Few franchises can hold a candle to the staying power of Mission: Impossible, and even when franchise fatigue threatened to clip its wings in the mid-2000s, Paramount’s box office darling continued to pull in the big numbers with each passing iteration – and the stellar performance of Rogue Nation ($682 million) is a testimony to that consistency.
Now, with Christopher McQuarrie ready to become the first director in the franchise’s history to helm two entries, all eyes have now turned to Mission: Impossible 6, and the filmmaker recently shared some details about his new approach.
With Tom Cruise and Rogue Nation breakout Rebecca Ferguson set to reprise their roles as Ethan Hunt and Ilsa Faust, respectively, McQuarrie has begun dreaming up ideas of where to take the franchise next. For a series defined by eye-popping action, along with thrills and spills, fans have come to expect a particular kind of blockbuster with Mission: Impossible, though the director offered up some fleeting details of his approach to the sixth installment, and why he would be disappointed if MI6 simply rehashed the filmmaking style of its predecessor.
“My desire as a filmmaker is to always be a better filmmaker than I was on the previous film. I’m not a filmmaker interested in stasis. I really want to grow and push myself. I think if you look at the three films I’ve done — from The Way of the Gun to Jack Reacher to Mission: Impossible — I think it’s very clear there’s a distinct voice that runs through them, and they’re each sort of expanding, in terms of the storytelling and use of technology. I’m learning on each movie the mysteries of this technical craft or that technical craft. I had things I specifically learned from this movie I want to apply to the next. I gotta imagine it’ll look different. Let’s put it this way: if it looks the same, I’ll be disappointed.”
Paramount is aligning Mission: Impossible 6 for a debut in the summer of 2017, with Tom Cruise, Rebecca Ferguson and director McQuarrie all on board.
