Ranking mission impossible movies

And Cruise shows no signs of letting up any time soon, with at least two more films already confirmed – both directed by Christopher McQuarrie, who has helmed the two most recent instalments of the franchise.To celebrate the continued success of Mission: Impossible we've decided to mark the 25-year anniversary with a special ranking: our mission, if we chose to accept it, was to rank all six films from worst to best.Read on for the (in our humble opinion) definitive ranking of all the Mission: Impossible films from worst to best – and don't worry, this article will not self-destruct in five seconds.Mission: Impossible movies ranked from worst to best6 – Mission: Impossible IIIMission: Impossible III is a perfectly good movie but despite the presence of one of the franchise's best villains in Phillip Seymour Hoffman's Owen Davian, it's the one that sticks out the least. The plot is a little too convoluted, what with the ridiculous 'Rabbit's Foot' MacGuffin and all, and it's altogether just slightly more dreary and a little less fun than all of the other entries in the franchise.It's notable for being the film that first tries to introduce some kind of private life for Ethan Hunt and, while Michelle Monaghan turns in a decent performance as Julia Meade, this aspect is a little soppy and uninteresting. It's clearly intended to raise the stakes by adding a more personal motive for Hunt but it doesn't really work – if only because the relationship has never seemed particularly believable.This being a Mission: Impossible movie, there are still some great set-pieces – Davian being dangled from a plane for one, the Vatican City sequence for two – but nothing is quite as memorable as the films further up this list.By entering your details you are agreeing to our terms and conditions and privacy policy. You can unsubscribe at any time.This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.5 – Mission: Impossible 2This is many people's pick for the absolute worst in the series, and the reasons for that are understandable: it's easily the most preposterous (and clearly the cheesiest) entry in the franchise. And yet there's something so wonderfully compelling about the ridiculous plot and the sheer showmanship of it all. To be honest, I wish more blockbusters fully leaned into shlockiness like this – these films are about a unit

Everett Collection The stunt work was sensationally spectacular and Tom Cruise did much dauntless derring-do. But some may forget that when the “Mission: Impossible” series first began in 1996, there were heated arguments about the franchise’s big screen debut. Some critics were positively incensed that the heroic lead character in the popular 1966-1973 TV series that inspired the film had been reconstituted in Brian De Palma’s big-screen reboot as a treacherous turncoat. Indeed, a few malcontents went so far as predicting the film would be angrily rejected by likeminded fans of the source material — and probably shrugged off by whippersnappers with no memory of the original show. Which, of course, is exactly what happened – not! Now, “Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One” — the latest entry in what has turned out to be the second-longest running movie franchise (after “Star Trek”) ever spawned by a live-action television series — has arrived in theaters and drive-ins everywhere. And while there have been better and lesser sequels, Tom Cruise’s charismatic portrayal of Impossible Missions Force agent Ethan Hunt — a character turbo-charged by alternating currents of ice-cold calculation and death-defying spontaneity, selfless loyalty and self-assured snark — has remained a reliable constant. Here is Variety’s slightly revised ranking of all seven “Mission: Impossible” movies. At least one film has been moved up a notch, after certain titles were reappraised during the extended COVID lockdown (which, not incidentally, delayed production of the new “M:I” opus). For the most part, though, the ranking has remained consistent. Just like Ethan Hunt. ‘Mission: Impossible III’ (2006) Image Credit: Everett Collection THE PITCH: When he isn’t busy wooing, and eventually wedding, Julia Meade (Michelle Monaghan), a nurse who knows nothing about his spy-guy activities, Ethan Hunt leads his IMF team in pursuit of a MacGuffin-ish device (known as “Rabbit’s Foot”) coveted by arms dealer Owen Davian (Philip Seymour Hoffman). THE RUNDOWN: Despite the game efforts of director J.J. Abrams to humanize Ethan by supplying a civilian romantic interest — and showing he’s not so ruthless that he’d make good on his threat to drop an uncooperative bad guy (a well-cast Hoffman) out of an airplane — the threepeat is a curiously bland spectacle that is nothing more (but, to be fair, nothing less) than the sum of its sporadically exciting action set pieces. Not surprisingly, it is the lowest-grossing entry in the entire franchise (so far). ‘Mission: Impossible II’ (2000) Image Credit: Everett Collection THE PITCH: Ethan Hunt convinces beautiful thief Nyah Nordoff-Hall (Thandie Newton) to renew her affair with IMF turncoat Sean Ambrose (Dougray Scott) in order to retrieve vials of an artificially created virus. Complications arise when Hunt falls for Nyah —

— Rogue Nation, Christopher McQuarrie is going to be the director for the franchise's next adventure. Here is McQuarrie's full list of feature film directing credits:The Way of the Gun (2000)Jack Reacher (2012)Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation (2015)Mission: Impossible — Fallout (2018)Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One (2023)In addition to directing, McQuarrie has written all of the Mission: Impossible movies that he has directed, as well as well-known movies like The Usual Suspects, Valkyrie, Edge of Tomorrow and Top Gun: Maverick.(Image credit: Paramount Pictures)The latest updates, reviews and unmissable series to watch and more!Michael Balderston is a DC-based entertainment and assistant managing editor for What to Watch, who has previously written about the TV and movies with TV Technology, Awards Circuit and regional publications. Spending most of his time watching new movies at the theater or classics on TCM, some of Michael's favorite movies include Casablanca, Moulin Rouge!, Silence of the Lambs, Children of Men, One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest and Star Wars. On the TV side he enjoys Only Murders in the Building, Yellowstone, The Boys, Game of Thrones and is always up for a Seinfeld rerun. Follow on Letterboxd.