Tom Cruise's Ethan Hunt is back with some of his closest allies for continuation of 2023's Dead Reckoning, which saw Ethan investigating The Entity, a powerful artificial intelligence housed in a Russian stealth submarine named the Sevastopol, which sunk in an undisclosed place in the Bering Sea. Ethan and his friends find themselves squaring off against an old enemy of his, Esai Morales' Gabriel, and his associate, the French assassin Paris, played by Pom Klementieff.

Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning sees Ethan continuing his hunt for The Entity, having successfully stolen the completed cruciform key to access it from Gabriel, all while Paris continues to recover from nearly being killed by Gabriel in Dead Reckoning's ending. With Angela Bassett's Sloan now the President of the United States, she puts her trust and the resources of the government behind Ethan's quest, hoping to prevent an all-out nuclear war. However, secrets from Ethan's past are uncovered, once again testing the government's trust in him and sending him on a full-circle journey.

In anticipation of the movie's release, ScreenRant interviewed Simon Pegg, Hayley Atwell, Angela Bassett, Greg Tarzan Davis and Pom Klementieff to discuss Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning. The cast all offered a preview of how Ethan's actions in the Dead Reckoning ending impacted their characters coming into the new sequel, including Sloan's presidency and trust in Hunt, as well as Klementieff's Paris and Davis' Degas changing sides to Cruise's hero on his adventure.

Sloan Won Her Presidency By Showing She Can Be "Trusted"

Bassett Also Shares Her Own Nerves Of Watching Sloan Backing Hunt

As previously mentioned, one of the biggest surprises to come from Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning's two-month time jump is the reveal that Angela Bassett's Sloan is now the U.S. President, Fallout as being the Director of the CIA and putting a damper on the IMF's plans to arrest Henry Cavill's August Walker. While not explicitly explaining how she rose to power in the next film, Bassett did acknowledge that her character's prior experience of "protecting the US from the outside" made her a great candidate for becoming President.

"I think that's a good skillset for her to have in her tool belt," Bassett explained. "She's met everybody, she's watched plenty from afar, and observed. She's discerning, I'm sure, and she made a great run. She was trusted, you can take her at face value and believe what she says."

This also creates a unique new dynamic between Sloan and Ethan, as the two were on rocky ground as to whether they could trust each other in Fallout. In The Final Reckoning, however, Bassett explains that Sloan is not only "extraordinarily confident that [Ethan]'s the only possibility" to prevent Gabriel and The Entity from unleashing nuclear destruction on the world, but that Cruise's hero is "the best possibility we have". She goes on to express her belief that Sloan has "put in a great deal of hope that it will come through", but even she was "nervous watching" the film.

Ethan's New Allies Will Have Very Different Arcs In The Final Reckoning

"...People To Care For, To Lean On."

Another big change to come from Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning is that Pom Klementieff's Paris is no longer an enemy to Ethan, having instead ed his side in an effort to get revenge on Gabriel for his attempt to kill her in the prior movie. When asked whether she's truly a villain-turned-hero in the next film, Klementieff was quick to denote Paris isn't, as "she starts with the movie with, of course, a quest of revenge" and is mortified by "this horrible scar" from the attack, even though both the Marvel Cinematic Universe alum and Pegg it "it's a really cool scar".

She did, however, express her belief that "maybe deep down, it's what she was looking for", pointing to the bond that Ethan has with Pegg's Benji Dunn, Atwell's Grace and Ving Rhames' Luther as being something she really resonates with, "people to care for, to lean on". Pegg and Davis chimed in with their agreement of Klementieff's interpretation, with the former expressing Paris wants people "who cared for her", while the latter humorously notes she wants people "to not stab her", and comparing her to Arnold Schwarzenegger's T-800 in Terminator 2: Judgment Day, as she's a "killing machine" who "cameo to protect us and save us".

As for Davis, whose character of Degas turns away from working with Shea Whigham's Jasper Briggs and US Intelligence to work with Ethan in the film, he views both Degas and Ethan as being "similar characters". "He thinks the way Ethan thinks, as far as caring for people, and, 'Am I making the right choice?'," Davis explained. "In Dead Reckoning, we see him question that like, 'Yo, we doing this or not? I don't really know, you hear me?' [Chuckles] But he's the first character to actually openly question if Ethan's actually doing the right thing."

With The Final Reckoning marking Davis and Cruise's third collaboration after also co-starring in Top Gun: Maverick, the star pointed to their real dynamic being similar to that of their Mission: Impossible characters, as they "question things" all the time. "If I want to learn storytelling, then this is how I should probably be learning," Davis expressed. "If I want to be a movie star, this is what I should be doing. If I want to be a better human being, this is what I should probably be doing. I think art imitates life in that regard."

Grace Becoming The New Female Lead Is Far More Than A Character Swap

"...It's Also Not Useful To Compare One Character To Another..."

Introduced in Dead Reckoning, Atwell's pickpocket Grace quickly became a fan-favorite character thanks to her quick-witted personality and chemistry with Ethan. With the 2023 sequel also seeing the death of Rebecca Ferguson's Ilsa, it led some to joke that there was only room for one brunette in the franchise, alluding to Ferguson having seemingly replaced Michelle Monaghan's Julia as Ethan's main love interest. Atwell, on the other hand, finds this joke to be "really reductive to the female representation in the movie", while also being "not useful to compare one character to another".

"I think the teamwork in this film is really important to the emotional connection that we have to it," Atwell expressed. "When we see certain stunts, we think this is really exciting and technically brilliant to watch, but it's because we care about Tom's character, and we care about the team behind him, and the cause behind it all. That gives us a lot more meaning to what we're watching."

With Dead Reckoning ending with Henry Czerny's Kittridge offering Grace a job with the IMF, thus seemingly putting her on the path to shifting her focus beyond herself. Atwell, however, is careful to share too much about how Grace's arc evolves in the new film, describing The Final Reckoning as "an accumulation of 20 years of an extraordinary franchise" and praising that Cruise has "been so ionate and dedicated to bringing it to fans", and expressing being "immensely proud of being part" of the Mission: Impossible world.

Atwell did go on to reflect on her experience working with the stunt team on the latest Mission: Impossible film, calling them "an expert team of world-class stuntmen and women" and knowing that ing the franchise meant "that's part of the bag". "I know that every job is very different, and it entirely depends on what that group of people is creating together, what the film needs to execute the story in the best possible way," Atwell explained. "I feel like what Tom does is contagious. He has an impeccable work ethic, and something that I feel very grateful to have experienced firsthand".

More About Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning

Ethan Hunt and the IMF team continue their search for the terrifying AI known as the Entity - which has infiltrated intelligence networks all over the globe - with the world's governments and a mysterious ghost from Ethan's past on their trail. ed by new allies and armed with the means to shut the Entity down for good, Hunt is in a race against time to prevent the world as we know it from changing forever.

Stay tuned for more Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning interviews!

Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning hits theaters on Friday!

Source: ScreenRant Plus