Another cracking entry

Cruise and McQuarrie have done it again.

Nearly 3 hours fly by with constant surprises, thrills and comedy.

The action is elite level as usual, with a train-set third act that requires a cloth to dry your constantly sweating palms.

This time you have 3 sexy women with English accents. The newbie Hayley Atwell is superb and bounces off Cruise brilliantly.

The return of Kittridge is great, Cary Elwes is a nice surpise, and we have a pretty nasty villain with psychotic henchwoman. Killing off Ilsa was a ballsy move that upped the stakes, I always saw her and Ethan running off together 😢

Overall I’d say this doesn’t quite match Fallout. The helicopter finale in that film was a revelation and while this train sequence occasionally reaches similar highs, it’s not quite as immense. Fallout also had Henry Cavill as a series-best villain (although nobody can top Hoffman in III - still my favourite film of the series)

The action prior to the last act was not as impressive as previous films, the car chase was played more for laughs this time which was an interesting new direction but just felt… flatter.

The idea of a super-villain AI that can think ahead of our heroes and manipulate all their tech has pluses and minuses. It’s a new kind of sci-fi menace that cannot be defeated like putting a bullet in some asshole’s head which is scary, but neither does it evoke the skin-crawling malevolence of Hoffman’s Owen Davian.

I really need to see Part 2 to judge the whole thing properly, but as a piece of entertainment this one’s right up there. Crucially, it’s not remotely woke, despite having a plethora of strong female characters. Cruise once again shows Hollywood how it’s done.