10 Things You Need To Know About Mission Impossible 7
3. Hunt, Laid Bare
After five films without much of an emotional throughline to the franchise, Fallout built upon the three previous installments to deliver an unexpectedly soulful reinvention of the Mission: Impossible formula, in much the way that Skyfall brought added gravitas to James Bond - and that's a tonal edge that looks likely to expand even further in the next entry, as McQuarrie confirmed that he wanted to build on the complexity of his main ensemble as much as Hunt himself.
"When we went into making Fallout, I said to Tom, 'I really want to make this more of an emotional journey [for him],'" the director stated. "Going into this, I said, 'I want to take what we learned from Fallout and apply it to every character in the movie. I want everyone to have an emotional arc. I just want the movie to have more feeling across the board."
Given that Ethan's core team in the field could remain unchanged for the first time - Benji, Luther and Ilsa were all by his side come Fallout's finale and whether Julia necessarily figured into that mix is a debatable subject - the ground is ripe for all three of them to undergo reckonings of their own. McQuarrie previously spoke about unfinished business with Ilsa in particular following the release of the sixth film, given that the character's own relationship with Ethan was altered so as not to hurt either player with Julia's reappaearance.