Your mission, should you choose to accept it...
✯✯✯✯ 1/2
It seems that the latest installments of the Mission: Impossible franchise want to capitalize on the latter half of the series' title. Indeed, a lot of the feats in both this film and Ghost Protocol are, well, impossible. At least for us. Apparently Tom Cruise is some kind of madman who insists on nonstop running in a uniform motion that almost makes it look like an art form, and performing his own stunts on screen with nothing but a couple wires.
Remember in the last film when Ethan Hunt was hanging on the side of the Burj Khalifa? To me, that scene is one of the most memorable in recent cinematic history, as far as action films go. Rogue Nation does its best to up the ante, having old Tom hanging off the side of an airplane as it takes off, and swimming underwater using nothing but his natural breath for at least three minutes. While the practical stunts in this film are amazing and memorable, as is the motif of recent M:I films, it didn't quite match the caliber of the last film. But it was just on the cusp of making it. This definitely gets second place in my book for having some of the most memorable scenes in the franchise.
My biggest issue with the film actually was the villain. Ever since Bond made his big return to the silver screen with Casino Royale the megalomaniacal villains of old seem to have traded in their diabolical cat-stroking and monocles for simple framed glasses and a computer screen. Quantum of Solace had one of the absolute worst and flattest villains of recent memory in the Bond franchise history, and unfortunately, there isn't really much to chatter about the villain in Rogue Nation either. He's not nearly as bad as Dominic Greene was, but he definitely wasn't all too convincing either. Ethan could have easily snapped him like a twig, had he not been behind all of those goons and computer-controlled explosives. Take away all the covers and the bombs, and all we have is a skinny nerd with a computer. At least Skyfall managed to make Javier Bardem's Raul Silva a truly creepy and menacing threat. Speaking of which, I got some of the same homoerotic vibes from a couple scenes in this film that I got from the infamous scene in Skyfall where Silva subtly hints at a seduction attempt towards Bond. Maybe it's just the way villains are presented as "menacing" in today's action films, but it still makes me yearn for the cat-stroking and the monocles again.
Luckily, Rogue Nation manages to make me easily forget its uninteresting villain and load me up with tons of action, intrigue, plot twists, and of course Tom Cruise and Simon Pegg. Ving Rhames and Jeremy Renner also reprise their respective roles in this film, and they are just as interesting and charismatic as they were in the other films.
On a side note, did anyone notice that Benji was playing Halo 5 on a computer screen with a PS4 controller? I don't know, maybe I was seeing things, but as an avid gamer, it kind of irked me, not only because of the blatant product placement, but also because it's blasphemy. That's a bit of hyperbole, but it did make the gamer within me twitch with discomfort for a few brief moments.
Packed with action, suspense, wit, and of course brilliant set pieces, Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation is one of the best entries in the franchise yet. I did find Ghost Protocol to be marginally better, but this is only nitpicking on my part. In truth, all of the Mission: Impossible films are wonderful fun, and I still have yet to be completely let down by Tom Cruise. He seems to be on a roll at this point, and I always look forward to his newest films. He's one of the best action stars working today, and even though the public seems to put quite a bit of hate on him (as is the case with most celebrities), I still love him to death. Rogue Nation is just the latest in his stellar lineup, and his career looks to be going nowhere but uphill at this point. The only downside is that now I have to wait another four years for Mission: Impossible 6, with the hopes that it blows me away just as much as the last two films have. You better not disappoint, Mr. Cruise. I'm counting on you.