MISSION IMPLAUSIBLE: THE FINAL RECKONING, IN WHICH TOM CRUISE LAUGHABLY CONFRONTS AI
by VERONA SILENDA 29/5/25
NOT ONE WARNING BUT TWO…
First, a confession: I don’t like Hollywood/the virtue-signalling creatures that infest it. But, you know, sometimes one has to take a hit for the (NFB) team. So, alerted this last instalment in the Mission Impossible film franchise ‘The Final Reckoning’ dealt with AI and I was offered free tickets (thanks AB xx) the bullet was bit. I understand it is protocol in a review to warn readers in advance the plot will be discussed: which I am now doing, though the plot is so preposterous such a warning is superfluous.
THE ENTITY
This film follows on from a previous one, which I haven’t seen and am now certainly not inclined to. An almost omnipotent AI creature–’The Entity’–aims to wipe out humanity, by getting control of nuclear arsenals worldwide and simultaneously firing them, obliterating us all. Here we face the first problem with this gossamer-thin plot. While the Entity’s motives are reasonably straightforward –humanity as a virus to be removed–that isn’t the whole story. There are, supposedly, devotees of the Entity in all governments/military/media spheres etc. A veritable cult. Brief clips are shown of odd-balls expressing their devotion to the Entity. But why, exactly would people support something that wants to end humanity? Do these idiots think they would be immune? If all they want is to be controlled by a digitally-generated World Government, how utterly infantile is that? Hilariously, we are told the Entity is spreading misinformation and stirring up conflict worldwide. Well, that happens now, anyway! You only have to look at the Mainstream Media/Politicians whitewashing IDF Gaza genocide in real time to appreciate that. One wonders: is Cruise trying to criticise the internet itself? If so it is gone about in such a covert way as to be invisible.
AGI & ASI
No detail is given as to exactly what type of AI this Entity is, but given the amazing powers and learning capacity ascribed to it, we are clearly meant to think it is Advanced Super Intelligent AI (ASI): essentially autonomous. Which brings a second scenario problem: even the lower stage of AI, ‘Advanced General Intelligence’ (AGI) is capable of learning: which also means how to defend itself from threats, such as that posed by Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) and acolytes. Thus, when Hunt enters a box near the beginning of the film to directly commune with the Entity, surely by invading/surveilling his neural synapses the Entity would learn his methods, aims, objectives etc? Indeed, why did the Entity not just wash his brain clean there and then, or simply liquidate him? Couldn’t be because the Church of Scientology has already done the brain-washing? Could it? Anyway, there is a poor attempt to justify the film’s implausibility by claiming that by Hunt and his friend the US President (Hollywood’s Kamala Harris stand-in, though Harris couldn’t order a coffee without prevaricating, this President is far better: think a stern Head Mistress with Nukes) and others who help them consistently do what is not logical. The assertion is that by doing this the Entity will thereby be confounded. Yet an ASI would clearly (instantaneously) grasp that: for surely this is and would be seen as a discernible (and thus predictable) pattern?
While we’re at it, would you not think the Entity disciple in the White House Ops Room would in reality contact the Entity to tell them about Hunt’s plans/location, rather than just try to kill the President? Laughable, as were the occasional and repetitive choreographed ‘action’ scenes: Larry (who has also seen it and helped with this review as did Heidi) says these remind him of cartoon violence in Tom & Jerry, whatever that was.
AN EMPATHETIC US PRESIDENT?
As an aside, yet again we endure the spectacle of a compassionate American President deciding not to launch nuclear Armageddon. But not only are the US the only country that has ever used such weapons, while this film was being made the US (and client states like the UK) were and are funding and facilitating Armageddon for the people of Gaza. Sick. Though Cruise did support his agent Maha Dakhil when IDF genocide apologists wanted her sacked in 2023, so fair play to him for that.
HUNTING FOR THE SOURCE-CODE
Another ludicrous plot aspect is hunting for the source-code of the Entity. Conveniently located in a sunken Russian submarine the Russians do not know the location of! Really? Anyway, the source-code is the supposed McGuffin here (look it up: an Alfred Hitchcock device—now there was a proper film-maker) but another problem looms: while the source-code is indeed the building block of any computer programme, an ASI worth its weight in micro-chips would have replicated itself to negate any such potential weakness myriad times. So, treating us all to Cruise jumping around inside a Russian sub full of dead Ivans is irrelevant. Indeed, his vastly outnumbered team (consisting for this operation of a pensioned-off ex-CIA computer geek and his Inuit wife, plus the English actor who is always gurning) got the subs location to Hunt by seeing off a crack Russian Special Forces Unit. Very believable, not.…
You have to ask, too, why a US unit in 2012 (way before the Entity) would have wanted to cover up the sub’s location. Apart from knowing in advance doing so would allow Hunt’s crew to visit Antarctica for this film to search for the co-ordinates. Very plausible, not. Especially as the head of the CIA is shown wandering around in Hunt’s wake like a pizza-delivery boy always sent to the wrong address. So, he clearly didn’t know, even if Aldrich Ames did, though on reflection he couldn’t have either…Â
AS FOR TOM CRUISE IN THE FLESH…
I laughed aloud when, 500 metres at least beneath sea level, Hunt tears his suit off and loses his oxygen with no ill effects whatsoever other than possibly dying for a few minutes. As one who knows about these things the attempts at CPR by Hunt’s (ex-squeeze?) Grace are side-splitting. Far too much mouth to mouth (with a poor seal anyway) and utterly limp chest compressions…Though we did like the treatment of an open pneumo-thorax by Pom Klementieff: virtually the only good bit in the film. She is deliciously foxy, though not in Jody Comer’s Villanelle class, but I digress…
What to make of Cruise himself? All the gravitas of a manikin, but crucially, who dyes his hair? Heidi thinks him swimming half-commando away from the sub was done so we could all marvel at his amazing body: I thought whales protected species, so will move swiftly on. And they surely must have sped the film up when showing Cruise running through London to save his friend Luther from Mr Cheap Suit (see below). What about warning the guy by using a phone? Then the fact after a bomb goes off in Central London, from which Cruise (as usual) escapes, he runs straight into a reception committee of CIA goons who conduct an immediate extraordinary rendition back to the US. In reality the place would instead be crawling with SO15, and while we may be de facto the 51st US state we are not de jure such. Though far nearer to one than Canada mind. And that decompression chamber looked like it was from Wal-mart or perhaps a Titan job-lot: but of course (unlike the latter) it worked!
ENTER MR CHEAP SUIT
Making up for the fact the film’s grasp of AI is so poor they can’t really portray their prime antagonist in any remotely realistic way, a secondary human opponent is some bearded guy in a cheap suit called Gabriel who Hunt has history with. He wants Cruise to meet him at the Doomsday Vault, claimed to be the Repository of all the world’s history and knowledge: funny that, could have sworn they just keep seeds there. And in Norway not South Africa….Anyway, both Cruise and Mr Cheap Suit aim to put a piece of malware (the Poison Pill) developed by one of Hunt’s team into a piece of kit–the Podkova module retrieved from the Russian sub–(do keep awake at the back there!) which will fool the Entity. Again, really? The plot would have you believe the Entity could be, would be, and indeed was  fooled into downloading itself into this device (the Poison Pill) barely bigger than a pen-drive. Who wrote this utter piffle: was it the Microsoft AI leech Co-Pilot? An ASI (and even AGI) as previously stated would replicate itself, precisely to prevent such an existential (for it) catastrophe.
When Hunt and his crew arrive at the Doomsday Vault, all the staff have fled. But why: if Armageddon was imminent the Vault would be far safer than almost anywhere else, would it not? Back to Mr Cheap Suit (who Larry tells me strangely resembles the late Matthew Kelly), he supposedly wants to put the Poison Pill (which he does not know is Poison of course: what he imagines it to be mercifully never stated) into the Podkova in order to gain control of the Entity. So, why, for God’s sake, does this gimp consistently try to kill Cruise and destroy his plane and with it the Podkova (while both engage in an aerial dogfight using two old aircraft now you ask). Like much else in this hokum, doesn’t make sense.
THE DEFENCE CASE CONSIDERED
Perhaps I have been too harsh on the film? I know the first tired objection ‘It’s only a film, not meant to be taken literally’. Indeed: but things featured in it like the US Presidency, nuclear weapon states and indeed (however pathetically) AI itself are real. Therefore, it is entirely legitimate to comment on issues raised. Cruise can’t have it both ways: if he is pretending to foreground serious matters like AI/internet disinformation why should he be given a free pass to feed us cinematic manure? While it could be said at least this film attempts to raise questions about AI these questions have been articulated before: starting with Fritz Laing’s Metropolis, and of course the fantastic Matrix Films. Speaking of which, the cod-philosophy attempts throughout the film to show Ethan ‘Ego’ Hunt as some kind of saviour/messiah (a Neo impersonator?) are just cringeworthy. Fact is, just as Inception was retrograde compared to the Matrix (the plot disappearing up Di Caprio’s fundament) , so is this film compared to Inception.
While the normal excuse for not addressing issues properly is shortage of time, at 169 minutes this film has no such mitigation. For example, there are very brief exchanges in which it seems that there is a binary choice: AI or civilisation collapsing. But they are not the only choices: decentralised networks, local and democratically-controlled servers are an alternative. And anyway, after the Entity is defeated miraculously all the lights go back on throughout the world. So, were they previously dependent on AI or not? The script-writers neither know nor care, but we should.
This film was in large parts boring: I lost count of the times I glanced at my wristwatch (remember them?) to check progress. The final defence might be who cares if the plot is illogical content-free BS: it’s Hollywood mega-star Tom Cruise entertaining us. Well, he didn’t entertain me, I’d rather have a tooth extracted….
CONCLUDING SALVO
In the film’s closing sequence Hunt is given the now supposedly incarcerated Entity in a box to do with as he wills. But surely it should have been destroyed. End of. That it was not but is instead presented to Hunt just underlines co-producer Cruise does indeed have an ego as big as the planet. As with other areas (e.g. the Soho Nail-Bombing scandal so dear to NFB’s heart) there is certainly a crying need for good films about AI and its dangers. This film is not one, indeed it piggy-backs in a parasitic way on such concerns. Yet the dangers posed by AI are very real as my article in the current Notes From the Borderland outlines. In fact, Co-Pilot is continually offering to rewrite this review, however many times I tell it to fuck off (or in Co-Pilot Speak ‘Go Away’)…
Of one thing you can be sure: those megalomaniacs propagating AI will see this film as an attack, albeit a shallow one, and pour millions of dollars into pro-AI propaganda films…..Thanks for nothing Ethan Ego. And this patently isn’t the final film: while gullible MI6 hit-man Daniel Craig at least had the common decency to get killed in his last Bond film Hunt and most of his motley crew sadly survive to act another (pay) day. Pity.
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