Mission: Impossible - Fallout

[Warhammer]

One thing I love about Ghost Protocol is that I feel like it nails the idea of the team. RN feels more like a solo Ethan effort.

Still I love them both, and along with 3, they make a pretty great trilogy imo.

I agree. GP was the most team oriented by far.

 

[Dark Raven]

The duplicate copy of one floor of the building for another in GP was taken straight out of the TV series.

They ought to really have more of these tricks than just using brute force or other methods. That's what should set Mission Impossible apart from other spy franchises. Unfortunately, they still try to be like other ones instead of being true to the series.

 

[Loki882]

Eh I don't totally agree about the team thing. during most of Ethan's biggest moments in RN, he WAS using a team (even if it was just Benji and Ilsa at times).

And when he tried to go solo, it didn't exactly work out well for him.

 

[Loki882]

M:I-3 has the best villain.

I said better villain, not best villain. In terms of villains, I'd rank them:

1. MI:III
2. MI: RN.
3. MI.
4. MI: GP.
5. MI:II

 

[Fallen Angel]

I'd rank Ghost Protocol antagonist last. He was...I don't know what he was.

 

[scifiwolf]

I loved the return to TV form that was Ghost Protocol, but Rogue Nation really had that great international spy intrigue. It out-Bonded Bond that year going up against Spectre.

 

[BlueLanternKal]

I like that if you look back at the MI series starting with the first (my favorite, I know, unpopular opinion) that it's been about Ethan slowly, but surely, building a team of people he could trust after his mentor screwed him and his original team over.


I don't know how planned it was if at all, but it's been a great story if you look at the whole.

 

[Dark Raven]

I only find the MI film series acceptable if I discard the first film completely.

 

[BlueLanternKal]

Hahaha why?

 

[Rowsdower!]

The first film definitely had a slower pace than the others and far less action but I still feel it's a really good film that was probably the most in-line with the old TV series. I remember hating how much they shifted the tone for MI2, which is the only film in the series I really used to dislike. But it was on TV the other day and I was rewatching it. It's a lot more fun if you just accept it as a crazy action film that's light on plot and spy intrigue.

 

[scifiwolf]

M:I is outstanding, minus what it did to the character of Jim Phelps.

M:I-2 is not a good film for the series it's in, but it's a great late 1990s/early 2000s nugget of action and marketing.

 

[Loki882]

For the first film, it's pretty simple. Butchering the character of Jim Phelps.

For #2, it was just a mess overall, with an incredibly irritating villain (which is why I rank him below the GP one. At least in GP, that villain didn't flat-out annoy me).

 

[Dark Raven]

Hahaha why?

I absolutely hate the first film.

They completely ruined the character of Jim Phelps, who was the star of the Mission Impossible TV series, and completely incorruptible.

It's like having the new Star Trek reboot making Captain Kirk the villain who decides to betray the crew of the Enterprise and become a villain out of the blue.

Or a film version of 24 where Jack Bauer is now the villain and betrays his country.

Imagine in a few years, there's a reboot of the Mission Impossible film series, and they decide to make Ethan Hunt the bad guy now and a traitor, after he's been the hero of all these missions.

Well that's exactly what happened with Jim Phelps. I hope someone does that to Ethan Hunt's character.

Cruise could've played Phelps himself, or if he still wanted to be the master of disguise, he could've been Rollin Hand (Martin Landau's character). Or he could've even been Dan Briggs, the leader from the first season.

There's no reason to ruin the hero's character.

The first film definitely had a slower pace than the others and far less action but I still feel it's a really good film that was probably the most in-line with the old TV series. I remember hating how much they shifted the tone for MI2, which is the only film in the series I really used to dislike. But it was on TV the other day and I was rewatching it. It's a lot more fun if you just accept it as a crazy action film that's light on plot and spy intrigue.

Most in line with the TV series? More like the biggest slap in the face to the TV series.

 

[Loki882]

It's like making a James Bond movie, and making James Bond the murderous traitorous psychotic villain who slaughters all of the other regular MI:6 characters ten minutes into the movie, while a different guy is the actual hero.

It just shows a profound and blatant disrespect to the history of the franchise and it's fans. It's no wonder that the actors from the TV show HATED it so much.

 

[Dark Raven]

Some of the actors walked out of the performance in the theatre, quite unsurprisingly.

And it makes it seem like Cruise was on a big ego trip: as if he wanted to hog all the glory for himself and make himself out to be the hero while ***ting all over the established hero and giving the middle finger to fans.

 

[Loki882]

I see it more as Brian De Palma's doing. That film feels very much like a De Palma movie. And one thing that his films are known for, is big twists/reveals.

I could see him wanting to do the same thing with MI.

 

[Doctor Jones]

I really like the first film. It's still the most suspenseful of the films. The only flaw is the convoluted plot with the list. The idea is clear, it's just how it's executed.

 

[Rowsdower!]

Damn. I didn't realize the first film made so many people's blood boil around here. Maybe it's just me but I didn't mind Phelps being the bad guy at all. It's probably because he was played by Jon Voight in the movie and he's such an a**hole in real life that it worked for me, lol.

 

[Loki882]

The thing is, you can keep him as exactly the same character with the same actor. Just don't call him "Jim Phelps." Make him his own character and we're good. That's ALL that they had to do. They ticked people off for no good reason.

 

[terry78]

It was just doing it to shake things up and be edgy. Like Scooby Doo where it made Scrappy Doo the villain, spoiler alert.

 

[Dark Raven]

Yeah, they could've made him a completely different character. If they did, I would've been fine with the film. You don't crap all over a beloved character though. It's not like he or the series was so obscure either. The Mission Impossible films weren't even established at that time, but the series had enjoyed numerous reruns and was well known. Jim Phelps was the most famous of the original cast too. And there had even been a remake/ reboot series in the late 80s also with Phelps, so it's not like his character faded into obscurity.

It really is like someone taking Jack Bauer or Captain Kirk and turning him into the villain, and people being fine with it just because the actor playing him is an a-hole in real life.

Or take any other TV show: Starsky and Hutch where Starsky is the villain trying to kill Hutch. Or Hawaii Five-0, where Steve McGarrett is a traitor to his country and trying to kill off the Five-0 task force. Or maybe Macgyver, where Macgyver is a mad scientist using his inventions to murder others.

Damn. I didn't realize the first film made so many people's blood boil around here. Maybe it's just me but I didn't mind Phelps being the bad guy at all. It's probably because he was played by Jon Voight in the movie and he's such an a**hole in real life that it worked for me, lol.

Would you be fine with Ethan Hunt being the bad guy in a reboot of the film series, especially if he's played by an a-hole actor?

 

[terry78]

^Well, that MacGyver thing is debatable.

 

[Rowsdower!]

Would you be fine with Ethan Hunt being the bad guy in a reboot of the film series, especially if he's played by an a-hole actor?

Sure. But only if he's played by an A-hole actor. t:

 

[Iceman]

One thing I love about Ghost Protocol is that I feel like it nails the idea of the team. RN feels more like a solo Ethan effort.

Still I love them both, and along with 3, they make a pretty great trilogy imo.

Yeah I liked this aspect of Ghost Protocol.

 

[Dark Raven]

From Wikipedia:

Reception to the first movie:

Several cast members of the original 1966–73 TV series reacted negatively to the film.

Actor Greg Morris, who portrayed Barney Collier in the original television series, was reportedly disgusted with the film's treatment of the Phelps character, and he walked out of the theater before the film ended.[13]

Peter Graves, who played Jim Phelps in the original series as well as in the late-1980s revival, also disliked how Phelps turned out in the film.[14] Graves had been asked to reprise Phelps, but turned it down when he learned his character was going to be revealed to be a traitor.

Martin Landau, who portrayed Rollin Hand in the original series, expressed his own disapproval concerning the film. In an MTV interview in October 2009, Landau stated, "When they were working on an early incarnation of the first one — not the script they ultimately did — they wanted the entire team to be destroyed, done away with one at a time, and I was against that. It was basically an action-adventure movie and not Mission. Mission was a mind game. The ideal mission was getting in and getting out without anyone ever knowing we were there. So the whole texture changed. Why volunteer to essentially have our characters commit suicide? I passed on it ... The script wasn't that good either!"[15]