job.
I think of saying that, likehis commitment and his

(33:55):
willingness to put his teamfirst, his life first, and to
basically gamble, which he'sbeen doing in every single movie
, but gamble with the fate ofhumanity, all of it is for
nothing, like, there's nocoincidence, basically in these
movies.
And so if the events of thefirst one don't happen, then the
events of the final reckoningdon't happen.
If Donlo doesn't get exiled upto this, this substation in the

(34:20):
Arctic, then he's not there tohelp the events of this film
transpire and ultimately succeed.
So I thought, just like as alegacy character in a legacy
film, he was great, he stickswith, he becomes part of tom's
crew basically, and they have agreat, great moment as they are
leaving the arctic and they'reon this airplane flying back and
he basically says this to tomthe donlo character, where he's

(34:43):
like I never would have met thelove of my life if, if you
hadn't got me reassigned up herehe pulls out the knife that
falls out of tom's um bag up inthe ceiling and still has it on
him to give him just like areally good moment that I was
not expecting, like a lot, of, alot of emotion in that scene

(35:04):
and communicated through theWilliam Donnell character.
So he was great in a legacyfilm.
My lead off character has to bea legacy character.

Speaker 3 (35:14):
Nice On deck.
For me and again, this is likethe person who kind of moves
along the film.
Right, we get stuff moving onthe bases.
For me it's Simon Pegg.
Right, he is constantlyexplaining what the plan is.

(35:34):
Um, he is as benji he is, he isfully in the field now, which
he has been for a couple movies.
He, you know tom, leaves theteam, uh, in this movie for a
while, so like he is running theimf team and and kind of
putting the players in position.

(35:55):
So he is, and he is always kindof a lighthearted, like funny
moments of of of each of thesefilms where he, you know he is,
he's constantly like well, thisis insane, but I guess we're
going to do it, I guess it'llwork.
It's going to work, don't worry.

(36:17):
And so I enjoy Simon Pegg.
I've loved him since MissionImpossible 3.
So glad that he's been in allof these movies and survived all
of these movies and he's alwaysgreat to see.
So that's my on my on deckhitter that's also my on deck

(36:39):
hitter.

Speaker 2 (36:40):
Um, I think simon pegg is like the ultimate
wingman, you know.
He is such a great sidekick totom and balances him out in such
a good way, and I think thateven just their chemistry on
screen as as actors really goeshand in hand, and I it I was
thinking about that yesterdayjust how much I really enjoy his

(37:02):
character and how he's.
It's like sometimes a littlebit of a comic relief too to his
scenes, but also very likeheartwarming.
And you know, when you, when hegoes through something like you
know, with him getting stabbed,I think is what happened, or
shot um, um, and towards thefinal scene, um, you're, you're

(37:23):
obviously really invested in hissurvival and um, I don't think
that these movies would be whatthey are without him that that's
a great call.

Speaker 1 (37:33):
I really appreciate his performance in this film and
also the work he's put in inthis franchise because, as
someone who doesn't really likewatch the Edgar Wright movies a
lot, I don't really have toomuch of a relationship with
Simon Pegg as an actor outsideof these films, so it is really
fun to have him in these moviesOn deck.
I have the entity this is whereI'm going to give another

(37:56):
little shout out to the entityas a villain that I think does a
really good job, sort ofreinventing what a quote unquote
bad guy can be in a movie andin a franchise that has shown us
all kinds of evil geniuses,these megalomaniacs, these quote

(38:17):
unquote criminal, criminalmasterminds, these anarchists,
um, we've really kind of seen itall.
And so, to take a step back, asMcQuarrie and Tom Cruise did,
before writing the, you know thestoryline for these two films.
I think, writing the, you knowthe storyline for these two
films.
I think that the the arc forthe Gabriel character to turn

(38:37):
him into, he's almost like he islike the MacGuffin in these
movies, almost where, like thebait and switch happens over
this four month period which wedon't get to see in between
these two films, um, which isagain kind of like another
nitpick, like what's tom beendoing?
What's?
Why is he not like still incontact with grace, like when he

(38:57):
and when he and grace meet backup?
That's something that I'll getto later.
Like just a lot of stuff.
They're kind of dumb, but, um, Ithink the transition away from
gabriel, who's like not a strongvillain anyways, I would have,
I would have been more upset hadthey have tried to really make
us buy in to Issa Morales'character as this Philip Seymour

(39:20):
Hoffman type bad guy that wereally need to quote unquote,
take serious, because we justdon't spend enough screen time
with him in the first movie toreally have that investment,
especially like Sean Harris in Ithink that's four and five,
five and six time with him inthe first movie to really have
that investment.
Um, especially like sean harrisand I think that's four and
five, five and six, five and sixlike we spend a lot of time
with sean harris in those twomovies and now like there's a

(39:43):
heavy, heavy investment in inhis villain character and his
arc is pretty solid.
But like, again, I'm glad theydidn't just try to do that again
and reinvent something else, um, or what they decided to do is
like invent something else bygiving us the entity as this bad
guy in this mastermind of sortsthat we kind of as again like

(40:06):
this is my appreciation for themeta text of it all Like we
don't know how to best defeatthis.
We really have to giveourselves over to the movie and
be like okay, luther, createsome crazy gadgets.
Okay, tom, again, risk the fateof humanity.
Like all you guys have to cometogether and just expo dump.
Tell us how you're going to doit.

(40:26):
Show us how you're going to doit, because it's not like we're
just going to have some bigcrazy hand-to-hand combat or
gunfight, or you know, we dohave the chase scene, but
ultimately it is to destroy theentity not necessarily gabriel
in this film and so I thoughtthat the entity as a villain
should get a little bit morecredit than, uh, than I see it

(40:48):
getting out there yeah, I thinkthe entity is is interesting.

Speaker 3 (40:53):
I just I I think gabriel as a character really
takes.
He's really such a differentcharacter in this movie, even
compared to dead reckoning.
Right, like in dead reckoninghe's, he's suave, he's cool,
he's a, he's an evil.
Ethan hunt uh, you know,because he's an ex imf.
Uh, in this he's just like gonecompletely mad and they try to

(41:16):
say that like he's been, he'sbeen in the pod.

Speaker 1 (41:18):
He's been in the pod Right yeah.

Speaker 3 (41:20):
He's, uh, he's been uh zapping, uh pimples on his
face with that mask for for toolong, um, but which is
interesting.
But also like the entity don'tknow.
I just feel like the entitycomes down to just like a big
doomsday clock, um, which youknow a running clock is in all

(41:41):
of these movies and like veryfun to do.
I just wish the entity I Ialmost kind of wish like the
entity had more of a like we gotto see it take over more things
.
More of a terminator terminatorvibe, right.
More of a like we got to see ittake over more things.
More of a terminator terminatorvibe, right.
More of a sky sky net vibe.
We're like it's.

Speaker 1 (41:59):
Actually.
I do think that maybe we'remissing a scene where the entity
does like pop off and take somephysicality, uh, yeah because
otherwise it's just like thisthing that's out there and we
know that in it's over analyzingeverything, and they do do a
good job of telling us like it'snot going to attack until it
knows it can be completely safe,totally totally so it's not

(42:20):
going to do something brash andsomething, something that you
know would be for ourentertainment?

Speaker 3 (42:27):
yeah, but also, though, wouldn't the entity know
that, if it is so secure andsafe and knows every outcome,
why wouldn't it know that, oh,the team is going to be at the
doomsday vault, they're going tohave a poison pill and a and a

(42:52):
usb to to capture it.
I, I, you know and again,that's nitpicking, and also like
no, no, no.

Speaker 1 (43:01):
I think I think that they have explained that, like
the, it does, it expects.
It expects tom to give it over,especially after tom and the
entity have their moment in thepod together.
It expects Tom to take the riskof having a moment where, yes,
it could possibly get captured,but if that blink of a nice

(43:23):
second millisecond is mistimed,it wins, and that's like the
safest the safest, the safestroute.
Yeah, yeah, because if it justgoes through with launching all
nine nuclear powers missilesagainst each other, um, you know
the world?
The world is no more, and so isit.
Um, so isn't?

Speaker 3 (43:45):
isn't?
It?
Isn't the world gonna be nomore even even say it does, get
into the vault safely and thenlaunches everything.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (43:53):
But then it can rebuild it.
And now you're almost steppingon my number two category here.
But but that's what the entitywants.
The entity wants the chance torebuild a a broken uh you know
planet that has fallen intonuclear fallout.
Okay, okay, and at least that'smy read.

(44:14):
It read on it Um okay.

Speaker 3 (44:16):
So our number three hitters uh, in the whole it's
Tom Cruise.

Speaker 1 (44:19):
Yeah, I have that too .

Speaker 3 (44:20):
The God of destiny.
Uh, yeah, he is, and I thinkeven more than recent films in
this franchise.
You know, uh, I think Alex, yousaid this he's in every frame,
right Like he, and he is verysoloed off from the team, uh,
and a lot of these uh moments inthe film where it is, it is

(44:43):
just Ethan Hunt, uh versus theworld and um, yeah, he's, I mean
he's Tom Cruz, he's great, he'sfucking.
You know he is.
So it is interesting that he isso, so serious and so like
dramatic.
He is very, very dramatic inthis film.

(45:06):
Two earlier films in thefranchise where Ethan Hunt can,
can be a little bit more jokeyor a little bit more uh, less,
uh gravitas, right, like alittle bit lighter on his feet.
Uh, it he is.
He is commanding uh the screen.

(45:26):
Uh, at all times in this film,yeah, yeah, I, I also had Tom
Cruise.

Speaker 2 (45:34):
I mean, he again, he is mission impossible.

Speaker 1 (45:37):
He's these movies, you know the opening credits
literally start with saying aTom Cruise production yeah,
incredible stuff.

Speaker 3 (45:45):
Yeah, I want to know where he's hiding in the
beginning and I mean Iunderstand that, like they
usually always somehow get amessage to him.
But yeah, it's funny that he'swatching a tape where the
president's like, yes, we don'tknow where you are, you know,
but you're.
But we somehow got this to you,please come in.

Speaker 1 (46:12):
Yeah, you, you forgot to turn your GPSps off on your
phone.
Actually, yeah, yeah, um, Ithink we might have to have just
like an eighth category fornitpicks, because I was
furiously like trying toremember stuff or like very like
my theater was packed so Icould not be that person on my
phone, but I was just like Ineed to put this in my notes, I

(46:32):
need to remember to mention this, um, so maybe at the end we
have like a or maybe we fit inpart of too long, didn't need is
also just like nitpicks.
How about that?
Yeah, um, okay, and then so.
So mine was ethan hunt as well.
I mean, one more, can you sayso?
Uh, pitch hitters now, who werekind of your scene stealers um,
I think I chose um.

Speaker 2 (46:54):
I don't know if I'm pronouncing his name right, but
Ving Ramis.

Speaker 3 (46:58):
Ving Rames.

Speaker 2 (46:59):
Ving Rames um Luther.
I love him.
I I think that like just hislittle side role, always I'm in
his in the movies that I've seen.
I just really enjoy him onscreen and I wish that there was
more of him.
And RIP to Luther.

Speaker 1 (47:18):
Yeah, for real.

Speaker 3 (47:20):
Spoilers.
Yeah, it's really sad he looksold.
Ving Rhames looks long in thetooth and it's weird because
he's been.

Speaker 2 (47:30):
He's really not.
He's only like in his 60s yeahhe.

Speaker 3 (47:35):
Well, he's always, he's always been a big guy you
know, yeah, exactly and uh, butyeah, he was, he was looking
they I don't know, maybe theyadded makeup, but he looked
really old and and uh and weakand um, you know he's been a
part.
He's been in movies for mesince the 90s, right.
Like I mean, he's just been apart of a great character actor

(47:57):
in so many different movies, uh,over the years.
And yeah, luther is one of hisgreat, great uh roles and uh was
sad, was sad to see him go, butuh, you know he also gets the
last word, so, um, he does whichhe does, kind of which I think
is great and you really you do.

Speaker 1 (48:15):
But you do believe that that brotherhood, that
connection I'd say between Ethanand Luther, like that's,
there's no manufacturing donethere.
That's real stuff, yeah.

Speaker 3 (48:25):
Uh, my pinch hitter was Tramiel Tillman.
Uh captain Bledsoe, uh the USSOhio uh which is the sub that uh
Tom Cruise show gets ontobefore he goes deep sea diving
and, uh, this guy is just he, he, he obviously is huge from his

(48:47):
role in severance, which I'veonly seen a couple episodes, but
you know he's always very funwhen he comes on screen.
But this guy is magnetic and Ithink he has the best chemistry
in the film with tom cruise,like he's constantly calling
ethan hunt mister like, yeah, hematches his freak, he totally
matches his freak yeah, and whatdoes he say he's like?

Speaker 1 (49:09):
if you want to poke the bear, you came to the right
person.

Speaker 3 (49:11):
Oh, you've come to the right man, yeah, yeah, and
he's just, he's just fantastic.
Made me want to see a wholemovie about the USS Ohio with
him at the captain of this ofthe submarine up there in the
Arctic looking for Russian subs.

Speaker 1 (49:32):
It really made me want to watch a submarine movie.
The entire sequence Also shoutout.

Speaker 2 (49:40):
Katie O'Brien too in that scene I was like I was
excited to see her.

Speaker 1 (49:47):
I almost had her down here, because I believe that
she also has some pretty legitchemistry with Tom tom I wish
she was more of it.

Speaker 3 (49:55):
I thought she was going to be much, a much bigger
role.

Speaker 1 (49:58):
Yeah um to say yeah same same with this person, but
they ultimately do have morescreen time at least, even if
their their lines of dialoguedon't necessarily balance,
aren't necessarily in balancewith their screen time.

Speaker 3 (50:14):
But I have palm clementine's character of paris
so I almost had paris as my ondeck person as like my favorite.
She was like probably my secondfavorite character of of the
film.
Like I just think again she'slike she's got good comedy, she
obviously really good timing.

Speaker 1 (50:32):
Yeah, good at martial arts and stuff and yeah, I I
wish there was more of her, heraction as well yeah, I, I like
her, her character arc and couldalways, you know, want I, I
would, I will always be wantingmore um out of that character,
which is, again, not a palmclementine problem, that problem

(50:52):
, that's a story problem.
But I do think that some of thecritiques and criticism of this
film maybe not being as quippyor as fun are sort of lost,
maybe on a little bit of thelanguage barrier, where she does
deliver a lot of goodone-liners and again has that
comedic timing, but we don'tnecessarily think of it as like

(51:15):
banter in the moment, someonegoing back and forth with tom,
but basically everything thatshe says, whether it's to benji
or tom or whenever the wholecrew is together, like she
doesn't miss.
She got a really high shootingpercentage in this film.
Um, so I just, I really Ireally liked her character.
What?

Speaker 3 (51:32):
am I again?
Like go ahead.
One of the one of my favoritelines of hers was when uh benji
was like you need to, he's likedying from the bullet hole, and
he's like you need to save me,and she's like I killed people
yeah, and he's like we'll makeit work.

Speaker 1 (51:48):
Um, uh, I do.
That was one of the first timesthat where I was like, oh no,
we can't be doing this.
Like, trust me, I remember, weall remember why she has that
scar on her stomach that youjust introduced her character
with.
And then they still show theflashback of, like, gabriel
sticking the knife in her um,again, not a palm problem, um,
but but just throw that wholefirst 30 minutes out.

(52:11):
Okay, uh, best, best quote, uh,for me it's second category.

Speaker 3 (52:17):
Yeah, for me it's uh, you're spending too much time
on the internet, Uh.

Speaker 1 (52:21):
Hagar Hagar, you're spending too much time on the
internet.
Yeah, I have that written downas well for one of mine.

Speaker 3 (52:28):
Yeah, that's just.
It's great stuff.
This is on the submarine.
Ethan Hunt gets attacked by oneof these divine followers of
the entity and again, I thinkit's good.
I think it's a good metacommentary on our world right

(52:48):
now and what kind of rabbitholes you can get into if you
spend too much time on theinternet.
I thought that was pretty funny.

Speaker 1 (52:58):
Do you have one, Erica?

Speaker 2 (53:00):
I struggled with this because my theater was also
really packed and I knew I wasgoing to forget something, but I
did really.
I mean because I thought themovie was pretty hokey, like
most of the time I did.
My favorite quote is reallyjust Luther's speech, and his
monologue at the very end of themovie was pretty hokey, like
most of the time I did.
My favorite quote is really justLuther's speech and his
monologue at the very end of themovie.
It's really really heartfelt.

(53:20):
There's very like kind of likesome spiritual elements to what
he's saying to Tom and like toEthan and and like kind of
leaving him with this likereally profound message about
life and, um, I actually reallylike kind of teared up during
that part.
So that's I.

(53:40):
I could not quote it, obviously, and I can't find it on the
internet to to recite any partsof it, but and I wouldn't want
to spoil it, I guess, for anyoneelse anyway because it was very
moving and a good way to endthe film if they really are
going to kind of leave thiswhere it's at, just be done with
the franchise.

(54:00):
I did think it was a reallygreat send-off to Luther and
Ethan's relationship.

Speaker 1 (54:07):
That's a great call I have the Children of the atom
will rise from the ashes.
And this is from doomsday cultmember, I think, number three or
four, that we see on the newsclip at the beginning.
And this guy totally fits intothat like religious fanatic, you
know, like you're thinking, jimJones, you're thinking, you

(54:31):
know, like conspiracy theorist,and and, and one of these, one
of these people who have giventheir life over to the entity
and feel this, this impendingdoom of AI, ready to take over.
So I thought that it was funny.
First of all, they show this,they show this guy twice, I
think.
The second I'm we, we hear thisquote is when tom is in the pod

(54:54):
with the entity, um, this guypops back up.
But but yeah, I just thoughtthat, I thought that that quote
was funny but also prettyindicative, um, of just kind of
like the, the vibes that they'rethe stakes that they're trying
to set here the children of theatom will rise from the ashes.
Thought that was a good one.
Um, okay, shoot your shot now.

(55:22):
So your favorite littlesequence, favorite, um, little
camera trick, maybe piece ofcinematography, I'll go, I'll go
first on this one, um, becauseI have a couple of honorable
mentions that I I want to getout there.
I've heard this scene talkedabout a lot my finalist here but
I do want to give a shout out,for when Tom is in the entity
chamber and he's having thisvision of a world in this

(55:45):
post-nuclear war, this nuclearholocaust, and the entire world
is exploding basically, world isexploding basically and we see
this vision of like a roundsphere of the earth with all
these different, you know,devices being launched and then
detonated and it zooms out andit is the iris of Ethan Hunt's

(56:11):
eye, of Tom Cruise eye, andbecomes and then, you know, we
zoom out and we get his face andhe kind of snaps out of the
vision.
At that point, um, obviously,um, computer generated and I I
still don't.
It's just like.
It was a really cool moment,though, where I was just like,
oh, dang, that was.
That was really cool how theydid that there.

(56:37):
Um, so, so I did really likethat um.
For anybody that wants to saythat this franchise is not sexy
or steamy and doesn't doesn't umset the mood in any scene, I
would like to direct yourattention to the 30 seconds of
hayley atwell performing slowmotion cpr in the decompression
chamber while wearing a tank topphenomenal stuff, um.
So I gotta get that out.
But but my, my, my favoritepart is is ethan leaving the

(57:01):
ohio, the submarine that he ison, and once he has gone out,
the films like dive chamber.
Then he and this was like, andI get it, I get it, it's in the,
it's in the big dive tank, um.
But when the momentum of hisexit then takes him back and the

(57:22):
propulsive um like flow of thewater in in the propeller of the
bellerog, the russian sub thatis right behind him then sucks
him towards the ship, and thisis mostly done like in one take,
in one take and and Ethan thenbounces off this submarine and
is holding on to one of the,like the side fins of it.

(57:44):
That's when I was like Holyshit, we are cooking, like I
don't know how they did that.
Just really, really good stuff.
And this will not be the lasttime that I bring up that entire
um sequence of him leaving theohio and and ultimately going to
the sebesta pool to retrievethe podcova.

(58:05):
But I thought that I thoughtthat that was just like an
incredible uh exit right therefrom the ohio, bouncing off the
bell rock and then going furtherdown.

Speaker 3 (58:15):
But yeah, that was incredible stuff yes, I the the
hayley atwell stuff is is reallyreally funny.
Uh, it's, it's no.
Vanessa kirby pulling like aknife out of her corset listen I

(58:35):
am.

Speaker 1 (58:36):
I wish I could phone a friend and bring in my sister
right now.
Like I grew up on the I grew upin the school of mission
impossible too and like whenyou're talking about tandaway
newton wearing like blacklingerie, sign me up.
Like that is sexy, I get that.
Like this you can be sexy andthen you can just be like this
bottled up horniness of sexualtension that will never be

(58:57):
opened and that's what TomCruise is like with every single
female partner that he's everhad in any movie ever.
And so like everything thathappens, not just the slow
motion, cpr, where Haley Atwellis featured prominently across
my giant screen, um, wherehayley atwell is featured
prominently across my giantscreen, but then like this, this

(59:18):
um, I don't know what you callthat film technique max, but
this almost like um, this hazy,like superimposed cuddling
session that's kind of happeningbetween them while he's like
snapping out of hisdecompression and they're just
like touching each other's faces.
And I'm like I wish, I wish Icould bet a live money line on
movies, because I would havebeen like what is the over under

(59:39):
on them kissing right now,because it'll never happen.
You have all this sexualtension happening right now and
there's like three differentparts throughout the film where
I'm like they're gonna, they'regonna kiss.
Oh, I never think they're gonnakiss, but I'm like you would be
dead.
You are dead wrong if you thinkthat I'm about to split up from
hayley atwell and run aftergabriel and the the the device

(01:00:04):
that's around his neck and leavehayley atwell next to a nuclear
bomb without kissing her, likeit's just not happening.
It's not not happening, tom.
What are you doing?
So a lot of, there's a lot ofstuff with Hayley Atwell in this
movie.
It's not air quotes sexy, but alot of interesting stuff going
on.

Speaker 3 (01:00:25):
My shoot, your shot, is the beginning.
Yeah, I think it's thebeginning of the biplane
sequence.
Yeah, I think it's thebeginning of the biplane

(01:00:46):
sequence.
Specifically, tom Cruise, orEthan Hunt, is on the wing of
the red plane and we're flyingover like a river, in a cavern,
like a canyon, A canyon, yeah,With on either side lots of
greenery going on and again justbeautiful.
Yeah, they look really close,the planes look really close,
but also like they're prettyclose to the ground too and like
and, and the rocks on on eitherside, and like there's just a

(01:01:08):
specific shot in there where Iwas just like, wow, that is like
that's just beautiful.
What a thrill that would belike wow, that is like that's
just beautiful.
What a thrill that would be toshoot that and like to capture
that on screen.
Um, that was definitely by farmy favorite favorite shot.
Um, also interesting note aboutthe biplane sequence they were
denied access to.
I think it was like they saidseven countries they wanted.

(01:01:31):
There were seven countriesbefore south africa that they
wanted to shoot this sequence insouth africa or somewhere in
south america, south africa.
And and, yeah, and uh, sevencountries turned them down and
said, no, you're not allowed toshoot this in our country
because we don't want to takethe risk of, you know, tom

(01:01:53):
Cruise dying uh on our, on oursoil.
So, uh, shout out to SouthAfrica for letting them shoot
there.
And, you know, it's, it's, it's, uh, it's a pretty backdrop.

Speaker 2 (01:02:06):
Yeah, my, uh.
My favorite scene is definitelythe biplane scene.
The whole thing was reallyincredible to watch and very
nerve wracking the whole time.
Him like transferring from hisplane to the other guy's plane I

(01:02:28):
don't even know his character'sname, so sorry, but Gabriel,
that's right.
I don't even know hischaracter's name, so sorry, but
Gabriel, that's right.
But him like hopping from hisplane and then you see his plane
just crumble beneath him wasreally amazing, and yeah, I just
I thought that whole scene wasjust Just wild.
Wouldn't expect any less,though, from from him, so I

(01:02:54):
enjoyed that.

Speaker 1 (01:02:55):
I did really like once he got out of the plane and
the plane stuff became moretactile, as opposed to like this
dog fight without weapons.
Really because, Max, somethingyou said earlier in the film um,
which I do agree with you on,was that like the flashbacks
take you out of it Anytime.
I see Tom Cruise in some sortof aviation, uh, like piloting

(01:03:21):
position, that's what I just gettaken out of it, Cause I'm like
you're doing top gun Like wejust love.
We've seen you fly.

Speaker 3 (01:03:27):
We've seen you fly, and like, I feel that way in
this, in this one too.

Speaker 1 (01:03:30):
Right when, I like in this one too, right where like
well, like even in fallout withthe helicopters, like that's
nothing but just like a top gunscene.
And and so I did like when itbecame more like hand to hand,
um, like yeah, he's like thisreal stunt work as opposed to
not that like flying planesisn't stunt work.
But, um, you know, I just I didfeel like, oh, here we go,

(01:03:54):
we're doing the, we're doing thepete mitchell thing here again
yeah, yeah, uh, yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:04:02):
I mean even like that first sequence where we get
onto the aircraft carrier um oh,with off sprays going up, yeah,
and like the jets coming on andoff, like yeah, it's so tough,
it's so tough, so tough man.

Speaker 1 (01:04:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:04:15):
Which is fine, because you know I mean
Christopher McQuarrie is.

Speaker 1 (01:04:18):
Oh, they both can't help themselves.
Yeah, they both can't helpthemselves.
Yeah, yeah, okay.
All Hans on deck Shout out toHans Zimmer, one of the best to
ever do it.
Piece of music in the filmCould be jukebox soundtrack,
could be something from thescore kind of, depending on what
movie we're talking about.
So you know, funny enoughbecause we are talking about a

(01:04:43):
franchise with one of the mosticonic theme songs ever, and so
is that the route you went?
Or was there another momentthroughout the film that stood
out to you guys?

Speaker 3 (01:04:52):
The like, large gaelic, almost hans zimmer, like
tones that happen when he'sunderwater, when he's deep sea
diving.

Speaker 1 (01:05:01):
They're like this is what I have.
I I have written down sourcecode retrieval.
The rumbling, the grunts, thetorpedoes falling.
I looked it up on the score.
This is like a five minute longsong composed for the score
called the sebesta pool.
Yeah, and it's cool.
It sounds like something thatmark corbin did for the

(01:05:23):
lighthouse it is so good.
It's so good and I love thatfor the most part, that entire
set piece, unlike every otherset piece in this entire
franchise, is paced so slowlyand like you're talking to
silence, almost.
Yeah, I've subscribed to thethalassophobia subreddit page

(01:05:46):
for as long as I've had a redditaccount, so like shit that goes
down underwater, like thattickles my brain in such a scary
and intense and in afascinating way.
And so the moment he comes outof the ohio to the moment that

(01:06:07):
he floats back up to the icesurface, um, when he's actually
like not breathing at that time.
But all of that stuff I justthink is so good and the music
helps with it so much.
Because, yes, little to nodialogue, I'm pretty sure no
dialogue and the music is notthis like high-paced, frenetic

(01:06:27):
action sequence, even though itis like some of the most
white-knuckle stuff that I canremember in the entire franchise
.
The submarine feels like ahaunted house where he's, you
know, around every corner he'sfinding these corpses that have
been rotting down there.
You have this other greatticking time bomb moment and the

(01:06:48):
music does such a good job andjust the sound mix in general do
such a good job of buildingthis tension of this submarine.
It's sitting on this shelf onthe ocean floor.
That's already 500 feet down,and it is because of tom opening
ethan, I should say opening thedifferent chambers and and

(01:07:09):
shifting the balance of thesubmarine because water's going
into different areas of the ship, it's beginning to slide down
this shelf and so it's just likeit's so good, guys, it's so so
good that stuff that happensunderwater.
So, yeah, the music helps it.
It's definitely my favoritepart too.

Speaker 2 (01:07:32):
I think I had the music down for the fight scene
in the cabin because I reallyenjoyed that whole scene of kind
of them swapping between, like,the team fighting the russians
and then also tom fighting theguy on the ohio, and so I really

(01:07:53):
enjoyed that whole scene andthe music in that.
But I, you did mention, like thetheme song of mission
impossible and, like you know,the title card of the movie
doesn't come for, you know,several minutes into it and my
whole theater like erupted intoapplause and because I'm, like

(01:08:15):
fairly new to the franchise, Iand I've had only positive
experiences, um, with it so far.
I get pretty hyped when, likethe theme song comes on because
I'm just like let's go, like I'mready.
So I think the theme song isworth mentioning in this because
it is so iconic and, you know,unless you've been living under

(01:08:37):
a rock, you really just areimmediately going to recognize
the song, you know, and it canfeel a lot powerful, kind of
tying into some other things Iwas saying before of, like you
know, with this, assuming thisis the last movie, it can give
you a little bit of nostalgiaand and kind of, like you, you

(01:09:01):
reflect on the last, you know,whatever, there's seven, eight
movies now and um, and so likeobviously I I don't have a long
history with them and I haven'tseen the majority of them, but I
think just kind of tapping intolike the collective experience
with Mission Impossible.
Hearing that song can reallyflood back a lot of memories and

(01:09:23):
reflect on your upbringing with.
The franchise is prettypowerful.
And there was, you know, I hada lot of, like, older people in
my, my theater and everyone wasjust really hyped and it was
actually really fun.
And um, you know, mondayafternoon and everyone just
started cheering.

Speaker 3 (01:09:45):
I had a bunch of old people at my screening too, and
they were cheering when TomCruise.
When tom cruise, uh like islands after the biplane, uh, uh,
sequence right.
And he's got like the because,like he, he pulls up parachute,
that parachute lights on fire.
Then we cut away from him andthen we get back to him and he

(01:10:06):
well, we see him pull a secondshoot, but we don't see it go up
yeah, and he, like he's now onthe ground.
I had, I had and again, likethis was a friday morning, the
you know bluebird special, uh, Ihad people hooting and
hollering, they love tomcat inthis town, uh, and so, yeah,

(01:10:27):
that's, that's a lot of fun.
But, um, my question was gonnabe, uh, what's a better theme
song?
Mission impossible or the jamesbond theme song, because I
think it's really.

Speaker 1 (01:10:38):
I think they evoke the exact I was thinking about
this yeah yeah, um, because Ithink it's the exact same thing.
You, you can't wait for thecold open of a james bond film
and a mission impossible film toend even though sometimes
that's like the most fun youhave during the entire movie
because you can't wait for thatneedle drop of like either or

(01:11:10):
possible is better.
They totally do the same thing.
They totally do the same thingthey do the same thing, and then
I think it comes down topersonal preference.
Yeah, you're right.
Okay, so now we get to, we'regoing to do some nitpicking here
.
We'll start with a big.
Too long didn't need.
It sounds like consensus mightbe just the London stuff,

(01:11:33):
everything at the beginning.
We've mentioned that a lot, allthe clips, all the remember
this stuff that's happening.
I mean, that's what I havewritten down.

Speaker 3 (01:11:40):
If you guys have something bigger that you want
to focus on now, we can do thator we can get into nitpicks I
have something very specific, uh, that I, I, just I, I couldn't
believe they decided to go withthis, and this gets into spoiler
territory.

Speaker 1 (01:11:58):
Oh, we're so far past that.

Speaker 3 (01:11:59):
Yeah, but I mean, this is something I had no idea.

Speaker 1 (01:12:04):
And when it came on, I groaned If you're an hour and
10 minutes into this and wehaven't spoiled something for
you, thanks for hanging out.

Speaker 3 (01:12:10):
Right, I do not need Shea Wiggum's character to be
Jim Phelps jr.
I thought that was a hugemistake and just just horrendous
lazy writing.

Speaker 1 (01:12:28):
That's where the legacy stuff, that's where the
legacy stuff goes wrong and I'mnot against the decision to do
it.
But if you're going to do it,shay needs to be in like 30%
more of the movie.

Speaker 3 (01:12:40):
The character does not even matter.

Speaker 1 (01:12:45):
I don't even know who Shay works for in this movie,
yeah exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:12:49):
It's insane, it's absolutely insane.

Speaker 1 (01:12:52):
I love Shay.
That hurts me so much.
Love shay too I want more.
Shay was great in deadreckoning right, but he also
also though in dead reckoning.
I don't know who he works for.
What's he doing?

Speaker 3 (01:13:04):
it's it's absolutely insane.
And why does?

Speaker 1 (01:13:08):
he not care about his partner, who's now just working
with ethan working with, yeah,just I mean just flip sides.
He's probably good like this.
Ethan guy is probably goodbecause my partner's now just
like in his crew.
It's insane dude.
I can know that.
Right, she has to know.
Does he think his partner'sdead?
I have no idea I have no idea.

Speaker 3 (01:13:28):
Um, yeah, it's, uh, it, it's, it was.
That was crazy.
That was crazy when theyrevealed that and I was like
that's just too far.
Um, so that that is the thing Ijust want out of this movie.

Speaker 2 (01:13:44):
I don't know I'm.
I'm curious like how you guysfeel about this, because for me,
like I, it just doesn't work.
For me I cannot stand nickofferman in these like weird,
like government presidentialroles I don't like him cleanly
shaven.

Speaker 1 (01:14:01):
Yeah, that was scary too, but you know he was the
president in civil war right, umwhich you know.

Speaker 2 (01:14:09):
very, very little part in that movie, but him in
this.

Speaker 1 (01:14:13):
Almost like stunt casting in that role.

Speaker 2 (01:14:16):
Yeah, it's like no, sorry, it doesn't work for me.
It just feels so like awkwardand like try hard to me and I
hate to like.
I tend, you know, I think a lotof people do this with certain
types of actors who areprimarily known for comedic
roles or, you know, maybe adramatic role, and then they try

(01:14:36):
to do comedy or whatever, but Ijust like it doesn't work for
me.
As him in these weird, likeserious roles, but especially
this movie I was, I just waslike get him off my screen, I
don't, and I like Nick Offerman,but I'm curious, like I don't
know if that was just me, likethat's a nitpick for sure, but I

(01:15:00):
do.

Speaker 1 (01:15:01):
I do like how they kept his character's motives
sort of in the dark.
When he goes to ask for the onesergeant's firearm and you're
not sure like is he going to benot necessarily a radicalist,
but is he going to be someonewithin the president's cabinet
that tries to take her outbecause of a decision that she's

(01:15:22):
ultimately going to make and ornot make?
Um, and so I I do like thatyou're.
You're left wondering what'sgoing to happen with his
character in that regard andultimately, that that moment
does come to fruition and we doget our answer.
I like the answer that we getto.
It's a cool scene, um, but I do, I do agree with you that, um,

(01:15:44):
I think there's 20 other45-year-old white guys in
Hollywood that I could have seenin that role and either been
indifferent towards or likedbetter in the position, someone
that I think you're right youdon't have the same sort of
comedic relationship with.
It'd almost be like notnecessarily on this level, but
pretty close to Like.

(01:16:05):
If Steve Carell was that partyou'd be like what the?

Speaker 2 (01:16:07):
fuck, we're not that far off from that, that
character, but just being likesteve carell offerman's a great
tv actor he is a good tv actorand and it's not that I don't
think that he's a good actor,it's just that like it has just
his.

Speaker 3 (01:16:24):
I couldn't stand his voice and I know he talks like
that in like everything he's in,obviously, but to me it just
felt so corny and like I didn'tlike it at all I'm like no, I I
mean the, the, the, all the warroom stuff right, and they're
trying, they're trying very hardto do the diploma thing, where

(01:16:45):
they've got the tilted anglesand the, the over the top
dialogue and the cheese going onthere and and we're you know
it's supposed to be very tense.
But yeah, I think I don't knowif it's Offerman or I mean even
some of these other characteractors that we have in there
Holt McCoy, you know I I tend toalways really love Holt McCoy.

(01:17:07):
You know I tend to alwaysreally love who Holt McCoy, holt
McCoy.

Speaker 1 (01:17:11):
Holt, mcclacrini, I think is his name, or McClareni.

Speaker 2 (01:17:16):
McAllany.

Speaker 3 (01:17:17):
McAllany, mcallany there we go Holt McAllany yes, a
Fincher guy, really love thatguy.
But again, I think this WarRoom stuff they're trying to do
diploma and I just I think it'sjust poorly executed or it's
just not diploma or I'm just,I'm just I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:17:36):
I I was very allergic to anything going on in that
war room and I just did not wantto be there yeah, and I think
offerman also has a part in thatright okay, here were some of
the side things that I was ableto write down to remember to
talk about here.
Um, first one, I wrote and Ihope there's an answer to this,
um, I just I wrote down lutheris in a hospital bed in the

(01:18:01):
bottom of a condemned sewer.

Speaker 3 (01:18:05):
Question mark yeah, so is he sick.
What I don't under was he sickin the seventh one because I the
weird.

Speaker 1 (01:18:13):
this is why you just gotta throw out the first like
30 to 40 minutes, because I wasunder the impression that after
he comes back in, like afterethan watches the the blair
wedge project tape, and he comesback in, then he and and Benji
and Luther meet back up and theylearn that they need to make
all these different devices thatcan activate the source code

(01:18:37):
within the Podkova.
And then Luther also has tobuild this trap that will hold
the entity inside of it, willhold the entity inside of it,
like they're all in what looksto be some sort of like imf
workroom, like lab or whateverfor that scene.
And then we're subterraneanlondon and luther's in a

(01:19:01):
hospital bed but he's wearing.

Speaker 3 (01:19:03):
But he's wearing doctors like he's wearing nurses
clothes.

Speaker 1 (01:19:07):
He has a nurse.
He has a nurse.
Yeah, like, are you she atraveling nurse?
Is she a nurse provided by theimf?
Like I had so many questionsabout, why is luther in a
hospital bed in the sewers?

Speaker 2 (01:19:22):
I almost brought that up earlier, but I was like
maybe I missed something, andwhy?

Speaker 1 (01:19:28):
again, you know we just talked about death's design
with final destination.
But why is ethan like yo homie,that's my briefcase.
Like yo homie, that's mynecklace, with the device on it?
I need that.
And then luther's like nah bro,it's good, I'll just keep it no
, no, ethan hunt, ethan gives itback to him like yeah, he takes

(01:19:48):
it, like yeah, he's like yeah,I'll take that, and then he's
like no, or yeah, I guess.
Then ethan's like no, you keepit, you keep.
And luther's like all right bet.
And then gabriel finds him andlike oh shit, now everything's
going wrong, hey yeah, there'slike no other guards or anything
, there's just this nurse justluther benji's not even there.
I'm so confused by that yeah,that's all very strange okay,

(01:20:13):
next next question nitpick,whatever.
Do we think that there is areal doomsday vault somewhere?
uh, because if not, that's acrazy thing for them just to
make up and write and put it inSouth Africa.
And now there should be one, ifthere's not one.

Speaker 3 (01:20:34):
There probably is one .
There's definitely one underthe White House right, okay,
okay.

Speaker 2 (01:20:41):
One under the Denver airport probably.

Speaker 1 (01:20:43):
Oh, there you go.
Now.
This is what I love CrackpotErica with the conspiracy
theories.

Speaker 2 (01:20:50):
This whole movie is based on conspiracy theories.

Speaker 1 (01:20:53):
This is true.

Speaker 2 (01:20:53):
This is true.

Speaker 1 (01:20:54):
Okay, also, too, I couldn't help but think this
during the film.
They decide that, as like anact and in an act of good faith,
if the?
U were to attack all theseother cities who have gone
offline with their nukes, thatwe should be sacrificing one of

(01:21:15):
our own cities.
They don't tell us which one itis, but I was like I have to
ask Max?
No, because they say thatthey're like we can't give up,
Like we've come up with a listof like strategic and
geographical options.
Now I've always read stuff likemuch to my chagrin, that

(01:21:37):
Seattle and the entire PacificNorthwest because of how much
Navy and all the other kinds ofmilitary bases that we have up
here that like this wouldactually be a high target value
for like an attack during a warand you could you could do a lot
to deplete the entire nation'sforces by like attacking the

(01:21:58):
pacific northwest.
So I don't think seattle's onthat list, but I'm like what
cities are on this list?
denver denver, somewhere intexas somewhere in texas,
chicago, philadelphia, I waskind of thinking can you refer?

Speaker 2 (01:22:16):
I could, I could definitely pick some.

Speaker 1 (01:22:18):
So you rephrase the question again or just repeat it
I just want to know what citiesdo you think were on that list
that that madam president had tolook at to to sacrifice to
sacrifice because obviously theywould have listed them off.

Speaker 2 (01:22:31):
I guess I was picking my own personal ones okay,
because it's not going to be dc.

Speaker 3 (01:22:37):
It's not going to be new york, minnesota, it's not
going to be los angeles.

Speaker 1 (01:22:41):
I don't think.
I think seattle's clear miamioh, someone florida, sure miami?
Yeah, good, miami, knock offMiami.
Ooh, someone in.

Speaker 3 (01:22:48):
Florida.

Speaker 2 (01:22:48):
Sure Miami yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:22:49):
Good Miami.

Speaker 1 (01:22:51):
Atlanta, Atlanta.

Speaker 3 (01:22:52):
Louisiana, that's, you know, pretty much underwater
.

Speaker 1 (01:22:55):
I think Miami makes a lot of sense.
You take off Miami and theyjust sort of like the panhandle
just goes.

Speaker 2 (01:23:03):
Austin would be awesome.

Speaker 3 (01:23:04):
Yeah, texas.
Texas makes a lot of sense,cause there's a lot of empty
space out there fair.

Speaker 1 (01:23:10):
Yeah, I'm trying to think those are the three things
that I had written down, butthere's so I mean there's a ton
yeah, another nitpick for me waswe only get one mask thing like
there's only.
But listen, this is I don'tneed my cheeseburger to be like
it, doesn't need to be a smashburger, but like just that's

(01:23:32):
like the, the, that's missionimpossible.
I mean like that is.
But these are the trappings,though, is if you do the same
thing over and over.
Because I can remember, I Iremember when, when dead
reckoning came out and peoplewere like jesus christ, there
were seven different maskmoments in this movie, and so

(01:23:53):
like you're damned if you do andyou're damned if you don't,
yeah yeah, I, I don't know, I'ma damned if you don't.

Speaker 3 (01:24:00):
Person, I like the masks.
There was only one part and Ijust think they're fun.
Ask her for do it and ask forforgiveness later yeah,
absolutely it's, it's, it's theend, it's the end of mission
impossible.

Speaker 2 (01:24:11):
Like you, know, supposedly yeah um, what else?

Speaker 3 (01:24:18):
uh, yeah.
So yeah, I mentioned theparachute.

Speaker 1 (01:24:21):
I mentioned, you know , the videotape at the beginning
, like also again, maybe it's,maybe it it's part of why Ethan
has to do it.
But also when he goes to thislike black tie event in London,
I'm like what are you doing?
Yeah, I have no idea.
Why is he there.
You are a fugitive.

(01:24:42):
Everyone knows what you looklike.
Yeah, everyone in the worldknows what you look like.
You know how many expos would bedone on you like, yeah, I don't
know.
Yeah, yeah, it's weird that I'mtelling you that first.
Oh, I agree, the first stuff,the first 30 minutes, 40 minutes
, basically, until we understandlike, okay, cool, because

(01:25:04):
here's the thing.
We talked about, this afterdead reckoning like hell, yes,
the next chapter is going to belike a submarine movie.
It's going to be sick.
Yep, and guess what was sick inthis movie?
All the submarine stuff.
Yeah, so until we get to likethis setup for that which
introduces like the katieo'brien character and just this

(01:25:25):
whole plot of how he has to getout there.
I love how he has, like I'mjumps out the bird.
Yeah, I'm really not trying tospoil my driving double feature
by talking about this part toomuch yet, but like the way that
he asked to negotiate withAngela Bassett as the president
to even get this part going,like I loved all of that stuff.
I thought that was so good.

Speaker 3 (01:25:55):
Like we just got to get out of london faster.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Get out of the, the sewerhospital.
Uh, that would be nice.
I hope that's where I go hey,wait guys, when I get old and
sick, just send me to the sewer,just send me down to the sewer.

Speaker 1 (01:26:06):
Yeah, the iron care.
Um, it's crazy stuff, okay.
So here we go drive-in, doublefeature for this film.
Um, you go unconventional, yougo conventional.
Obviously, when you're what weassume to be the final chapter
of a franchise maybe we don'tassume it to be, but, like,
there's a lot of stuff here thatyou can pull from.

(01:26:28):
So, so what are you pairingthis movie with?

Speaker 3 (01:26:30):
I have a whole list.
So if you guys want to go firstand then I'll, you know, add
some scraps, sure.

Speaker 1 (01:26:37):
Sure Erica.

Speaker 2 (01:26:38):
I struggled with this , but I chose tenant.

Speaker 1 (01:26:41):
Oh, tell us why.

Speaker 2 (01:26:57):
I don't know.
It kind of gives me that samevibe.
I also what recently watched,re-watched it.
You know Tenet is really aboutthem like trying to prevent a
world war three, um, and it justkind of gives me that same vibe
.
Like Tenet I know a lot ofpeople think is like really long
and um, a little like painfulto watch.
I personally really likedtenant but um, it kind of gives
like I don't know.
And I really, like I said Istruggled with this one hardcore
because I was like well, I'lljust pair it with another
mission impossible movie, but um, I thought that like there was

(01:27:21):
a similar like the, the whole aithing, for whatever reason it's
, because it's so liketechnologically advanced.
I compare that to how they're,you know, manipulating time yeah
um and it um.

Speaker 3 (01:27:36):
So that's my that's a great pick and a movie that,
like I would have never thoughtof.
Erica that's, that's, uh, it'sa good pull yeah that's really
thinking outside the box.
That's yeah, yeah, it's verytenet of you.

Speaker 1 (01:27:51):
So I went way outside the box Box didn't even exist
for me on this one because Ithink that some of the first
things that came to my mind maybe on your list as well.
Max, I'm happy that you'regoing to bring a couple of
different titles to the tablehere.
I'm going to TV, actually, andI'm going with season three of
24.
And now I think that Ethan Huntand Jack Bauer have so much in

(01:28:20):
common where they are the personwho always ends up at the
center of these world crises andthey are the only person, for
some reason, that can save theday.
And and so, whether, like youcould say that Ethan Hunt's a
superhero, you can say thatEthan Hunt is James Bond.
I'm like Ethan Hunt and JackBauer are the same person.

(01:28:43):
And and now, what really madethat apparent to me while
watching the final reckoning wasthat scene in which he is
trying to convince AngelaBassett and her entire cabinet
to basically give him carteblanche to carry out this
mission the way that only hesees that he can do it, and he
has to keep things classifiedand everything else else.

(01:29:12):
And after he leaves that meeting, you see that angela bassett's
character of the president,unbeknownst to the rest of her
cabinet is like, yeah, here yougo, here's the green light.
That is so jack bauer and davidpalmer, where dennis hayes
bird's character in 24 wouldjust be like you don't ask me
why I'm trusting jack, I trustjack and that's all you need to
know.
Um, and so season three,specifically, is when when jack

(01:29:35):
and president palmer, davidpalmer in the 24 series, really
start to have that kind ofrelationship and really just
like flex that friendship oneverybody else and and you know,
keifer sutherland is left tojust go do his thing.
Ctu and IMF also not thatdissimilar.

(01:29:56):
So, yeah, that's the one that,after thinking about it for a
minute, kind of came to me.

Speaker 3 (01:30:01):
Yeah, that's a great poll, that's a really great poll
Because, you're right, jackBauer and Ethan Hunt, I mean,
obviously Ethan Hunt came first,I guess in in the 60s, right,
but jack bauer is kind of like a, like a more violent, grounded
version of that, for sure, yeah,uh, okay.

(01:30:23):
So I have, yeah, a big longlist.
Uh, you know, I I think lastweek we touched on no time to
die, uh, is is a good thing topair with this, because it's the
last Daniel Craig, james Bondmovie, um and uh, or the dark
night rises, um, you know, thelast Christian Bale Batman movie

(01:30:43):
kind of ends a little, you know, it kind of ends a little
similar to the way this ends,where we're head nodding, our
friends, and then we're lookingat the camera, winking and
walking away.
I also had movies like Logan,toy Story 3, the Last Crusade,
avengers, endgame.
Those are all like the end ofcertain franchises or eras in

(01:31:08):
franch, franchises.
A lot of those then, you know,go, end up going on and ruining
some of those legacies.
Uh, on those movies, but onethat I was thinking about, uh, a
couple other ones that are kindof outside the box and not
having to do with ending a storysomething.

(01:31:28):
There's so much, there's somuch like water diving, navy
stuff in here.
Yeah, right, I check out theabyss, right I?
I think that's an interestingwe're at the bottom of the ocean
, we're.
We're going around trenches, uh, we're.
You know that one gets a littlebit more sci-fi than than a, a,

(01:31:52):
uh, mission impossible movie,or you can go and this is one I
think alex and I watched, or atleast I know I watched during
our kevin costner moment lastlast year.
Uh, is it the Guardian?
I believe.

Speaker 1 (01:32:10):
Oh yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:32:10):
With Ashton Kutcher and Kevin Costner.
It's like a frogman jumping offhelicopters into raging ocean
film Coast Guard film.
So I think those would pairnicely with how much water
action we get in guard film.
So I think those would pairnicely with the uh, with how
much water action we get on thisfilm.

Speaker 1 (01:32:34):
I think for a lot of the same reasons.
You could throw you five, seven, one the hunt for red October.
Right, you could do a couple ofdifferent submarine movies with
this one as well.

Speaker 2 (01:32:41):
Yeah, Yep your water, uh.
Starring Kristen Stewart.

Speaker 1 (01:32:45):
Oh underwater yeah, starring.

Speaker 3 (01:32:47):
Kristen Stewart oh, underwater, yeah, we started
William Eubank baby.

Speaker 1 (01:32:52):
Okay.
So now let's talk about thelegacy, our final category here
for this film.
I think I'm maybe the strongestsupporter of this movie, so
I'll go first and just kind ofsay my piece and then be done
with it.
I do like what you justmentioned.
This is a good segue, max, oryou kind of set the table nicely
for me here, I should say,because a lot of those other

(01:33:13):
franchises that you did justmention did go on to try to
revitalize and reimagine orreboot themselves after we were
told we're done.
So here's how I feel about thefinal reckoning.
If the franchise ends here, Ithink people are going to come

(01:33:36):
around to this movie prettyquickly, and and if they're able
to just like, like, ifMcQuarrie and Cruz and everybody
Cruz first and foremost, but ifeveryone's able to stay away
from it, I think they're notonly going to get credit for
their strength, the restraintthat that shows, but I also
think that, as I mentioned atthe top, this movie's
relationship with AI and the waythat they are confronting some

(01:33:59):
of these things in real time andhow that might feel a bit too
like on the nose in the moment.
I think give it five, 10 yearsand we're going look back on it
and and feel we're gonna be moreum sympathetic to some of those
ideas.
and now, that's not be me beinglike pessimistic by saying like
in 10 years shit's really gonnabe bad, um, but like I just

(01:34:19):
think that in in five or tenyears, if this franchise hasn't
tried to come back yet, we'regonna, we're gonna look back on
it pretty fondly and then, ifthis franchise does continue, I
think people are going to say weshould have left it here and
the final reckoning was a goodend to the ethan hunt story.
So I think this, I think thismovie in either way, um, no

(01:34:41):
matter what we, no matter whathappens next, I think this
movie's in a good position togrow in a lot of people's
estimation.

Speaker 3 (01:34:51):
Yeah, it'll be really interesting.
To be honest, I haven't watchedDead Reckoning since it was in
theaters, right, the lastMission Impossible movie I own
is Fallout, and so I thinksitting down and maybe
marathoning these two togethermight help Final Reckoning a
little bit more.

(01:35:11):
Or it also might hurt it, right?
Because that might be evenworse if you get through Dead
Reckoning and then you have toget through everything at the
beginning of this movie whereeveryone's telling you exactly
what happened in Dead.
Reckoning and what we're upagainst.
I think the big question is isthis going to be the last one,
the fact that the oscars are nowrecognizing stunts in 2028?

(01:35:36):
Does the lure of that oscar, ofa possible oscar for tom cruise
, chris, uh, you know, mckughand and team, does that make
them come back, you know, uh, orare they gonna make him go back
to maverick?

(01:35:56):
Well, so yeah, that's gonna bepart of part of the part of the
news coming up, uh, so yeah, Idon't know, it's, it's gonna be
really interesting.
I, I hope this is the end andyou know this movie again.
I think it just needs morereexamination and, like the

(01:36:16):
stunts are amazing, I just It'dbe cool if there was a super cut
out there of Dead Reckoning andthe final Reckoning together,
where maybe we get rid of thetrain sequence and we get rid of
the first hour of this film andand somehow, stitch them
together.

Speaker 1 (01:36:36):
Can we keep rebecca ferguson alive?
That'd be amazing, becausethat's another.
That's the biggest part.
That's the biggest thing that Ifeel like is missing from this
film is just, we don't have thetime invested in the hayley at
will character yet, and like weall felt this and talked about
this on the pod when deadreckoning came out, is it like
that was a terrible decision tokill off that character?

(01:36:58):
Yeah yeah and this movie now,and this movie now suffers
because of it.

Speaker 3 (01:37:03):
Yeah yeah, she's, yeah, she leaves a gaping hole,
for sure.

Speaker 2 (01:37:11):
My take on the legacy thing.
I want to believe that this isthe last movie, because not that
I really am invested either way, but it's more of just my
belief in how Hollywood justloves to over milk things and

(01:37:31):
just keep making movies formoney, rather than like letting
like a really great franchise orstory just be what it is.
You know with with this, withthis movie or these these movies
, it's very likely that we'llhave one of those like it's not

(01:37:54):
going to be right away, butmaybe like I don't know, but
it's like how do you do that?
Well, I don't know.
I mean you might do thatwithout Tom and then have some
like younger actor taking hisplace in the stunt department,
but tom's still involved somehow.
You know what I mean.
Like I I feel like we see thatoften where they'll bring in

(01:38:16):
like a hot new actor and andhe's maybe like the like the new
ethan hunt, even though he'snot playing ethan hunt, but like
I could really see thathappening like 10 years down the
road, maybe even less than that, but I hope it doesn't.
I just I mean I'll always standby, like just leaving, just

(01:38:36):
like this movie is getting likemixed feedback but it's not
really being like.
I don't think people considerthis movie like a flop or
anything, or it's definitely notlike whoa.
This is really bad, becauseit's not.
It's just like it's a littletoo long, it's a little, you
know, hard to follow for youknow some people, um, but it's

(01:39:01):
still good.
So, like, leave it alone.
You know, just like.
Just like, let something diepeacefully.
And like, let us all be likejust kind of nostalgic about it
and say, you know, like let'smove on.
And I don't know, I think it'dbe nice to see Tom Cruise and
like other roles, you know, anddoing other things, kind of

(01:39:22):
getting back into some of thestuff that he used to do in his
like earlier days and I, I mean,I don't know, I who knows
what'll happen.
I just I really hate howhollywood just tries to continue
to like like keep going withthings when it's like kind of
clear that it's reached itsexpiration.

Speaker 3 (01:39:42):
So yeah, yeah it's.
It is sad it's.
It's the ip era that we live inright now, um, where they yeah,
they just milk it dry and we'llsee.
I don't know, they've tried.

Speaker 1 (01:39:54):
Listen, the entity wants us to believe we have.
We have shown the entity thatthat's what we want.

Speaker 3 (01:40:00):
Yeah, the algorithm, the entity is, is is aware.
Um, and you know they havetried to do the whole.
Brandon the young hotshot withRenner with Renner, with, uh,
what was the guy in in three?
Uh, John Reese Davies orwhatever, um, so, yeah, I don't

(01:40:24):
know, that would be interesting,but also, like, I think, I
think it needs to.
You know, stuff like this,stuff like Indiana Jones, stuff
like even Star Wars, right,where, like these legacy movies
that have been going on forevernow, and and Mission Impossible

(01:40:44):
is probably the youngest out ofthose, definitely the youngest
out of those movies we just gotto stop, though.
We got to just put it down.
Put it down, it's been a greatrun, it's been a great 30 years.

Speaker 2 (01:40:59):
Right, yeah, I would want my franchise to die, to be
put to bed very peacefully.
You know what I mean.
And like everybody has stillhas a good taste in their mouth
with it.
It's not like, oh my gosh,another one came out and this
one sucked and it's just notgood anymore.
And you know, like I like justlet art and like just let it be

(01:41:26):
what it is, and like we can,there's plenty of other movies
to be made out there, you know,and there's you can make more
movies just like this if youwant.
Like who cares?
But just, I don't know, likejust don't over do it, Don't
over milk it, it's too much.
If I could just tell everybodyin Hollywood that message, I

(01:41:48):
would.
There's so many movies that arecoming out that are just so
unnecessary welcome back to thespace of dramatic acting with a
capital D.

Speaker 1 (01:42:12):
Then I think that he will be able to leave at least
Mission Impossible alone.
I think the stage is better setfor him to maybe hand off the
Top Gun franchise to someonelike Glenn Powell or Miles
Turner and so or not.
Miles Turner, you can tell I'vebeen watching too much
basketball.
Miles Teller and so and so ornot.
Miles turner, you can tell I'vebeen watching too much
basketball.

Speaker 3 (01:42:28):
Uh miles teller and and so and turner is a center
who can hit a three, though, allright listen, I'm trying to nix
that.

Speaker 1 (01:42:38):
Game's probably in the fourth quarter right now.
Nix pacers, game four um, gopacers.
We gotta wrap this shit up, um,and so I I do think that
that'll be.
That'll be very telling.
As opposed to um, if he feelslike he needs to come back to
this, because I was tom, tom didsomething.
I would advise everyone to goand listen to tom's interview.

(01:42:59):
He actually went on a podcastand was on the pat mcafee show
and talked for like 30 minutesand it's incredibly telling and
also very obvious that, like tomtom simultaneously is always
going to march to the beat ofhis own drum, but he's very
aware and I won't say like henecessarily quote cares what
people think about him, but heis hyper aware of of the state

(01:43:22):
of movies and his importance tomovies and and the power and the
influence that he holds, and soif he feels like he can walk
away, I think he will.
But now that is again going tohinge on this transition that
we're going to see, startingwith his appearance in the new
Inuritu film, and I know nothingabout the plot of that story

(01:43:44):
and if he's going to be thecentral figure to it or just
part of an ensemble, so we willsee.
We will see what's next for tom.
That's really this, like thislegacy conversation is almost
more focused on like tom cruiseis an actor as opposed to
totally mission impossible it's,yeah, it's, it's exciting, it's
very exciting.
It is, um, okay, so.

(01:44:06):
So that'll do it for for ourconversation around the final
reckoning.
Max, you did ask if you couldhave a little time at the end
here, for some people are sayingtidbits.
I also.
I also do want to touch on ourbig winners coming out of the
Cannes Film Festival, so we cantalk about that for two seconds
here as well.
But what do you got for us?

Speaker 3 (01:44:26):
Well, so I mentioned earlier Christopher McQuarrie.
I was watching a.
He was on some podcasts todayhe has penned the script, or at
least the first draft, for top,or for top Maverick, top gun
three.
So that is in the works, andthen I also have some graphics

(01:44:51):
here that I want.
You guys are sick of Scorsese.

(01:45:16):
Do we need a five-part seriesabout a director and his legacy?
There's going to be DanielDay-Lewis is coming out for this
.
This Kate Blanchett, dicaprio Imean you can, you can just
imagine all the people that aregoing to be on this.
Uh, five, I can't believe it'sfive parts.

(01:45:37):
That's just that's five hoursof of content and that's a lot.
So I wanted to get your guys'reaction to that.

Speaker 2 (01:45:46):
I love that.
I think that's.
I mean I love a documentary nomatter what, and a docu-series
of that about an amazingfilmmaker.
I mean I'll watch it Always.
So I think that's exciting.

Speaker 1 (01:46:00):
I think that these things are always a sum of their
parts, and so if, Daniel Day,if you got DDL and Leo and a
bunch of his longtimecollaborators, De Niro, I would
expect um you know if they'regoing to show him yeah, if
they're going to come and showout for him, um, then that's,
that's great.
I will say that I always thinkit's a little weird when these

(01:46:22):
career retrospects anddocumentaries come out on people
who not only are still living,and documentaries come out on
people who not only are stillliving but, more specifically,
like, still working.
So if, if he's gonna make liketwo more movies, then I'd say
like no, to answer your question, we don't need it, not right
now, just we need it.
We need it, but just wait yeahyeah, yeah, that would be
interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:46:43):
Uh, and then, alex, I was really interested in this
piece of news that I saw and,again, I have no idea if this is
real, but it's what people aresaying and maybe I'm spending
too much time on the internet.
Uh-oh a movie in the works,starring DiCaprio as Chuck Knoll

(01:47:09):
and Brad Pitt as Art Rooney,covering the Pittsburgh Steelers
who, if people don't know you,are a diehard fan of.
Yeah, what do you think of that?

Speaker 1 (01:47:25):
That already sounds more prestigious than what we're
gonna get with bail and cage.
Doing the story on the raiders,right and and I think that you
never want to be reactionary,right, and so a little bit of
that does feel reactionary to mewhere maybe some studio, some
director, whoever it was to dothe, the john madden story, the

(01:47:48):
al davis story, the oaklandraiders story maybe they just
like tapped into that first andnow someone else is saying like
oh wait, we can take a biggerand better franchise that has a
bigger global reach than theraiders, and there's not too
many of those.
Honestly, it's probably thecowboys yeah um, and and we can

(01:48:10):
get more accomplished actors and, um, maybe we feel like we have
a more interesting story totell.
I think anything post once atime, once upon a time, in
hollywood with brad and leotogether, is going to obviously,
no matter what it's about drawa lot of attention.
I'm not going to sit here andsay I'm not for it, uh, but I I

(01:48:34):
also I'm sort of with you whereI'm like is this real?
I have no idea if that's realyeah, and is there an exciting
enough story to tell like, yeah,you could do, you could do a
whole run through the 70s ofthem winning their super bowls
um?

Speaker 3 (01:48:51):
who's your pick for terry bradshaw?

Speaker 1 (01:48:53):
maybe make a great sports movie.
Who would I pick for terrybradshaw?
Gosh, who right now is likematthew mcconughey in 2001.
That's who I want.
Glenn Powell I want.
Right, that's just too easy,though.

(01:49:14):
I don't know Gosh 10 years ago,I don't know.
There's a lot of people who Icould say this person 10 years
ago, this person 20 years ago, Idon't know, I'm not sure that's
a good one, though.
Yeah, we'll see.
I'll keep my ears peeled formore news on that to come.
Leo's kind of one of these guys.
You know, you see leo at abunch of basketball games,

(01:49:35):
obviously lakers, um,specifically, but he's sort of
like tom cruise, where I'm likedoes leo, does leo care about
the same things that we careabout?
I feel like brad pitt caresabout the same things that we
care about.
I feel like Brad Pitt caresabout the same things that we
care about, but like, does Leocare about telling a story?

Speaker 3 (01:49:52):
I don't know, from 50 years ago in the NFL.
I have no idea.
Yeah, you know, I think you'reright, I think Brad Brad does
care.

Speaker 1 (01:50:00):
No.

Speaker 3 (01:50:01):
I think Brad does care about that stuff, cause
Brad has a production company,right, brad has a production
company, right.
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1 (01:50:11):
But like, yeah, leo is just like on beaches with
squirt guns, like I totally ortrying to make.

Speaker 3 (01:50:14):
Don't look up yeah, yeah, I guess he cares about the
environment.

Speaker 1 (01:50:18):
He cares about the environment, right, right, yeah,
I have.
No, I don't know, I don't knowum got anything else for us I do
.

Speaker 2 (01:50:27):
Um, I don't know if this is like old news or
anything, but I'm really excitedto hear that alex garland will
be taking on the elden ring liveaction movie because, I feel,
like last, when we did our alexgarland episode, I think we had
touched on kind of wanting tosee him do some more fantasy

(01:50:48):
stuff and I mean I know I reallylove this realm that he's in
right now with, like you know, alot of his war horror stuff
going on.
But I feel like we did kind oftouch on like maybe going back
to a little bit of fantasy, likeit from annihilation that we
saw um and it has been confirmedthat he will be doing a live

(01:51:08):
action elden ring, which I havenot played the game but I know
it is a very popular highfantasy game that uses and I I
from what I was me and my friendwere talking about is that
george rr martin will be helpingcollaborate a little bit on
this movie oh, so it'll neverend.

(01:51:28):
Uh yeah, but I think this isexciting and I think that this
is in the right hands.
And I again, I don't have anytie to elden ring, but, um, I
would love to see one of myfavorite directors right now
take on something like this andturn it into like.

(01:51:51):
I mean, I can't even imaginewhat this would look like, so I
won't try to like get my myhopes up too high, but I do
think that a project like thisis in the right hands with Alex.

Speaker 1 (01:52:04):
I'm just happy to hear that you know.
Also, something we talked abouton the warfare episode was him
potentially calling it quitsafter that film, and so that
seems to have been swiftlydebunked yeah, that's good.

Speaker 2 (01:52:16):
Yeah, a24 confirmed this too at A24 too.

Speaker 3 (01:52:22):
It is going to be.
That's going to be reallyinteresting to see, because we
yes, we've seen him do sciencefiction, but we haven't seen
like this is like medieval, likeknights in armor high, like you
said, high fantasy stuff,celtic, nordic high fantasy shit
, like I love that I mean veryinteresting yeah yeah, I'm

(01:52:42):
really excited.

Speaker 2 (01:52:43):
I loved the movie the northman um, and I definitely
want to see more stuff like that.

Speaker 3 (01:52:51):
And so for Alex to take on this, like Celtic
fantasy video game adaptation, I, I'm like 100%, I'm in and I'm
and I do believe that it is aneight 24 production which just
and you know this could be thenext wave here, which just and
you know this could be the nextwave here because of you know,

(01:53:11):
stuff like Last of Us doing sowell Video games now it looks
like might be might be the nextwave of films as well.

Speaker 1 (01:53:23):
So to keep to bring things back then full circle to.
So to bring things back thenfull circle to well, I guess
sort of like just the other sideof that coin of that IP
adaptation stuff.
And to wrap up, cannes FilmFestival, which you won't often
see, big IP blockbusters debutthere.
We do have this year's Palmed'Or winner.

(01:53:43):
It's a film titled.
It Was Just an Accident fromananian filmmaker, so that took
home the palm.
Neon acquired the film um,actually before it debuted too,
it can and so that is six yearsin a row now where neon has been
the distributor of the palmdior winner.

(01:54:05):
So once again the film wascalled it or titled.
It was just an accident.
So be on the lookout for us totalk about that film as the year
wraps up in the winter time andmore eyes get on that to see if
there's any oscar buzz aroundit.
There was also really good wordof mouth from joaquin trier's

(01:54:26):
new film.
He of course, directed theWorst Person in the World a few
years ago.
That film's titled SentimentalValue.
It won the Grand Prix.
A film called the Secret Agenttook home a lot of awards as
well, and then just some otherthings that we've had our eyes
on, like Highest to Lowest, wasactually received very well at

(01:54:46):
Cannes, so that gives me a lotof hope going forward for spike
lee's new movie um alpha byjulia ducar new, I guess is not
being received as well as fansof hers would like yeah, they're
being, they're being rough yeah, I mean, however, the bar for
her.
She is one of those with titan.

(01:55:07):
She is one of those former palmwinners.
So, however, the bar for her.
She is one of those with T-Tan.
She is one of those former Palmwinners, so she has set the bar
extremely high for herself.
But so encouraging stuff comingout of Cannes.
Sounds like an extremelyinternational year this year, as
it always is, but really somestuff and some filmmakers I know
Kelly Reichardt's filmpremiered out of competition
there so some stuff that we willdefinitely be keeping our eye

(01:55:30):
on.
As far as distribution goes, Ithink mooby also walked away.
I'm just reading um the dailiesright now and sounds like neon
and mooby were the big winnersas far as having films that uh,
premiered, did well and or theywere able to acquire at the
festival.
So good stuff for, for for filmcompanies, distribution
companies that we really likeand admire.

Speaker 3 (01:55:52):
Yeah, uh, one last show note, uh, before we wrap it
up.
Uh, this is on YouTube, thispodcast is on YouTube.
Go to the chatter network.
Uh, on YouTube you will findour playlist excuse, the
intermission podcast, um, andyou can watch us now.

(01:56:13):
If, if you like to do that, uh,with with a podcast, uh, and we
have fan mail, you can.
You can send us your notes,send us some notes.
You know, uh, if you, in anypodcast app that you use, you
click on the link above the showdescription, take you to a

(01:56:34):
prompt or a page to send us anote or a text or a lengthy
letter complaining about me andmy takes, please do that,
because we'd love to have someinteraction and read that stuff
on air comment section onYouTube now as well.
Comment on an episode whileyou're watching it?

Speaker 1 (01:56:54):
yep, for sure.
Yeah, it's really cool.
Okay, next week are you off,erica?
Are you with?

Speaker 2 (01:56:59):
us next week?
No, I'm not, I'm off next week.

Speaker 1 (01:57:02):
You are off next week .
Okay, so it'll.
It'll just be Max and I on thepodcast next week.
We're unsure of what we'regoing to talk about yet, but a
lot to chew on right now, as thecalendar turns over to June and
once again, the box office isbooming.
Summer blockbusters are here,so that'll be a good time.
Until then, please followExcuse the Intermission on

(01:57:25):
Instagram and the three of us onLetterboxd to track what we're
watching between shows, and wewill talk to you next time on
ETI, where movies still matter.
This podcast will self-destructin five seconds.
Bye.

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