Mission Impossible Franchise Ranked

Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011)

Damn great and the finest entry in the series. It has the best action, well written humor, great direction from Brad Bird and is a fun ride all the way through. The villain, Hendricks (Michael Nyqvist) isn’t particularly memorable and is just like one you’ve seen in previous spy films. He’s after nuclear launch codes and aims to start a nuclear war between Russia and the US. Besides that, there aren’t really other big flaws. Simon Pegg’s awesome in his expanded role, Jeremy Renner is a great new addition to the franchise, and not to mention that sequence they filmed at Burj Khalifa in Dubai—it’s exhilarating and really quite the spectacle. I wish I had seen it in IMAX.

Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015)

Another damn fine entry in the series, I dug it. Christopher McQuarrie directs this time around and gives us more of what we’ve come to expect from the series. Like with the second film, it has a Bond feeling going for it and pulls it off so much better. Sean Harris is menacing and superb as Soloman Lane, the leader of the Syndicate, a criminal organization. Hunt’s objective is to prove it exists in order to save himself and the IMF as a whole. Rebecca Ferguson plays the female lead, Ilsa Faust quite well. She’s strong, well developed, and has been the best female character in the series thus far. Overall, it has the right balance of style & substance.

Mission: Impossible III (2006)

Hard to believe this was J.J. Abrams first film as a director. His career has really progressed since then (Star Trek AND Star Wars!) and for the best because he’s talented. His entry in the franchise is solid for the most part. It definitely has the darkest tone and the best villain in the series, Owen Davian, who’s played so well by the late Phillip Seymour Hoffman. He’s been one of the few stand out villains in the series so far. The stakes are made high in the film for Ethan and his team because his wife, Julia (Michelle Monaghan) is kidnapped by Davian who demands the “rabbit’s foot”, a mysterious device. They don’t really explain what it is, and it’s essentially just a McGuffin to keep the plot moving. The only major downside is that some of the supporting actors aren’t used as well as they could have been. Laurence Fishburne is stuck playing, Brassel, the angry superior character type and Billy Crudup plays Musgrave, an IMF superior who’s so obviously a traitor and working with Davian the entire time. Simon Pegg is a stand out as tech genius Benji Dunn, who becomes part of Hunt’s team in the sequel. A pre-Breaking Bad Aaron Paul also shows up! It’s another tense and fun entry in the series.

Mission Impossible (1996)

A fun and suspenseful flick—it helps that they got Brian De Palma as director. He’s directed his share of classic thriller & suspense flicks, no doubt. This film got the series up and running quite well. Tom Cruise is great as Ethan Hunt, the agent who’s set up and made to look like a mole inside the IMF. He’s then forced to clear his name and set things right with his superiors. There are a lot of twist and turns as the film progresses, leaving you on the edge of your seat the entire time. It’s not as action packed as the sequels, but the climatic action sequence with the helicopter and the train is quite stunning and suspenseful. There’s also the sequence where they have to break into the CIA headquarters and steal important data, talk about impressive and a huge round of applause to the cast & crew for pulling it off in such suspenseful fashion. Overall, it’s everything an entertaining spy film should be.

Mission: Impossible II (2000)

A lot more action packed than the first largely because of the film’s director, John Woo and it feels like it’s trying too hard to emulate the James Bond franchise at times. It has all of Woo’s trademarks: gunfights, slow-motion, kinetic action, and of course, doves! It definitely boasts more style than substance as the story itself isn’t anything too great, but it’s an entertaining follow up. The opening title sequence with Ethan rock climbing is a thing of beauty and keeps you on the edge of your seat. Thandie Newton is solid (not to mention lovely) as Hunt’s love interest, Nyah, who was previously linked romantically with the film’s antagonist, Sean Ambrose (Dougray Scott), a rouge IMF agent who has stolen a modified disease. It is a little unrealistic how fast she falls for Ethan, especially after he almost drives her off a cliff, but women love “bad boys” I guess. Ving Rhames returns too as tech genius Luther Stickell and is fun to watch as always. Overall, it’s a fun, albeit flawed flick with a mostly cool soundtrack.