MOVIE NEWS – For over a decade, the ‘Mission: Impossible’ franchise has experimented with side characters who could replace Tom Cruise. But these characters have now “run out”. Caution, a major SPOILER for one of the characters from the latest ‘Mission: Impossible – Fallout’ is included in the article!

For more than a decade, the ‘Mission: Impossible’ films have been trying to introduce a new actor to take Tom Cruise’s place when he retires from the franchise, but the producers have run out of options. Since the original 1996 film, Cruise has played the leading role of Ethan Hunt, an IMF agent, in the ‘Mission: Impossible’ series. But it’s only a matter of time before Cruise steps down or ages out of the franchise to focus on other projects, and the list of his potential successors is getting narrower.

The two-part ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning’, the first part of which was released this year (the seventh installment in the series), was originally planned as Hunt’s farewell, allowing Cruise to exit the franchise. It seems that this story is no longer planned as Hunt’s last adventure, and Cruise intends to leave the ‘Mission: Impossible’ films sooner or later. When this happens, the producers will need a new lead actor, and they are quickly running out of options.

The ‘Mission Impossible’ franchise lost its 2 best Tom Cruise successors.

In the ‘Mission: Impossible’ series, the producers had already attempted to set up Cruise’s potential successor in the 2011 ‘Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol’. That film introduced a character, intelligence analyst William Brandt, played by Jeremy Renner. Brandt was clearly groomed to take over for Hunt in a future film, but after a brief return in the 2015 sequel, ‘Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation’, Renner seems to have exited the franchise and does not plan to reprise his role in the future. Unfortunately, his serious accident earlier this year and its aftermath would also make this a challenging option.

‘Rogue Nation’ introduced another potential Cruise replacement with Rebecca Ferguson’s character, the covert MI6 agent Ilsa Faust. Ferguson was great in the role, and Ilsa quickly became a fan favorite, making her a natural choice to take over the ‘Mission: Impossible’ franchise when Cruise steps down. But after appearing in ‘Fallout’, Ilsa was killed off in the first part of ‘Dead Reckoning’. Both potential successors to Cruise as the franchise lead are now out of the running.

Would a Mission Impossible movie work without Cruise?

It’s possible that this is all a moot point because a ‘Mission: Impossible’ film might not work without Cruise. The franchise’s main selling point is not the brand name but the daring stunts that Cruise performs in each film. The series has become an exercise in one-upmanship as Cruise tries to outdo his previous stunts. Even if the producers find an actor willing to go as far for stunt work as Cruise, they may not have Cruise’s star power.

Source: ScreenRant