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Least Important Things
The Final Reckoning Preview Extravaganza | Podcast: Impossible
Join Luke and Mike in the biggest episode of the podcast yet—The Final Reckoning Preview Extravaganza.
A panel of guests from all the Least Important Things rewatch series to preview Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning, celebrate the franchise, and attempt the impossible mission of rating Tom Cruise's best hair in the series.
Special thanks to: Zach Hall, Daniel Stephen, Greg Jackson, Jim Hargrove, Bri and Andy Warsen, and Shannon Wynne.
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Podcast: Impossible is a special rewatch miniseries from Least Important Things, where we accept the mission of discussing the Mission: Impossible franchise and its legacy.
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- Misson Impossible - Main Theme [1 hour]
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Welcome to Podcast Impossible, a special rewatch miniseries from Least Important Things where we accept the mission of discussing the Mission Impossible franchise and its legacy. Today's a special episode. of Podcast Impossible that we're calling The Final Reckoning Preview Extravaganza. We have a panel of guests from all our rewatch series to review the new film, celebrate the franchises we've covered, An attempt at the impossible mission of making sure Mike doesn't doze off in the theater for the new movie. If you've ever listened to any of our rewatch episodes, where have you been? Subscribe to Least Important Things wherever you get your podcasts or on YouTube to get all our rewatch episodes, essay episodes from yours truly, and more to come. You can follow me on Instagram at Luke H. Ferris, at least important things on TikTok until it's not a thing anymore. And learn how to get involved at leastimportantthings.com. And you can also email this show at leastimportantthings at gmail.com. Okay, it's time to introduce this illustrious panel that will continue to grow along with the episode. Of course, we have the Luther to my Ethan. It's Mike Nguyen. Mike, how are you? How are you feeling? Are you ready to preview The Final Reckoning? I'm, I'm doing great. And, uh, here I am. Oh, it's green. It's not going to work. I'm clinking glasses with Ethan. Here at the bar. At the bar. We'll get to that later, uh, later on. So Mike, I'm, I'm thrilled that you're here to talk about The franchise, this new movie, but what time do you expect to fall asleep during this episode? I'm curious. Yeah. Good question. Good question. Um, Probably shortly after we begin. His eyes are already pretty droopy. Yeah, Dos Equis in. Yes, when I get Dos Equis in, yes. Uh, we have the patron saint of Jurassic Pod. He's joined us. He was on Ghost the Ghost Protocol episode as well as many Jurassic Pod episodes talking Jurassic Park. It's the creator of Stuck on Sorna Podcast. It's Daniel Steven. Daniel, welcome back to the pod. We're so glad to have you. I'm so happy to be here. You are our, you're our Tom Cruise expert. Uh, you're our man in the field. You're Tom Cruise philosopher. The big question for you is, do you think this is the last time Tom Cruise will portray Ethan Hunt on film. No, not at all. This will not be the last one. That was a firm no. If Tom Cruise lives to be eighty-five he'll still make a Mission Impossible movie. You can't stop him because the great thing about these movies is you could kill off Ethan Hunt And they can make a spinoff with Glenn Powell playing Ethan by putting on the mask and Tom Cruise's back. Like some way, somehow. Ethan Hunt will return on screen. I guarantee it. What could you possibly do? I mean, you could kill him. They wear masks. Simple. He'll come back. They'll find a way. Life will find a way. Tom Cruise will find a way. We have to, of course, welcome an old... Friend, uh, oh, you know what? Guys, yeah, I'm sorry. My video is just not working. Uh, Luke, could you turn off? I just can't concentrate. Can you turn off the music really quick? Yeah, let me turn off the music really quick. I just can't think. I don't know. I don't know. Hold on. Like, give me a second here. Having some issues. Just a couple. It's okay. Okay. I think I can figure it out. Give me one sec. One sec. One sec. Oh, that's great. Oh, my goodness. It's Zach Hall, ladies and gentlemen. And if you're watching on YouTube, he is dressed to the nines in Mission Impossible two fashion. The doves are flying. The flames are roaring. Zach Hall, welcome back. You were supposed to be here for the part two of the extravaganza. I don't know if you got the note. Um, it's the, the lesser sequel. Um, so I think you came out a little too strong. You guys guys got, you said to come between seven. You said everybody was going to be coming between seven and nine thirty So I thought I'd get here on time. Like I, I'm very prompt. I like to be prompt. So yeah. Yes, yes. You were supposed to come later. You were the sequel episode. It was just going to be you and just a loop of Mission Impossible two and that was the episode. I don't even think Luke and I were going to be in that. No, we weren't. It wasn't going to be that good. We're glad to have you. Yeah, I got on my motorcycle from work. I drove so fast here. I kicked so many people off of their bikes and like, Even threw a couple grenades at things. I picked up these doves for you guys today. I could have actually watched any movie after Mission Impossible two To prepare for this instead, but it's still an honor to be here. So thanks for having me. Thank you, Zach. I now realize. All of the money that John Woo meant to give to Ambrose, uh, actually went to Zach Hall in preparing for this tonight. Yes. He used all the funds. Yep. Exactly. That's all I'm coming with today, by the way, uh, dove facts and a little bit of John Woo. I'm going to bring him in. You're our John Woo expert. Oh, oh, friends. We have a, we have a special guest. One of the earliest guests on all of our rewatch series. I think he was for the Lost World Jurassic Park. It's our friend, Greg Jackson. Welcome to the show, my friend. I, I, I feel it's so incredibly Hollywood joining late and then leaving early. Let me state that it is the least Hollywood thing it is. It's like the least Hollywood thing possible is having a child and then like actually take And freezing on screen. That's the most valuable thing. There we go. There we go. Uh, Greg Jackson, ladies and gentlemen, contributor to least important things. A friend and long time supporter. I will get back to Greg once his internet works. Uh, that is definitely the most Hollywood things and friends. This is a little taste of what's to come. This is going to be wild. This is going to be crazy. Uh, but it's going to be a ride. It's going to be very similar to, uh, like a John Woo film. I would say we have a lot to get through. We'll have more guests. If Greg ever gets back, we'll let, we'll ask him a few questions. Um, so, but we're going to get into the, the real contents of the, oh, he's back. Okay. Is he back? It was very Hollywood to freeze and then come back and say like, okay guys, we need to, we need to scrap this, this project. We're not going to release it. It's exactly why I wear a tiger's hat everywhere. Good grounding. Yes, it is. Greg, as our Hollywood correspondent, um, do you think this final Mission Impossible film is the end of big theater movies? Just a simple question. Wow. What a question. Um, no, because, uh, my, my former employer has avatar movies scheduled for the next twenty years, uh, and, uh, supposed to be releasing a star Wars film sometime. Whenever. Whenever. Yeah. Whenever they get around to it. I've been hearing that for five years. And then we're gonna see a hodgepodge of uh, like Nintendo um, adaptions and things like that and uh, the entire Mattel Cinematic universe is coming. We're gonna see Jenga probably made into a movie or something of the sort. So like, no, I don't think this is it for like big Like ticket item films, I definitely think that we're nearing the end of like the movie star for sure. Tom Cruise is really it. I think that they should make Jenga into a crossover with Jungle Cruise. Get The Rock and do Jenga Cruise. And it should be like, you know, like, what was that movie? It was a skyscraper that the rock was in. Yeah. Oh, it's just scribe. Yeah. Okay. I get it. But it's a skyscraper made of Jenga blocks, but that's also somehow a cruise. Okay, there's a lot in there, but it's gonna get greenlit. Make it happen. And there's a wave pool too. Yeah, there's a wave pool. So to that answer, no, this is not the end of big ticket films. Of course not. Amazing. Yes, there's so much. I'm waiting for the Stratego movie or the, uh, maybe, uh, what else is there? The Trouble movie could be good. Uh, we have a new guest coming in friends. Uh, this is the fun continues. Uh, longtime guest contributor and the antithesis to Mike's terrible takes on movies. It's Jim Hargrove, friend of the show. My friend, supporter. He backs me up on the, on the born cast. Jim. Welcome. Did you call me Mike's antithesis? Yeah. I appreciate that. You know, something I learned about Mike Wayne a few weeks ago. He has never seen what a And it's as the antithesis, as the antithesis to Mike, I have seen it and love it. Mike has not. You told me, I think I asked you. So what about Bob? Okay. Jim, we've been talking high level about Hollywood, the industry, Tom Cruise. What are you most looking forward to in this next installment? Or where would you, no, better question. Where would you take the franchise after this movie? Uh, I actually don't know. I don't know. That's not the answer we're looking for. This is Hollywood is listening. Yeah. I don't know what I would do. I, I would end it. I don't know, but, but I'm a sucker for ending on a good note. Yeah. Otherwise it's going to turn into James Bond. There's going to be thirty of these things with six different Ethan hunts or variations of the, you know, the next person in line, what they'll probably do is they're going to hand it off. Right. To somebody. Well, and they tried to do that with ghost protocol, which Daniel was on the episode that the renter factor did not, did not work out. I think that was the right choice. Yeah. So they're going to try to hand it off. I would end it. I mean, this is, it's going to be the perfect ending. Whether he dies or walks away at it, just end it. So you're saying it was not going to let it happen. No, they're not. It was money hungry and they're going to do something to make more. So you're saying the Barry Sanders approach versus the Brett Favre approach. Go off on top. You're about to win the Super Bowl. Flying to the sunset. You know, but you can say that about Top Gun. They're going to make a Top Gun three So Hollywood will win. Money will win. They were watching, I was watching dead reckoning part one last night and one of the, it's not part one. Remember it's, it's just dead reckoning, dead reckoning. And uh, in one of the beginning scenes, uh, there's a courier who is, who delivers like, you know, the mission to Ethan. And Ethan says, welcome to the IMF, which tips off that they are actively recruiting. Hmm. Hmm. That's a good, that's a good setup for some questions ahead as we dive into the preview. So thank you, Mike. That was great. I'm glad we rehearsed that transition ahead of time. Um, like you guys all know, Mike, he's always prepared, taking notes, preparing the transitions for this show. I really appreciate it, Mike. All right, first, we have some sponsors on today's episode that we have to get into. You know, this isn't a free show, guys. Today's episode is brought to you by Entity AI. Reach your goals at an unprecedented rate with Entity AI, the world's first AI that knows every government secret, yet doesn't require a server farm or any cooling system to run it. With Entity AI, no matter the size of your business, government, or shadow organization, you too can unlock the power of AI to transform your operations. For a free trial, just dive to the bottom of the Bering Sea and find a Russian sub, then use the cruciform key to unlock the door. Entity AI. Headgear sold separately. And brought to you by Dos Equis beer. Ethan Hunt doesn't always drink alcohol, but when he does, he prefers Dos Equis. Stay thirsty, my agents. Thank you for sponsoring. Today's episode. And Mike is, is also supporting our sponsor Dos Equis actively. I believe this is the first Dos Equis I've had in about ten years. Do we, we might have to run back the tape, but I don't, do we see Ethan actually drink the beer or is it just there? Oh, good question. You see in this picture, he has his hand on it. Yeah. So he has his hand on it here. Which one is this from? This is from Ghost Protocol. Daniel was on this episode. Let's, let's, uh, let's like Tony Romo this. Jim, Jim, I see if we got a, we got Dos Equis here and it looks like Luther's pounded five. What a record. And Luther, is Luther pouring his Dos Equis into a glass there? Because he's got a glass. Yeah, because he's a classy, he's classy. But then, but then here's the thing, Luther's got a bottle. Luther buys Gucci. Like, he's classy. Luther has a bottle in his hand and there is still a semi-full glass on the table. There's just a lot going on here. He's got to get, he, Ethan's buying though, you know? Mike, Mike, when you're, you're wearing a Spartan sweatshirt and you're, and you're policing how another, how another person is enjoying. I mean, come on. Well, I'm just, I'm frustrated there's no couches burning in these pictures. There's no couches burning. I have an idea of what's happening here. If I could just bring it up, having not seen the scene. I think that was having no context for the entire franchise besides the second movie. First and second. I did you a little bit over it for our stuff. Um, he's warming up the beard just to the right temperature for Luther and then he's passing his beard over there to pour into the glass. I like that. Yeah. That's what it is. Or is it the other way around because Luther supports Ethan. Luther is caring for him. That's why Ethan's only got one because Luther's doing the prep work. That's a good one. Symbolic. They're the layers of this movie are just boundless. All right, friends. Let's move on to mission briefing. I want to set up the movie that is coming out in theaters very shortly. So, reportedly, there's a $400 million budget. That's $400 million. That's a lot of money. And by calculations, it would need to break even by earning $1 billion. There's a lot of money at stake in this film. There's a, there was actually rumored to be a three hour cut test screened in multiple us cities, which is interesting. So the potential of a, Director's cut could be out there. And then it is screening at the con film festival, which is, which is really exciting. Uh, we also got a new trailer. Uh, we saw a lot of the same stuff, but we also had some new things. Uh, we had some newcomers, Nick Offerman. Hannah Waddingham and Tramiel Tillman. So three actors that are, I want to say hot right now are coming into this final quote unquote installment of Uh, out of those actors, what are you guys most excited about or looking forward to? For those watching on YouTube. Okay, Ron Swanson's coming in. For context, for those watching on YouTube, we do see a photo of Nick Offerman playing a General and then Tramiel Tillman looks to be in a, a submarine or a, a naval thing. Experts, not lovers. I don't know. There's looks like there's looks like there's some natural light behind him. So I'm wondering if it's like a like a control tower. Yeah, he might be, he might be working with Ethan, but I mean, that's a big get to get, I mean, he is one of the hottest stars right now in Hollywood. I would say it's an aircraft carrier. This might be the aircraft character carrier because it was referenced. And then, uh, Hannah is all, I think she's also a military member. So we're, I think they're all going to be part of the military operation. Apparatus, uh, part of this. Angela Bassett is back as president also, which we kind of knew because in the previous installment, you can see her photo in the background of that, that CIA. Scene where Ethan sneaks into the CIA. You can see her like presidential portrait or picture in the background, but she's going to have more of a presence. Aircraft carrier is mentioned. Ethan gets an aircraft carrier. What does that mean? So much. Um, and then we have Ethan matrixing into the entity. Um, And then we have Tom Cruise as Ethan jumping into the ocean from a plane, which looks like a new stunt. Uh, first reactions, Daniel, I want to bring you in. What, what stood out in that trailer, the new trailer that we got? Yeah, I mean, him jumping into the ocean, um, I think I just like that it feels real. His arm's like flailing. Like, it's not, it's not pretty. It just feels kind of real. Um, that caught my attention the most. I think seeing Nick Offerman, like, I don't know if, I don't, I don't think I knew that he was in the movies. I was kind of surprised by that, which I like Nick Offerman. Not necessarily. I would not like want him to be in a mission impossible movie. I don't know why. I just don't like, I don't like thinking, oh, there's Nick Offerman from parks and rec. Cause I love that. Having that in the back of my mind, but um, the cast is pretty fantastic. I mean, I expect a lot from this movie. I didn't know there was a three hour cut that was test screened. Yeah, I believe that was a deadline article that I saw. So yeah, that's, there's a lot of potential for deleted scenes. Man. Yeah, I don't know. That's. The budget though, I would say that watching the trailer, like they clearly use a lot of the money. I mean, that's, I, I hope it makes a billion. I don't, the last movie, I think it's just, you know, it's coming out a week, week or two before, um. What Barbie and Oppenheimer was kind of a bad call but uh, yeah, I know that I think they have all the IMAX screens like reserved for two or three weeks compared like only one week in the last film so. It might come close to a billion. I hope so, but uh, might be kind of tough. It will be tough. That is a good point. The last film, there was this big issue with Not Tom Cruise, but this film getting the first film out of the two of these getting enough screens and IMAX and the amount of time that he was getting. So I think the good thing is there seems like This window is going to be pretty strong for this film. I don't think there's going to be a lot of competition. Uh, so this is it. They're going for it. And it's, it's pretty exciting. Uh, I'm going to open it up to the panel. Anything else from the trailer stand out to you guys? I know Jim mentioned Nick Offerman. Tramiel Tillman. Uh, I don't know if everyone has been keeping up with Severance, but like, He's he's one of like the the best just like facial actors I've seen in a long time like and and like that show is just very ripe for just. Not having a lot of dialogue and having to just be a really good actor with just like your emotions and like. Everything like that. He's phenomenal. So I'm, I'm actually just excited to see him just do more stuff in general, especially like in a big film like this. I see him as like kind of a rising star as well. Hannah Waddington obviously as well. All Apple stars. Yes. They're the sourcing. It's like the farm team. Right. Exactly. Farm team. Yeah. It's, it's, it's what we've seen this before in the franchise. When you step back, You see these up and coming stars that really get a chance to shine in small roles in these big budget movies. So I'm really excited to see him. I think it's a, whether they, they knew how big the second season of severance was going to be as far as stardom goes and. Awareness. They probably didn't know, but they probably had an inkling that he, his talent was off the charts. So I'm excited for him to see him too. Cause it's a big get. Also another, I think, point out, has nothing to do with the last point I'm making at all, uh, or anything with the cast. $400 million for a budget is massive. Yes. That is a massive budget. I, I mean, they only, they did 571 on, on, uh, dead reckoning, um, total box office. And I think that was on like a $380 million budget. 300, maybe 320. 400. is a lot bigger. I mean, not a lot bigger, but it's bigger. And like, I don't know. Theaters aren't, haven't really been overperforming this year. So. Who knows? I mean, maybe Tom Cruise gets some more butts in seats and does another magical thing like he did with with Top Gun, but. I don't know, leading after the first film, I would, I would be a little skeptical of it. I would, I would say that that's a lot to. I mean, to break even at a billion is huge in today's day and age. I think the only film that did a billion is uh. What is it? I can't even name it. Is it The Force Awakens? Well, I think the Super Mario Bros, I think, almost broke a billy in the animated film. Yeah, I mean, there have been films, but just like in 2025, it's just rare. And it's not, it's only like, I think Wicked may have broke it last year. Like, it's just, it's really rare to break it. So this is, I mean, hopefully. Hopefully Tom Cruise works some, uh, what do you call Scientology magic? You know, exactly the term. In the least important things universe, this budget, um, I guess we need some context. You know, this budget is greater than what we saw for Pirates of the Caribbean on Stranger Tides. Yes. But it's not as big as, uh, Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom. That's good context. Thank you, Mike. But it, it, it's going to be, I'm glad you did some homework. It's been, it's been interesting with the Paramount, the Paramount as a studio, Tom Cruise really has kept that studio alive. And as it's changing ownership, it's an interesting time to have. This big of a film be tied to Paramount when Paramount successfully they're, they're moving into more prestige TV and there could be a different strategy. Like this might be the end of traditional Paramount filmmaking that we've known for the last. twenty forty years. So interesting stuff. Thank you, gentlemen. We're going to dive into some more predictions. Uh, we had some, some questions from, from, from listeners that we wanted to touch base. So again, this is the least important things, a universe type. You're going to get high level stuff and then very specific stuff. I wanted to ask just general, what are some predictions, expectations that you guys have? Uh, Jim, let's start with you. What are some overall predictions that you have? Benji's, it's gonna be great. I wish it was three hours plus. I'll start with that. Um, it's gonna be great. Uh, Benji's gonna die. Which leads to my first question that I do have a question is who's gonna die in this film? Yeah, Benji's gonna die. Jury's still out for me on whether Ethan's gonna die. It's going to be like a, if it's going to happen, it's going to be like Top Gun Maverick where you see him get blown out of the sky. You think he's dead and he's not dead. Um, so he will die, right? But he won't actually die. That's going to be Ethan. And he'll retire at the end of this rather than die and he'd be replaced. It's my guess. But yeah, Benji's going down, unfortunately. He's going down. Daniel, I don't know if there'll be anyone else like Luther, I think will be fine. But yeah, yeah, Luther, they're teasing that he's sick. That he's something with him researching the entity that he has maybe some sort of cancer or some sort of radiation poisoning. So it should be interesting. Okay. Interesting. Daniel, what about you? Any death predictions or overall predictions that you're looking forward to? Yeah, I mean, I agree. Benji is, he's gone. He's for sure gonna die. He's toast. Hardy gets Benji. Wow. Yeah. He's not in the trailer enough. I just feel it. I feel like they're pushing... They're making you think Luther is going to die from the trailer. Yeah. So it means he'll probably be fine. But again, you know, you can kill off Ethan, which I expect they will. But he'll come back in the sequel. Yeah. Like, there's some mission where they need Ethan to his face. So, you know, Some other actor puts his face on, kind of like a face-off situation, kind of a goofy actor kind of thing, always got to act like Tom Cruise. Some, they'll think of something, but I do expect, I think Ethan will die. I don't see his character retiring. I can't, I just can't imagine his character just Being done with things. Um, I think Ilsa, I think she's definitely alive. Ooh, that is a good hot take. You know, I would love that. Because I think it's very, they didn't, They didn't show like, they cut from her like on the bridge dead, supposedly, right? And then Ethan is on a roof like mourning or like looking out at them. And it's like, if you had to trick the entity to think that Elsa was dead. I just won't be surprised if she's alive. I don't know if I'll like it, but I, if I don't see a character get their head chopped off or like a helicopter land on them, there's a chance they're coming back. And so I expect that, but um. Yeah, I think I'm with you when you say you'd be annoyed. You wouldn't like if she was alive. I don't think I love her character. I think I'd be kind of annoyed if she was alive, too. I just didn't like her death. I don't think it was like clear enough. And I'm like, oh, she's no, especially for that great of character. Becky Ferguson is a very busy actress right now, so I always assumed they kind of killed her off because like, she's like, I'll give you five days. And I, I don't know if she's going to be available. Uh, cause she's, I think her schedule is very packed with, uh, Dune and other stuff. Um, Zach, um, when Daniel said face off, that was a key word for you. You started to be very giddy. Um, I want to bring up an important prediction, uh, for you specifically with your expertise in Mission Impossible two Um, how many gigabytes will be used In this, this next film, uh, if you don't know the context of this conversation, it started with Mission Impossible two If you're watching on YouTube, I have screenshots of the thirty-two thirty-two gigabyte memory card, we believe. Megabyte. It was thirty-two megabytes. Megabyte, yeah. That was used by our villains. That really was the focal point of the entire film. And we were trying to track how much, um, Just information storage capacity with that that came along in this movies and it really shows you the course of time. But what are your expectations for the storage capacity of the entity and where we're at? I love that you saved this question for me, Luke. Thank you so much. I think what we're actually going to see is finally a jump into the gigabytes. Despite the chip shortage that we had, the supply chain is stronger now and we are ready to bring gigabytes to Mission Impossible. How they will be delivered is I think the way that we should have this debate right now. I don't think it's going to be boat. I don't think it's going to be aircraft nor freight. I think it's going to be dove. Yeah, you know, Zach, I'm actually willing to go. That's further than you. Not only are gigabytes being introduced, terabytes are being introduced. And they're going to be delivered via server data centers, okay? I mean, if we're talking AI, we have to at least jump up in two terabytes. You're right. Just at least it might be the big unveiling. I don't really know what's happening. This is just a huge data farm in Ireland. Like it's, Stealing water. I could see them using doves though. And like the, the, the, the, the air that they generate with their wings to cool the data center, um, because of the heat generated from the computers. You know, I've been looking up fun facts about doves in preparation for this rather than watching the movies. And um, fun fact, doves have a magical property with their wing flaps that does cool things down about how So, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, it could happen with enough doves. John Woo comes in with second unit. Just unveils those uh, those white pigeons and just lets them fly. Just lets them fly over that uh, that big server farm. Are we talking about doves or pigeons here? So here's another fact. Actually, they are both in the same species. Technically, a dove is a pigeon and a pigeon is a bird. Yeah, a lot more often if you see a white dove, you're actually seeing a white pigeon. Um, they're more, it's more often, uh, it's pretty rare to actually see a albino dove. So a lot of those, um, And Mission Impossible two a lot of the movies that you, or doves that you did see were actually pigeons, fun fact. So, just want to keep that in mind, including my favorite dove, um. My favorite dove is as he looks it up. Yeah, his name is Perry. So Perry is actually, he was the strongest performer in Mission Impossible 2's end scenes, I think. Um, that is, you didn't get, you didn't ask me what I was thinking was going to happen in this next movie, Luke. I'm kind of mad because Perry's coming back. That is what's going to happen. Um, you're going to see Perry return. So Zach Hall, if you will, um, always good seeing you. Uh, you're telling me that. I mean, forget Mission Impossible for a second. You're telling me that when we mourn the death of our loved ones, And we put them in the ground and we release doves. We're actually just releasing pigeons to crap over the entire ceremony. More than likely, Greg, yes. And I'm sorry to break that to you, but there are a number of pigeons that I feel are beautiful. The rock pigeon, that green, that green flow on top of its head. Beautiful. I'd be a rock pigeon fan. Um, so truly I, I understand. But it's okay. It's, we can take this new fact and move forward in life with this and watch this new movie that will feature, I would hope at least a million dollars of budget of doves in it. Um. To be like, maybe that isn't a duck. Maybe that's just a pigeon. Yeah. Now, uh, Zach, earlier we asked Jem if he could predict Um, where this franchise was going after this movie. Are you willing to, to walk out on the proverbial branch here and, uh, suggest that perhaps there's a spinoff involving Perry. Yes. Uh, Perry and Benji. Well, Benji dies, goes to heaven and then comes back as Perry. Reincarnated, um, to help in Mission Impossible two the one that he wasn't in. Do doves release doves at dove funerals? Do you think that that's a thing? No. You think they just all like flock together? There's actually a war between pigeons and doves for who truly is the whitest of all doves or doves. This is not going well. There's a war there. So yeah, I think that there is probably some releasing of cut this part loop. I'm going to get you out of here. We have to welcome two new guests. The Warsons, uh, I don't know if you guys realize you were joining a pigeon podcast. No. Did you guys know that? That's, this is not about Mission Impossible. Uh, uh, we have Andy Warson, of course, and, um, Andy's partner is also here. Hello. Can you guys hear our audio okay? Yeah, we can hear you. Uh, so, Andy's partner, uh, that, where did this bit start? Mike, do you remember when this started? So, I recall. Do the rest of the people on the call understand the bit or like have heard the bit? Mike is about to explain it. Yes, he's about to explain it. Thanks for tuning in for us, Andy. Appreciate it. Okay. So shortly we were recording a podcast and Andy and Brie had just had their, uh, their, uh, office. These are, you're already, you're already scared. Their offspring. And I did not want to, uh, say the name of their child, which is, which is very respectful. That's like, you know, some parents are more protective. Like, yeah, I get it. It's, it's. So what I did was, uh, overcorrect and refused to say Bree's name. And then, and then not only refuse to say Bree's name, which, which is somewhat androgynous, but like, but like I refuse to acknowledge that Andy is married to a woman. And the fact that Brie had already been a guest on the show as Brie, that's the big important thing. Uh, but Brie, Brie welcome. We're glad to have you here. Um, we've been talking about really important stuff, of course, um, we have a segment coming up that's going to feature you both, but we're, we're just kind of wrapping up our overall predictions. Uh, as we, as we explore this new installment, I'm curious to you guys, for you guys, because you, you have seen, uh, the previous installment because we saw it together in the theaters. You can listen to that episode if you want to. Do you guys have a prediction of who or what is controlling the entity? Is it Shannon because she just joined at the same time? It might be Shannon Wynn because Shannon Wynn just joined. And I'm so embarrassed. Ironically joined during the entity conversation. And it doesn't even have my name. It has my company name at all. Which is the CIA, which is the CIA. I'm like, what is happening? But hey, everybody. Hey, Shannon, do you know who is controlling the entity? Shannon, that's business development at its finest here. Shout out to Twist Link. Um, no, I don't know who's controlling the entity. I feel like I don't follow the plot in the last one as much. I get confused. So I'm like, what is the entity? What is real? I don't know. So. I think Shannon's controlling the entity. That was a very good non answer. Uh, that was, it was very good. Uh, uh, Bri and Andy, what about you guys? I do not. I'm kind of in the same boat as Shannon, um, as I feel like. My only guess is, and this is because if you, like, I was thinking about the characters that were in the first movie. I can't, it's hard for me to think that the movie writers would make any of them the controller of the entity. So I go to who are going to be the new characters that are coming in. And so that's where I'm like, oh, it's Hannah Whittington. Yeah. The entity just out of nowhere and totally changing her character arc from Ted Lasso and killing the most evil, uh, Evil existence in mission impossible franchise. I don't know, but that's a good, that's a good point. That's a good point. Are one of the new characters going to control density, uh, more to find out. All right, friends, we're moving on. Um, some more big franchise questions that I want to talk about. Um, and Mike mentioned this, that Ethan in the last movie is recruiting agents, but how big is the IMF? Daniel, I want to bring you in here. How big do you think the IMF is as an organization? That is a valid question. I don't know the answer to. I, you know, when I think about Like Anthony Hopkins not being seen again or Lawrence Fishburne. Um, yeah. How big is it? Is Ethan? Cause in rogue nation, um, In the beginning of the film, Ethan walks into the record shop and the girl behind the counter is like, is it really you? You know, these stories. And I, I, I'm curious if like, if they're going to go deeper into is Ethan like this, You see this James Bond character. Does everyone, like, know who he is beyond, like, these stories? Um, because we really have, we don't like a sense, like, how big it is besides Mission Impossible three where they're, like, at their headquarters. Yeah. And you see, like, him running around the halls, but Um, since then, I don't think we've gone back to. Well then, uh, in Ghost Protocol, we learn that there's only about four of them left. Um, cause they're, when they're on the train, um, Ethan says something, and this is all from memory. I, I don't, I can't remember exactly verbatim when he says, but he basically says, this is the IMF is everyone on this train. Right. And then in what, in Rogue Nation, they shut down the IMF. Very quickly, very quick. Yeah. I mean, but it's like, it wasn't like a big, I don't think it was a big task that I'm just curious. Cause I feel like it's pretty much Ethan is the IMF is my, what I, my theory is, or that's what it's become at least. That's how they implied in the trailer and in Dead Reckoning, where they kind of talk about, like, he's the one guy you call if he accepts it, where it's like, if this was a big IMF at this point, you wouldn't be talking about Ethan, you'd be talking about, like, 200, other qualified agents, but it's kind of like he is the one they're referring to. So now they got to have support step guys. Come on. Got to have support staff. There's a whole, there's an alarm army of IMF agents, support staff. There's a lot of spreadsheets. They're trying to make the numbers work with all the houses, buying the property. Wait, that's such a good point. And then the first one, I know there's like five or six other agents in the restaurant when he survives everything and then he blows up the fish tank. There's like five or six watching him. And then that whole scene at the ball and everything, so. Benji started IMF, he was like a lab rat, right? So there was like a whole organization, like that he was in the basement and like. I think that there's the reason to suggest in the most recent movie that the IMF is actually a pretty sophisticated and relatively large organization because When Ethan is, when they're on the run in Rome, he needs to ditch the BMW that they're driving and he pulls out a phone with like an integrated application on it and there's Options. He can find a safe house. He can find a safe car or he can find, I don't know. There was another option on there and he chooses safe car and then it like immediately routes him Shannon, as somebody who understands like cloud-based, um, like web services, can you help us understand like what kind of infrastructure would need to be in place to support an app of that quality? Well, thank you for asking. Um, I, I'm not going to claim to be a total expert in actually creating it myself, but it's going to take substantial effort to like create the system. Like just to create an app takes a lot of work. To have it be connected all across the world takes substantial effort and complexity, but then even just to have like the infrastructure to like have The fleet of vehicles or houses that would actually connect to it like that feels like the even greater ecosystem that you're going to need to have so. There's certainly some complexity that you're pointing to there, Mike. Yeah. And bringing Zach back into this, uh, Shannon, uh, how many, like how much data do you think would be needed to support something like this? Like, um, are we talking gigabytes? Terabytes at what level of data? Are you asking me? Yeah. Well, yeah. Um, this is what the people came for Shannon. This is what they came for. This is what they came for. So, I mean, it's going to be a lot of data, right? So I don't know if I'm speaking on scale exactly, but as we're growing in complexity, AI, everything, it's just more and more and more data. It's getting out of control, right? So it's certainly going to be on the larger side of that. Still like five gigabytes. Right, right, right. Gigabytes for sure. Yeah, yeah, definitely. The world can't take. We got to the gigabytes. Oh, wow. Thank you, Shannon, for bringing the expertise in. Uh, my other franchise. Can we ask one interjection? Yes, you can. Do we think we are going to get to the Yodabyte stage of memory? Yodabyte? Yodabyte? I'm not sure if we're pronouncing it correctly. It is yodabyte. Now that would be an interesting crossover. It is equal to a million trillion megabytes. Sandy, I'm not gonna lie. I thought you made that up when you first On this show, you think we make something up on this show? No, no, this is very accurate. Uh, I'm going to throw back to, to Andy and Brie as, as the couple that are on the same screen on, on the camera here. Uh, what if Ethan retired with Julia and mission impossible three? What if, what do you think would happen? Uh, for those watching, I have a photo of one of my favorite scenes, the house party scene, the engagement party scenes, this beautiful homestead of, of Ethan. What do you guys think would happen if he would have retired with her? There would be no movie franchise. Our lives would be the lesser. Um, but if we're playing out Ethan's life with Julia, I'm trying to imagine Ethan as a soccer coach, like a kid's soccer coach or something. Oh my goodness. Um, I think he would have been legendary. Do you think he would be like track? Oh, this is a good question. What do you guys think? What sport do you think he would have had his kids play and coached? That's a good question. Brie, you mentioned track. I mean, I think cross country or maybe just an Olympic sprinter probably. I think a 200, 200, 400. Yeah. I think it's gotta be, I mean, he's a short King, so it's not going to be basketball, unfortunately. I, I, I like that. I like, uh, Ethan as a track coach at the local high school. That that's about fitting. Cause he's got, he's got a little bit of the crazy. And then, and then the last question friends is as I've been rewatching these movies in preparation of tonight's call. Obviously this is an American movie. Some people could say this is the American James Bond movie. But is Ethan bigger than that? Is Ethan the people's hero? Is he humanity's hero? This is one of the questions that we can't answer tonight, but I just want us to think about it as we enter this movie because I think Ethan really is not just about the governments, the systems, like, patriotism. I think that's part of it. To me, he really serves, like, humanity. Right. He serves the one life for the greater good. That's the whole thing is like Ethan's willing to save one person and that's why he's So that's just more of a philosophical question to ponder as we head into this next installment where we have a we have a great upcoming Segment here in honor of Bree and Andy, we have the Bree paradox. Uh, Andy and Bree, can you explain the Bree paradox for, for listeners who maybe don't know what that is? Do you want to explain from your point of view? So yeah. So from my point of view, it started with the first movie and it is what is on. If you're watching on YouTube, uh, you can see on the screen. But essentially, again, sans dead reckoning because we were in theaters. It's the moment in the movie where I'm rewatching it. With intention and I'm, I'm edge of my seat, edge of the couch and Brie is just nonchalantly reading her Kindle in the corner of the couch. And it is the moment that the sequence or the scene causes her to look up and audibly say something more of like an exclamation about the scene. Um, and. It, it usually is something egregiously crazy, uh, that happens. Um, and so we've been tracking those, uh, as we've gone through, I think we didn't actually start naming them on the show until like halfway through. Yeah, I think so. That's the Brie paradox. It's a critical point of the movie that we'd like to call out. Brie, just curious, and you don't have to share this, what books are you typically reading while a Mission Impossible movie is on in the background? If you're watching like you're reading an intense memoir and like educated and like then you like are looking looking up and Tom Cruise is running, it feels like. That'd be hard to do, but I don't know. Um, a variety of things, um, fantasy, like Hockey romances. Oh, yes, yes. I think Audrey's reading that one right now. Yeah, it feels like the hockey romance would be a good pairing. Yeah. I'm trying to think would be like a, we might need to make a list of parent of Kindle pairings with, with each film. It's like wine and cheese. Yeah. Yeah, it is. It is. All right. We're going to go into. The three paradoxes for, for the franchise here. We're going to do like a David Letterman countdown. Um, I have the information here, so I'm going to read them off, but you guys feel free to jump in with context. Um, there's eight for, I know there's seven movies, but there's eight because there's two for one movie. Um, we're gonna start out at number eight is the slow guy with a briefcase in Ghost Protocol. Ethan, who's young. Spry guy in this. Yeah. Um, takes way too long to catch up with this old guy with the briefcase. Yeah, this is Hendrix. He's got the launch code and he's a much older man. Yes. So just the math wasn't adding up of like the distance and how long it actually took. Um, so that was my comment for that one. All right, number seven. Hair tie in Dead Reckoning. That one's, that was a pretty good one. This is where, uh, I think Grace pulls her hair back right before the action starts. I don't think I recall ever seeing a woman in an action scene. Like taking time to take the hair tie off her wrist and pull her hair back. So that was one that really stuck out to me as well. Very, um, for the dress. Shannon, if you've ever seen a woman, uh, do that, but. For the Jurassic Pod fans. I don't think so. No, but Jurassic Pod, I was going to say, knows my thoughts on unrealistic hair. Yeah. Check out the Jurassic World episode. I'm fully aligned with you there. Yeah. All right. Number six, it is the nightclub fight in fallout. Uh, I mean, this is a special one. I mean, please explain. It's one of the best scenes in the entire franchise. Yes, they're fighting the White Widow. He's protecting her. He stabs a few people. Ethan, is he? Um, And everyone around is like, oh, that's weird. That's a little crazy, but I'm going to stay like in this party, drink my drinks. Yeah. But that happens quite a bit all across. Then one gunshot goes off and everyone then decides to run out and, uh. So they're okay with people dying and getting stabbed, getting thrown around this room. But as soon as the gunshot goes off, that's when they go, well, I think they thought it was part of the performance theater as part of the fundraiser. It seemed like that was because again, this is like a, uh, it's, it's a rave. Disguised as a fundraiser, disguised as a, as a way to be a smuggler, essentially, um, black market smuggler. So I think they're all cool with knives. Yeah. Knives are cool. But the guns come out. We don't like it. Okay. Uh, the, the helicopter tunnel in mission possible, of course, this is a very iconic scene. Um, what's wrong with this? It's absolutely ridiculous through and through. Um. This was a practical stunt. Yes, it was. This was the first one. This was the first, uh, Brie paradox. She just audibly said, this is insane. That is impossible. Well, it- The width of the tunnel seemed to adjust to whatever they felt like could fit in it at the time. Um, so like another train could come through, but then like the next shot, the helicopter took up the whole tunnel. Didn't make any sense. So when it blew up. They all should have been dead. Um, so that was my one for that. It is interesting because that's probably one of the most absurd moments of the entire franchise because as we get later on in the installments, Tom Cruise is doing the stunts like so practically that I mean, you mean after the second movie, right? Like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. We will get to that. We will get to that. Uh, okay. Number four, this is playing pinball in rogue nation. Yeah, um, he drops into the. One of the opening scenes when he is, it's the stunt when he's climbing, holding on to the airplane and finally Benji, I think, opens the door. Yeah. Right. And then he goes through that door like a fricking pinball. And he, if that was a bad guy in the movie, any, anyone else, he would have been dead. They would have been dead. Um, so the fact that he survived that was also another ridiculous, um, I do have to say you were in for Rogue Nation because that is like five minutes into the movie. So you were like, I think I could just feel that something really cheesy and ridiculous was going to come up. All right, number three, the weak-wristed henchman in Dead Reckoning. This is the second, uh, dead, or this is the Dead Reckoning one. Yes. Um, so yeah, the guy who they hired to choose to shoot who Ethan was going to kill, you know, when you like point a gun, you feel like you have to have sturdy wrist when you're going through. Yes. He chose to break his wrist when choosing in between and it maybe it was like ten seconds because he did it twice, two shots where he was kind of in the back and you could see it and then he comes around and does it again. He was just flailing this gun. I don't know how he got hired, but it wasn't the best choice. I think the entity hired him. It seems like an AI hired me with the entity. If you rewatch Dead Reckoning one it's pretty funny. Yeah. Number two, uh, chef boy RD and mission impossible three. So can you, this is a, this is a good call out. This is like the eagle eyed. Yeah. Um, so we were watching, this is one I remember like very vividly. Um, we were watching, they were chasing the rabbit. Um, Um, right. Your rabbit's foot. Yeah. Chasing the rabbit. Yeah. Essentially. Um, and so they're going through the streets and I reading my Kindle and I look up and I'm like, it's a Chef Boyardee commercial. From 2004, um, where they're in the grocery store and the girl's like, oh, I love Chef Boyardee. And the mom was like, we've had Chef every night for dinner this week. And so they leave the Chef Boyardee there and then the Chef Boyardee can rolls off the shelf and follows. And actually we just watched it right before this and it does go through multiple streets. Gets run over by a semi. So felt very similar. Um, so I don't know if that was actually an inspiration, but I think so. As most of us millennial generation on this call, I think they resonates JJ Abrams knows his audience and, uh, the chef boy, the inspiration is There. All right. Last but not least in the brief paradox, top eight, of course, you know, I had to be from mission impossible to this scarf patch. Yeah. What's wrong with this? Just why? Like, why was that included in general? Um. The whole scene is absurd. Just the slow motion, her getting off the dock or walking the dock. And very, um, had cowboy standoff music kind of in the background. Oh, yes. Like the echoes. It just felt really, uh, really weird. It was so cheesy. The slow motion of the- Scarf being snatched and then wrapped around the pole for it and for a kiss. It was just... Even the romance books I read don't. Oh, oh, Zach Hall, we have to bring you in here. Can we, Zach? They don't? You're really missing out. I think there is market for a really good book if you included the Scarf Cat. I think there needs to be a Mission Impossible two John Woo-esque romance series. We need the whole background. We need some fan fiction. We're in spacings longer for the slow motion. Yes. I have, uh, I have a mic paradox to add. Um, it's just, it's just one. Uh, so Shannon and I just returned from Italy. Um, Yeah. So you were doing, um, reconnaissance about this. I said this, I feel like, but go ahead. Okay. This is a Shannon parent. The Shannon paradox that Mike stole. I definitely don't agree with Shannon that this is the case, but it doesn't matter. We both agreed to this. The, um, So in Venice, Ethan and Ilsa both say to each other, this is their first time in Venice. And if you have not been to Venice, um, it's, it's near impossible to put you like, if you've, if you don't, if you've never been to Venice, like you could put you anywhere in the city and it's next to impossible to figure out where you are. So the idea that Ethan is running around the city and has any clue at all on what to do is just totally unreasonable. Like, there's just no possible way. Like, I really think it would have been funny if, uh, in that, if, like, when he arrives to the bridge that Ilsa's actually at, is if he actually arrived at a bridge that's, like, two bridges down. That would have been better. I'm surprised they didn't. I actually thought that's what was going to happen. Uh, That he was going to be on the wrong bridge. I thought maybe that was a possibility. It feels like that could have been a comedic Mission Impossible action scene. Um, but I also think, I don't know what you guys felt like. I understand where like he wouldn't know where he was going, but I think they deliberately shot it that way with him running in the small Venice streets for the dramatic effect. I don't know if you felt that way when you guys were running together through Venice. It was, it was, did you feel like you were Ethan? Yeah, it was actually less. He just ran a lot. Yeah, he ran a lot. So, so Venice is, is just overwhelmed with tourists. I mean, it's just absolutely ridiculous. Uh, so it, it was quite, um, it, it, it was, It was more unbelievable that Ethan knew where he was going than it was to believe that there weren't anybody else walking around. Yeah. That makes sense. Yeah. And I would agree with Mike about like the map, but it's like, I just thought it was funny because like they were directing him, which So it felt super realistic, like trying to go left, go right, like it was getting at that. But then at the end, they're like, oh, like he says to Elsa or whatever, like she's on this bridge. And somehow the two of them know where that bridge is. There's 400. bridges. There's so many. There's so many bridges. How would you know? Unless it's the Rialto, like, you don't know where that is. You're not finding it. Guys, this is the support staff telling the support staff he did his training, he got his brochure. Yeah, he did his brochure. Is his booklet of information. Jim, you're so right. The logistics of this team need a support staff, guys. Yes. Yes. Yes. They, they said that this is their first time in Venice. And when, and, and, and Ethan knew that he wanted to see that bridge. So he kind of knew what bridge to look for. You know, this is his first time in Venice, but he had a smile on his face at the same time. So he, he kind of, yeah, he had done some research. You're right, Jen. That's good. You know what? Thank you wins for, for going on that trip just to get to the bottom of that scene and, um, uh, make sure to, uh, write off, uh, all your expenses to at least important things. Um, All right. We're moving into some, some fun categories where we're going to mix up all of our franchises, all of our panel. Uh, Greg Jackson had to leave by the way to, to take care of his child. So thank you, Greg, for being on the show. Uh, one of our original guests. In all of our franchises, uh, and, and a great friend of the show. Um, we're gonna, we're gonna do some, some fun categories. So the first one incorporating all of our franchises that we've covered is choose a road trip partner. Choose a road trip partner. For those not watching on YouTube, I'll read off the list. We have Dennis Nedry. We have Jack Sparrow. We have Stampin' Ambrose from Mission Impossible two You have to get them both. We have Owen and Claire. From Jurassic World, we have Solomon Kane in a straitjacket. We have the Dream Raptor from JP3. We have Brant and Aaron Cross. We have Dr. Sheeran explaining the science of the Bourne legacy and why she can't conference. And then we have the entire crew of the Flying Dutchman. So you have to choose one of these. To go on a road trip, like across America, uh, it definitely has to be multiple days, multiple hours in the car. Okay. Uh, I'm going to. There's only one answer, Luke. Okay. I was going to start with Jim. Tell me. Yes, Jim. And I gotta, I gotta run after this. This is the only, there's only one answer. It's Dennis Nedrick. If you're going on a road trip, that man knows how to eat guys. Right. He's going to have the snacks. He's going to know where to stop. He's going to plan his food stops. Yeah. Yeah. He's got it on lock. Everyone else like, no, boring. Dennis Nedry is your boy with the snacks. Thank you, Jim. And thanks for being on the show. If nothing else for entertainment, he's got the food unlock. Yes. He will let you know where Dobson is. That's for sure. That's true. Uh, Daniel, uh, you're up next. Who are you taking on your road trip? Well, I should say the dream rafter from JP three, but I won't, I gotta go. Ooh. You know, I feel like there's some hate towards Mission Impossible two I can feel from some of the people here. So I gotta go with, I think it's Hugh Stamp and Sean Ambrose. I really... I love Mission Impossible two I love having a clear villain. I love Ethan Hunt having an actual Zach is losing his mind. Because look at this, in the first movie, the villain is an old guy, okay? The third movie, great villain, but Philip Seymour Hoffman is a little bit out of shape compared to Ethan Hunt. Too good of a villain. Or not. Perfect. Yeah. Ghost Protocol. Another old guy. Rogue Nation. I don't know what was going on. I mean, Solomon Kane. Solomon. Yeah. He was like a very weak kind of quiet character. And it's not until you get into Fallout where you have like an actual like Another equal villain. So Sean Ambrose in the second one, I'm all about him. I feel bad for the guy. He doesn't get enough love. He's definitely still alive. I don't think he's dead. Um, if he came back, if he was referenced in any way, I mean, I'm going to be clapping in the theater. So I'm going with Stampin' Ambrose two for one special. Wow. I love it. Uh, another part of that is there is like the tension, Daniel, when you're, when you're on this road trip. There's a lot of tension between Stamp and Ambrose. We don't know if it's romantic. We don't know if it's more like career. Um, I'm just worried that, that, that stamp is going to be jealous of any attention that Ambrose gives you. Maybe you like pick the music. Maybe you guys talk about JP3 and Snape gets jealous. So just watch out for there. There's a little bit of jealousy. Yeah, it'll keep it interesting. It will keep it interesting. All right, Zach Hall. Uh, it's, it's, you have a fellow MI2 lover in the house. How do you feel? But like, who are you going to choose? Yeah. Daniel, if you ever want to just do a podcast about one movie. For at least like fifteen episodes, we should talk. Um, I think. You know what? It's hard because I agree with Stampin' Ambrose. Great couple. I love the thumbnail you chose, by the way, for everybody. I do have to say that was one of the first thumbnails that came up for those who aren't watching on YouTube. We couldn't stop laughing. It just supports my theory. Listen, listen to that episode again and it'll explain it all. I think I'm gonna, this is a hot take. Dr. Shearing. I think I want to take Dr. Shearing because I just want to know what she would have done at conference. Yeah. What, what conferencing would she be speaking? Would she be on a panel? Uh, would she be, you know, be more of a host role? Um, what, what workshops would she be workshopping at the conference? That's what we really want to know. Exactly. Yeah. You know, and plus there's plenty of, I believe in these movies, plenty of viruses and stuff like that, that we have to take care of. Chimera, including. Yes. Chimera, of course. Of course. Um, she would be able to take care of that. Yeah. Yes, uh, Rachel Weisz as your, uh, compatriot in a road trip would not be a bad thing at all. Uh, Mike, what about you? So I would not pick Ambrose because he would conveniently Ambrose and stamp doesn't matter. I would not. I'm just saying I would not pick any package. I include Ambrose because he would conveniently be sleeping every time I'd stop for gas. The, I would probably pick Shearing's probably got the, like, gonna be the best conversationalist, I feel like. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You can go deep in the science. Yeah. Wow, she's the frontrunner so far. Shannon, what about you? Who are you going on a road trip with? You know, I'm going to be honest. I've been struggling as I'm looking at this list. It's not supposed to be easy. I know. Jack Sparrow, I feel like would drive me insane. Like Owen and Claire, like I love, you know, Chris Pratt and I love like. You know, it could be Andy from, you know, no, no, it is Owen. It's Owen. It's Owen and Claire and they bicker so much. And I'm just like, not here for that. So I thought about the raptor because I'm like, at least it would be quiet and like not annoying, but it can eat you. Yes, yes. Ah, so I think I'm, I'm leaning towards Dennis or Dr. Shearing, but yeah. Um, maybe Dennis. Like, maybe he has got, like, a good joke or vibes. I don't know. But that's... Yeah. Difficult question for sure. It's good. Okay. So right now we're tied with Dennis Nedry and Dr. Shearing two and two, uh, Bree and Andy jump in here, jump in the mix. Who do you got? Go ahead. So I'm going to go with the, uh, the entire crew of the flying Dutchman is my pick. Oh, you guys can both do it. You guys can both do it. Wow. There's two reasons for it. Uh, number one. We, you know, the key to any road trip is good jams and good music. And you got a guy that knows how to play an organ. Yeah, that's true. Anybody else? Yeah, he's, he's, he can rock it. He's going to throw in that organ. He's going to use those tentacles and make sure that the vibes are high on the trip. And then the entire crew, they're really big into games, right? You know, they play that liar's dice. Yes, that's true. All throughout the game. I'm big into games, make the road trip pass by. You know, this is going to be a fun cruise. It's going to be a fun car. Yeah. How about the smell? The smell? The smell? What are you worried about the smell? You wear nose plugs. Yes. Okay. Roll those windows down. Can't, uh, can't be sniffing. Okay. Brief. What about you? This was hard. I said Jack Sparrow just for the entertainment purposes. I just feel like he'd be annoying. Yes, but entertaining. It would make the time go by. You don't really know where he's going to turn. Yeah. Well, hopefully he wouldn't be driving. He'd probably take you off to drive, so. Too much rum. Yes, yes. Too much rum. Yes. Uh, I'm going to go with Solomon Kane in a straight jacket. I think that's a great partner. He's just not going to move. He's going to say ominous things very quietly. And I love that actor and his voice. So I think, I think he's going to just shut up. And we're just going to get to where we need to go. So that's my, uh, Solomon Kane in a straight jacket. Shut up and drive as they say. Yeah. Thank you, my friends. Uh, we're going to go next and I'm going to get Andy involved in this. So Andy, we've, we've talked about in the series about stunts. Uh, you are one of the more in shape people that we know. Uh, you have talked about the physical feat list. I want to talk about stunts, but I want to, I want to shout out some of the other physical feats that are kind of pseudo stunts, the pole climb, which we talked about with you extensively on our episode. Uh, you mentioned the Kremlin in prison run and ghost protocol. We're going to get to running. Don't worry. Uh, some of the longest running scenes of the franchise and then the, the deep water free, free dive, which we'll talk about here, but, um, anything about like just the physical feats in the franchise that you want to talk about before we get into the pick, pick a stunt. You just have to respect Tom Cruise's athletic ability in all of these and his defiance of age. And the balance that he has of strength and flexibility, like I feel like he does Pilates, but also at the same time he squats 400. And so I don't, I don't really know what his training regimen is. Uh, I'd love to be on it. I've been training for the pole climb. Um, yeah, we're still waiting for receipts on that Andy. So it's coming. I'm working on it. Um, but yeah, you just have to respect the, respect the game. The core strength is unbelievable. He must do a thousand crunches every morning before he does anything in the day. So. He is a specimen. Something to aspire to. He is amazing. All right, I'm going to break down some of the stunts and then our panel is going to choose a stunt they would have to do. You have to do this stunt. Obviously, you get the support of the team, but you have to do the stunt and you have to do one of these stunts. So for Mission Impossible, we have Uh, the sneaking into the CIA on the bungee cord. Now, at first glance, that seems like the easy first choice. Not that hard. Think about how long he had to shoot those scenes. So you think you're actually the actor in that scenario. Think about how much he had to be in that harness, hovering, maneuvering throughout that shoot. So I'm just giving that for context because it seems like the easiest one. Um, next is, uh, the rock climbing mission possible to, of course, um, mission impossible three, we have the scene on the bridge or the explosion where Tom Cruise gets thrown into a car. That was the actual stunt he did to simulate the explosion. He got essentially pulled into a car. Um, then we have, uh, what are, where are we at? Uh, yeah. The Burj Khalifa climb of course is up there, um, from, from ghost protocol. And then we have. We're all, we're all, okay. We have the, the, the, um, holding your breath. We have, um, we have the jump on the London roof where Tom Cruise is. Broke his ankle or shattered his ACL. Then we have, uh, from fallout is the helicopter drop where he's at the end of the scene, dropping from the helicopter onto the payload. Um, then from mission possible to, we have the, the motorcycle, uh, Just the, I just said general motorcycle stun, but it could be the one where he's lifting up. And then we also from fallout, we have the, the, the hella die or jump. Um, and then the other one that I want to throw out here from rogue nation is. You have to be Simon Pegg sitting in the stunt car while Tom Cruise drives. And then, of course, we have the plane hold that we've already talked about. Um, so out of all those, I know they were kind of convoluted in order, but let's start with Shannon. What stunt are you doing? For me, as I was looking through these, I'll tell you the one that I will never do, and that's the underwater. That terrifies me. Yes. Holding your breath underwater could never do it. But as I was looking through the options, I'm liking the having to ride along with Tom Cruise and scream and just be scared the whole time. Even if I had to be the one driving the car, I would still pick that over any of these others. It feels like Kushier with the airbags. A little bit more support. So that's, that's mine. Zach, what are you doing? What's done? Are you doing? Um, I do have to confess, I am the Ferb Heights, so all these are so scary, except for one, um, and that is... You gotta, you gotta do the motorcycle, guys. You gotta, you gotta do the motorcycle. Um, especially at the end when they're doing the joust. Yeah. Yes. They jump up and just flop on each other and then start fighting in the sand. That's the best way ever to end an entire stunt sequence. That's about, let me check the YouTube video. I was just referencing. Uh, three minutes long. Like, I mean, it is a really dynamic, dynamic scene. I mean, you gotta be able to pick that stunt above all the other ones. The rest are fine in my opinion. Yes, and low to the ground. You're not, you're not hanging off a building. That's true. Uh, Daniel, what about you? What stunt are you doing? Well, I hate to copy Zach, but the truth is. Oh, yeah. I love this. I love this Mission Impossible bromance that started here. Because the truth is all of these stunts will kill me. Just attempting, I will die. And I've never been on a motorcycle or a dirt bike. So I figure if I can ride the bike at least a little bit and do the jumping part and crash into somebody, It'll look cool. But everything else, I mean, I don't know. That's all I got. Mission Impossible two I just gotta support it. Mike, what are you doing? Probably the Halo jump. Oh, wow. Courageous. I love it. Everything says that to Daniel's point, like everything else is going to kill me. OK, the halo jump's not going to kill you. No, it will. It will. But like. Die in the air. Uh, okay. Andy and Brie, what are you guys doing? Um, am I one? Uh, Yeah. The external elements, like no, you know, gust of wind will come kind of more predictability with that one for me. Yeah. In a studio space. Yep. Yeah. Okay. Good call. Andy. I wish I could have put a hundred grand on Zach Hall picking the stunt. But what's the parlay on that? That's okay. I'm gonna choose the plane hold to the pinball. I think for two reasons. I Don't love heights, but when you're rising in height that fast, like you're just trying to climb. The Burj Khalifa seems more like if I look down, I'm screwed. Yeah. Type of deal. Uh, so if I think about my strength, just doing pull-ups, like I think that that'd be the one I do. And I would definitely die. Don't hear what I'm not saying. I definitely die. And when you died, that one would be like, eh, He went for it falling. You wouldn't feel anything. You wouldn't have a hundred million people in Dubai looking at you. So that's true. That's true. That's a good one. Uh, I'll jump in here. I'm going to say the, the, Probably the one I would like to do is the Mission Impossible three uh, stunt where he gets pulled into the car. I think that would, it's an extremely technical stunt and it uses the, uses some of the traditional old school pulley system. And I think it'd be really fun to do that. I would hurt really bad. Uh, but I think it'd be really fun to do that sequence, um, with the special effects in the whole team. The team would be really involved with that one. Which is what I'm looking for, like connecting to what Bree said, like you have a lot of the support system where a lot of these, it was obviously they had the support system, but it was really just up to Tom Cruise having the courage to do it. So I'm going to go with Mission Impossible three All right, friends. Uh, we're going to keep rolling here. Uh, we're going to build your team. So you have to pick three of your T three people for your team members. Of course, I'm going to list out our team members. We have Naya, Ilsa, Luther, Jane, Benji. Zen Lee, Brant, Billy, and Declan as your, your potential IMF team. Who are you picking? You can pick three, uh, to, to start your mission on. I'm going to start with Daniel here. Who are you picking on your team? Bill, I mean, Billy, I just, I feel bad for Billy. I mean, I was not expecting Billy to be picked. How could you not expect that? Everyone, like, even Declan, I feel, look at Declan's picture. I feel bad for the guy. But Billy, Billy just never had, beyond piloting a chopper, he didn't have much skill. Like, they haven't expanded upon that. They haven't given the guy a chance, but like, I know he's got more to offer. So I would go with Billy, um, Brandt probably. I mean, Brandt does it all. And Luther. Everyone loves Luther, right? That's a safe choice. It's a safe team. Yeah, safe team. Not too fancy. They get the job done. Yeah, I like it. I like it. Mike, who's your team? Um, like, I want to pick, uh, Billy, but not this Billy. I want to pick Billy Brennan from Jurassic Park three No, no, that's not allowed. We're not doing, that's a bit, that's another one. We'll do an episode where you have to pick a team from all of our franchises, but I do like the call out. Okay, all right. A lot of potential there too. I don't, Luke, I feel like this is a waste of time. It's Luther, Benji, and Ilsa. Like, I just. Ooh, yeah. Dream team. Dream team. But unless you're Zach Hall, in which case we'll figure out. Yeah, Zach, who's your team? I think I think I gotta wait till I hear everybody else's opinion. Okay, okay, okay. Shannon, who's your team? All I know is that I want Benji. He's my favorite. Just Benji. Can I have three Benjis? Yes, yes, you can. Yep. That is allowed. So you could have in the field Benji and you could have two IT Benjis. Yeah, he's at the computer. I love Benjis. Three Benjis. I love that. Uh, Bri and Andy, what about you guys? I, if I could do what Shannon did, I would pick three Luthers. Ooh. I love Luther. Yes. But I'm with Mike on the Benji, Luther, and Ilsa. Just like the old Reliables. Always been there and always come through, so. Arguably the best team. Are you? Uh, Andy, what about you? I would pick Zen Lee first overall because she's got the coolest name. Uh, and so that takes the cake for me. And the car. She's got a great car too. She probably has, she has a really good car. And then I'm picking Declan because honest to goodness, I don't remember what he's from and what role he plays in this franchise. He works with Zen Lee. That's a good pairing. They work well together. Oh, great. Perfect. Perfect. And then you got to throw a Lutheran because you always need a guy in your, in your bunker. Okay. Pulling for you. So the right side. I like it. Yes. The right side of the grid for those watching on YouTube. Uh, Zach, uh, we, we, you waited, we gave you time. Uh, the clock is ticking. You're on the board. Thank you. I think I just got to go with the coolest names as well. Declan, Zan, Lee, and Naya. Um, and Billy would be... Um, just in the background on comms. That's if I had to pick up just there, just there. Yeah. I like it. These are all really diverse, different teams. I'm, I'm excited. I thought maybe it would just be Ilsa, Benji and Luther, but you guys, you guys surprised me. I would actually, I go, no, go ahead, Zach. Oh, I was just picturing who's best in slow motion. That's all. Yeah. Oh, okay. Yes. In your mission, slow motion is really important. Yes. I'm, I'm, I'm going to go. I think here's the thing about Luther and Benji. I think they cancel each other out. You don't need to both of them. So I'm going to go with Luther. Ethan disagrees. I know Luther. I'm, I'm the team. I'm the team leader. Luther, Ilsa in Jane. I think Jane is highly underrated agent. She can do a little bit of everything. I like, I like having my, my, the female power out in the field. So. Ilson, Jane, and Luther are my, are my team. All right, we're moving on to leasties and besties. We did not do these for the franchise. Uh, so we're going into these categories and any of our guest panels, if you need to leave, uh, please do, because, um, I'm sure you have more important things than going through these, but, uh, we're, we're gonna, we're gonna ride. Into the sunset here. Uh, starting with the leasties. It's our favorite category from the born cast. It is least competent government employee. Now there's a lot of employees. Associated with the government. So it's kind of confusing. So I'll run through them. We have the original IMF team. We have William Don, uh, Don Lowe, who is the guy from mission impossible one. Who's the research person that, uh, has an upset stomach. Kittredge, of course, everyone's favorite ominous government employee. Lindsay Ferris, uh, which I, I have a, it's, I know that's a little controversial, but, uh, Not great in Mission Hospital three if you really break it down. Uh, John Musgrave from Mission Hospital three who betrays Ethan. Uh, and then, and this is in Ghost Protocol. Uh, Antolya Sadorov, now you, you would say, well, he's a government employee. He's a government employee of Russia, and he does a terrible job finding Ethan. We have Brandt. That might be controversial, but technically when he's framed, he's framed initially as a government employee to us as an analyst. And I don't think he's the best analyst. So I'm throwing out there, but we can argue about it. We have Adelaide who is working for the UK government who betrays Ilsa. We have Erica Sloan. And I'm throwing this out here because in fallout, Her like right-hand person she puts in the field essentially is the bad guy of the movie. So I think that's a, and somehow she becomes president. Um, and then we have Briggs from Ghost Protocol, just kind of like your generic guy who's trying to find another guy. And, uh, Denlinger, who is like the, I think he's the director of defense, um, who's, who's trying to buy the entity. Uh, I'm going to just open the floor. Who, who has an argument of who's the least competent government employee? So it's gotta be the ones that get crushed by an elevator, right? The original IMF team. The original IMF team? I mean, they're out like ten minutes into the movie. That's true. That's true. The rest of them don't get crushed by elevators. I think they're a tier above. I gotta agree. There's, I don't know what anybody else did in these movies, but I know what they did, and I know they didn't do it right. That's all I know. I mean, the one guy did have like attack diarrhea. That's what was like. He's not bad at his job. It just, he had a really bad day and then he got sent to Alaska. And didn't even get time to pack. Send him his clothes. Tough day at the office, I do have to say. I do feel bad for him. I'm going to go out on, I think Erica Sloan is she, again, this is the conflict. If you remember is IMF versus CIA. She steps in and says, I want someone there operationally to like be, be in the mix. And she basically sends in the villain of the film. Uh, so I'm going to say, and then she tries to fix it. But if you remember, like they're in the, they're in the bunker and she tries to fix it and bring them all home and her own operation, her CIA like operation, half of them. Have betrayed, uh, immediately. So I, I'm going to, I, I'm going to argue Erica Sloan. She really drops the ball. I feel like that's probably the bigger stakes and like, you know, drops the ball. But I do have to agree with Mike on, um, the, the diarrhea guy. That's like, to me, that's like so quintessential, just like, you know, getting distracted by something so simple and it's just so funny, but. Shannon, Shannon's been known to hour through attack diarrhea. Oh, yeah, it's true. You can't let it get in the way of your work. You know, you've got an objective. You gotta just, you know, keep it in and move on. I think, I think there, there's a case for William Don, diarrhea guy, as we're calling him. Uh, he's the poster child for least competent government employee. He's definitely plays the doofus. Even like the look of him and like, you know, it's the, you know, the styling of the movie is older. Right. I don't know. Just like his character feels that way a little bit, how it's portrayed on screen. So that's a good point. He's the poster child for least competent government employee. Uh, Daniel, I don't, do you want to chime in here before we move on to the next category? I'll just say that, you know, I didn't think about Erica Sloan being on this. I didn't agree with you at first, but now I do. I mean, if it wasn't for her, I mean, should she even be present in the new movie with a mistake like that? Probably not. Like, there should have been investigations into it. Yeah. So, I appreciate you bringing that to my attention because I was not thinking about that. I, I, I just caught on my, when I recently rewatched it, I was like, oh, all of her decisions worked out very poorly and thwarted Ethan at every turn. All right. So we can, we do, you can do a tie between diarrhea guy and Erica Sloan with the original IMF team coming up just behind us. All right. Next is, there's a great cast of villains in this franchise. Some of them are more effective than others. So we're doing least effective villain. Of course, we have Jim Phelps from the first one, Ambrose, Davian from three, Hendrix, Lane, and then I'm going to throw in Walker there. Um, Shannon has to drop. Thank you for joining us, Shannon, and bring your expertise and charm. We appreciate it. Uh, thank you, Mike's partner. So what, who's the least effective villain here? We have two guys who are trying to use nuclear or three guys, two guys trying to use nuclear weapons that, that don't in Hendrix and Walker. Lane is essentially loses a game of like a bluff game with Ethan because he wants money to run his shadow organization. Davian trying to get the rabbit's foot. He's pretty effective though. I have an argument, uh, an outside the box argument for why Sean Ambrose is the most effective villain, um, and this list. Okay. Mall years, Mike. um the panel is shrunk to a very very excited mission impossible to loyalist group yeah the uh sean ambrose is the most effective villain because He did everything that he did on the lowest budget. Yeah. Yeah. When you think about it, just very low budget, keeping it tight. I mean, he spent a lot of money on, on the memory card, his house. I mean, his house. Yeah. That made us styrofoam. Paid for by the pharmaceutical company. Would you say, Mike, that he wasn't staffed for that? No, thank you. No, he had staffing. He did have staffing. I think that's a good point. I think Davian, I think Davian was, he was effective. Ambrose was effective because he did want to mess with Ethan. And to, to be fair, Ambrose had a much more complicated goal. He was trying to get stocks for a pharmaceutical company. Yeah. By create, by, uh, uh, help me here by, uh, stealing. A disease. He was, yeah, it's still a disease. It's very complicated. He's trying to essentially make, it would be essentially if you Cause COVID because you had stock in Pfizer. That's essentially what he's trying to do. So very like, but it, but it's actually aggressive. We think about the other characters. It was just like, get a nuclear weapon and explode it, you know? So, we gotta give him credit for that. Davian, I think, is probably actually the most effective because he gets under Ethan's skin the most. He's the one who really emotionally messes With Ethan. So I think he's effective in that way. His final goal is not achieved, but I think he's the most effective in disrupting our hero. I think Walker's the least effective. I was going to agree with you, Mike. That's what we said over here. He's all brute and no brains. That's exactly what we said. Just to do the one-two punch. Yeah. And then that was it. Still to get beat by Ethan. Yeah, especially under the circumstances. Like, he, like, all he had to do was just get that trigger away from Ethan and who was in a different helicopter. Maybe if they had different background music, um, in the club, they would have. Yeah. That would have ended better. Daniel, what about you? I'm really torn. I don't know. I mean, here's the thing. It's not. Okay. Sean Ambrose is effective, but I want to point out though, the opening scene of MI2 on the plane was, He doesn't even realize That the guy that he kills, um, had injected himself with the virus. So he, he had the virus already. He just didn't know it. So as far like he could have ended the whole thing right there, taking this guy's blood or whatever. Um, At the same time, it's easy to look at him being very effective because He plays Tom Cruise. He plays Ethan Hunt throughout the movie and tricks people. As far as the big picture, he's probably not the least effective. I think the least effective, I do kind of agree with Walker because Walker is just kind of like A guy. He's like the, literally the muscle, um, not much else. But, um, I don't know. I think one thing about mission impossible movies that I do, they have pretty good villains. Uh, but yeah, you're probably right. Walker's probably the least effective. Yeah, I think it's a good call. I think we came to a good conclusion here. Jim Phelps is pretty effective. We didn't mention him, but he is pretty effective because he wipes out his entire crew in one night. So that's And stays under the radar like the entire. Yeah, that's true. Towards the end. I mean, that's pretty, and pretty much gets Ethan kicked, you know, for, I think at the end he's kicked for a little bit, right? Yeah. Yeah. So it's about, yeah, yeah. All right. Next is least favorite MacGuffin. Now, if you don't know what the term MacGuffin is, it's for the film nerds on there. I think it it's it's Hitchcock really made the phrase famous, but it's essentially it's an item or a totem. That our hero is trying to get or it is impacting the plot. Think about every single Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Uh, there is a. Powerful MacGuffin that those movies are made from MacGuffins, uh, but also mission possible. We have MacGuffins here. Um, and some are very intentional MacGuffins. Some are just plot MacGuffins. Uh, so I'm going to read, read some off here. We have the knock list on a floppy disc. For mission possible one, we have the chimera virus on the thirty-two uh, it's megabyte memory card. And then we have the rabbit's foot, which if you know, behind the scenes was essentially the plot of the movie, JJ Abrams, uh, Did this as kind of an homage to action cinema of saying a rabbit's foot. I'm just going to name it the rabbit's foot. We don't know what it is until maybe the next movie. I don't know. The rabbit's foot might come back. Uh, we have the syndicate ledger. We have just John Lark as a, as a MacGuffin. Uh, and then we have nuclear bombs and the cruciform key. What's your least favorite MacGuffin out of the franchise? That rabbit's foot sounds lame. It sounds lame, but it's actually, I think it works in the movie. Because it's when we start to see a turn to like where it's not necessarily about the Not the plot. It's not necessarily about the end goal for Ethan. It's about the journey to get there. And I think mission possible three calls it out. I'm right. I'm ready to say that the most recent MacGuffin is the worst MacGuffin. The cruise form key. Yep. It is like very old school movies. It's, it's an actual key and there's two ends of the key. It's, I understand that there's like, there's, it's a, it's an analogy to the fact that like the key is literally analog. And like it's analog versus digital. I get all that. It's just like, it, it's just, I don't know. I don't like it. You don't like it. Uh, being handy. What about you guys? We agreed on the syndicate leisure. Just because it's a list of names that we never see. It's just a, yeah, it's just a spreadsheet. How big of an Excel file do you think that is? Oh, that's only a couple of gigs at max. It's just a list of names. That could have gone on a file. No, it's way less than gigs, right? I didn't realize we essentially have two. We have the ledger and the knock list, which are essentially spreadsheets. Yep. It's kind of, I like it. It doesn't get the juices flowing. Yeah. I will say, I will say with the syndicate ledger, it's probably gonna be, uh, even if it may be a larger file than the NAC list, it may be, um, It may be a smaller file in terms of data because as technology has improved, the way we've compressed data has improved as well. Good point, good point. Daniel, what about you? Well, I'm going to say nuclear bombs only because in these movies, you know, they're not going to go off. It's almost for sure that they're going to stop it. So it's kind of like it's pointless, but I mean, it's a great point. Yeah, but. Yeah, probably nuclear bombs. Simple answer on that. I agree with that one, Daniel. It's, it's very Bondi to have just a nuclear bomb with like a timer. I think that's what actually makes Fallout a great film because there's the Again, we know Ethan's going to save the day, but it's, it's the separating between like the, the trigger and the multiple bombs on the, and the facility and the. Um, campsite that makes it so intense where our heroes have to stop the bombs from going off, but also get the key. It was a nice like change, but I think. I think, uh, the, the, the ghost protocol nuclear bomb, I think is my least favorite. Cause it's just, it's essentially like Bri already talked about. It's like a old guy with briefcase and, but we do get that moment where mission accomplished. All right. Let's go. I think, uh, nuclear bombs. I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to override everybody there. All right. Besties. Let's get positive guys. Come on. As we roll to the end, a very fun category, best running, uh, Andy, I know you're a fan of, of all the running scenes as we all are. Uh, there's. There's so many to choose from. If you have one that's not on this list, please let me know. I just tried to get the gifts of the ones that I like. So from the first film, uh, we have, uh, of course the running from the aquarium bursting. Uh, Mission Impossible three it's the running, this is the Chef Boyardee, uh, section of the film. Um, it's Ethan running through kind of that, the Chinese environment. It was one of the first big like sequences where it was all about the run. Ghost Protocol, the running from the Burj Khalifa with the dust storm. Rogue Nation, there's a couple different ones. I like the one where he has his shirt off. I mean, it's pretty good. And then we have a running on the, the, the, the roof scape of London and then fall out or, uh, uh, dead reckoning or final reckoning. We have, um, The running with the candle lights in Italy. So there's a lot in there. I didn't put a mission impossible one because I wasn't sure what the main running scene is from there. Which movie? Mission Impossible two Sorry. Mission Impossible two Yeah, there's no running. There's really no clear definitive running scene. The best running we get is when he's on his Heelys. Yeah, it's really the bike. He's actually on Healy's going past the door. Yeah. Well, there's not a lot of running. I think he's, we have to look back at the, uh, spreadsheets for that. I don't know if you have any data on that, Mike, but, um. Daniel, you have to go soon. So what, what's your favorite, favorite running scene? Oh, definitely. Uh, ghost protocol sandstorm. I mean, that's, yeah, it's such a cool shot. It's, it's a gift used across corporate America. Um, and, and it's a meme essentially now. So I think it's, it's definitely one that stands out. Yeah. Love it. But yeah, thanks for inviting me on the podcast. Daniel, thank you. You are a good friend and a gift to us all. Thank you. And we're excited to talk more about this film. Excited for it to come out and hear your thoughts as always. Oh, I'll, I'll definitely share them with you. So yes, we're excited. Cheers, my friend. All right. Thanks. Bye everyone. Anybody want to defend, uh, another running scene? I think the, the ghost protocol one is up there, but. Mine is dead reckoning. With the lights. Yeah. Candle light. Yeah. Candle lit atmosphere. Yeah. It's really nice. It's really, they're like, let's get a little soft. Let's get a little romantic. Yeah. Yeah. I agree, Bri, when I rewatched all the movies and saw that, I was like, wow. I think in the theater, I, it was a wow moment, but there was so much happening, but rewatching it, it really stood out. The only one that's in, um, like the Mission Impossible one. There's the running that one's in slow motion, right? Yeah. And there's the rain sequence where the bridge with the bridges. So that's the, the other one where he's going from the phone booth. And we talked about that in the first episode. Yeah, he goes, it is slow motion, and at the end, we don't really know how far he runs because the camera stays in the shot and just cranes up as he runs away. This is my favorite. It's like a wind-up toy. Like, let's just send him out into the horizon. Yeah, that's my favorite, but that's just me. I can't choose. I don't think we can choose the best. I think they're all great because I love the mission impossible three one. It's just, it's such a fun sequence because they filmed through these. The streets and it's just magical. Uh, I can't choose one. And the London one is great too. I mean, London's so beautiful and to see Tom Cruise running, I could just watch hours and hours of footage of that. It just, it just be like meditative for me. We can't choose one. I just can't. I can't pick one. It's like, it's all my favorite children. All right. Uh, we're moving into our last categories. Thank you for my friends for staying with us here. Uh, as we, we, we finalize this extravaganza. Uh, I, this is, this is tricky. The best carb slash bike chase. I noticed that there were bikes and cars were involved in all the chases. Uh, so not every movie has a bike chase or a car chase. There's a train helicopter chase in the first movie, uh, but mission impossible too. Of course we have chases. We have the car chase with the Audi and the, and the Porsche. I think I believe it was a Porsche. Uh, at the start of the film, we have the bike, just the bike chase. We can't, we've already talked about it. It's just epic. Uh, ghost protocol. We have the car chase in the sand. Then a rogue nation, we, this is, this is what, this is the new trend that I noticed when McQuarrie gets involved, we have this thing called the bike car or car to bike. Where and go in a rogue nation, it's the Simon pegs in the car. And then it goes on to the bikes where Ilsa's on her bike, that bike chase. Then in fall fallout, it's where they're in the retro BMW in Paris and then, or the bike starts. And then we go into the retro BMW in Paris and then, and, uh, Dead reckoning. We have the BMW police bike into the other car and then the Fiat. So there's multiple cars. So there it's, it's, it's pretty fun to see the trends where Macquarie Macquarie is like, we're going to get the bikes and the cars involved. But there's a lot here, but, and they're all great, but what's, what's your favorite guys? What, what stands out to you? Bree and Andy, do you guys have one? I like how you guys like confer. Like you guys are like confer. Like we do together. It's so cute. It's so cute. No, I let you go first. Ladies first, ladies first, but no, they're handcuffed in the taxi. So it's so good. It's so good. You're right. I rewatch it. That was my favorite part of the movie when I saw it in the theater and rewatching it. I was like, this is amazing. I can't believe someone hasn't done this. It's a good one. It was good. Let Zach talk about his motorcycle scene now. Yeah, I mean, that's a really good scene. You guys are right. But I mean, imagine also uh, entangled romance through Two cars driving through a mountain range and then as they go and nearly collide in a Merry go round of cars, um, making the eye contact with your loved one. I don't think, I don't think you can write that better in a, in a romance romance novel. Um, I wish I could give you more opinions on any of these other scenes. They look really cool. But I think I have to say, uh, that the motorcycle is the best. Yes. Yes. Am I too? Yes. I'm here still. I'm still. Yes. Zach is still here earlier. Yes. God. Michael. My favorite is the fallout one. Um, specifically the, the bike portion of the chase. That's my favorite. Sequence. I'm going to, I'm going to break the tie. I'm going to go with dead reckoning with the fiat with the, with the cuffs. I absolutely love that. I think it's one of the more innovative chase sequences, car chase sequence. And it's funny. There's, there's. My favorite line in that is when Ethan says, uh, when he's trying to use the car and he says, sorry, this never happens. It's a little bit of an in joke. Of the age of Tom Cruise and his, um, virility, let's just say that I really appreciate, appreciate it. I think it's definitely, there's so many good ones. It's like, again, choosing your favorite child, but. Uh, it's as the most recent one, I think it was the most fun and clever and innovative mission possible to also is it's that that's special as a special place in my heart. All right, moving on. This is gonna be a short one. Best secretary. Uh, We have Hunley. We have Secretary, who's played by Tom Wilkinson, just Secretary. We have Theodore Brassel, who's not really... He never is, I don't think... Titleist secretary. And then we have mission commander Swan back. Who's essentially the secretary as Anthony Hopkins and he's uncredited. Do you have one that stands out to you guys? I have a theory that I think. Daniel's onto something where maybe we see something, somebody come back from this group. Maybe. I think, uh, Anthony Hopkins as the entity controller would be really interesting. I mean, it's gotta be Morpheus, so. Yeah, Theodore Brassel. Gotta be Morpheus. I wish he would have done more in that movie because I think he's essentially you, it's set up to make the audience think that he's the villain and that he's really, and they kind of do that with Hunley a little bit. Um, but he's, he could have been in a few more of the movies. I think it would have been great to keep him. Yeah, Lawrence Fishburne's thumbnail in here looks like he was walking out of a building. Ethan came up to him and said something like, hmm? And then just kept moving. Like, just doesn't seem like he had a lot of screen time. That deep eye contact, though, from Swanbeck. I could do all that. Yeah. Tony Hopkins. I mean, they really, they, they, he was there for one day and they're like, we're just going to shoot the crap out of this beautiful man. Mike, what about you? Um, Hanley. Yeah, I agree. I'm a, I'm a Hunley fan. I'm going to vote Hunley. I think Hunley wins. He's, he's the only one who gets multiple showings and I really love how he becomes part of the team and then unfortunately dies immediately. It's kind of the end of Alec Baldwin's career too. When he dies there, it's like, it was like very symbolic. Like this is the last big movie he's going to be in. Ooh. All right. We have, uh, two more categories here. Best ally, uh, From the franchise. This is someone who maybe isn't officially part of the IMF team, but that comes in and helps Ethan or falls in love with Ethan. We have Max in the first film, um, who helps. She's kind of a smuggler that helps kind of, Uh, Ethan get financed for his Pentagon raid. We have Naya, of course, from Dispatchable two Julia, who is an ally, who is a romance, who is his, uh, his true love fiance, uh, wife. Yeah, they get married right in the hospital. And then we have the only male ally is Bogdan from Ghost Protocol. This is the Russian guy from the jail. That Ethan goes back to when they need some help. And then of course we have Ilsa with a rogue nation. And then we have the white widow who is Max's daughter. If you guys didn't catch that, I never caught that. She's Nax's daughter. And then we have Grace from the new movie. Who's your favorite ally, friends? Mike? Elsa. Tough to beat, Elsa. Elsa, yeah. I mean, Jane's funny or Julia's funny because she's the one that, and Bri just brought this up, right? She learns how to shoot a gun quick. Yeah, she does. When she's in the apartment and she kills. Yeah. Quick learner. Quick learner. Yeah. She did a good job and she resurrected Ethan. So it's pretty good ally. Yeah. Zach, what about you? Is it Naya? It's gotta be Ilsa. Yeah, it's Ilsa. It's Ilsa. It's Ilsa. We all know. We all know. She is by far the best. Grace? I like her, but she's got another movie. We'll see. We might have to do this category again. Uh, and last but not least, I'm sorry. Daniel's not here. Uh, this was one he called for a best. Hair. This is our final category as we wrap up our extravaganza. Uh, one of the best parts about Tom Cruise, of course, is his charisma. It's his stunts. It's his acting ability, but also his hair. And because this franchise has gone along so, so long in his life, in our lives, we have different versions of his hair that I think really symbolize what's happening in the movie. Of course, I would describe the hair, but I can't really. So I'll let our esteemed panel just start talking about the different hair stylings of Tom Cruise in this franchise. Anything stand out to you? I'll call out the main, we have the big differences long and short. Long, we have Mission Impossible two Ghost Protocol, we have Final Reckoning, and then Rogue Nation, it's kind of a half. It's not totally short. Zach, you're about to jump in here. Yeah, so I was, I came only without facts today, so I just have a lot of other things to bring to the table. Fair facts. So I went to chat DPT about an hour ago and asked, like, what's the most fire facts for Mission Impossible two that I could also talk about? I met, like, the fire in the... In the movie used because it's fire is, there's a lot of fire, but the number four of the top five firebacks was that Tom Cruise grew out his hair for the role. Um, And I think that's gotta be it. Um, that should be possible too. That those long locks, man, those long locks. Yeah. It's a lot of slow motion. It's, it's, it's, it's definitely the hair that's shot the most with intention. Yes. Intentionally we are seeing the hair at its fullest. Exactly. Yeah, I think the entity would also agree. Yes, I agree. I think so. There's a lot of hair choreographed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In that movie. I like the original. Um. Nice and tight, young crews. Yep. High and tight. It's a little spiky. It's interesting because they could have done frosted tips there maybe. It was right around the era and I'm glad they didn't. But we have a little bit of that kind of like Gel. Kind of the boy band. Boy band, yeah. Style hair. But it's not like, it doesn't take you out of it. Yeah. Andy, what about you? Are you, are you in on. Yeah, I mean, I'm short, short hair guy. Short hair, uh, first one. Yeah. Mike, what about you? I like Michigan Passable one It's giving me serious Jerry Maguire vibes. Yeah. Yeah. Show me the money, mate. I'm gonna make an argument for Mission Impossible three It's a little bit longer than MI1. I think Cruise looks the best in Mission Impossible three Yeah. I don't know what his age. I think he might have been late 30s. I could be wrong with that early for Zach. Did you come with that fact? Tom Cruise's age. I forty-five forty-four I thought you only came. I guess you only came with forty-four and Tom Cruise years is thirty-four These fingers are fire on a keyboard as well. So six fun back. I found from catch you. I, I think it's, it's, he looks the best in that movie. He looks great in all the movies, but I think Mr. Impossible three, he's at his peak, like physical form, uh, and just like cut lean, but still looks young. I'm gonna, I'm gonna go with Zach with Mission Impossible two I mean, his hair is a feature of the movie, but I think we can have a friendly draw here with the first two movies. With both versions of hair, we have the two extremes of the hair. And I think that's symbolic of this franchise, the beauty of this franchise and all its splendor friends. We made it. This is the end of the final reckoning preview extravaganza. Thank you, listeners, viewers, for staying with us. Thank you to our esteemed panel who joined us. Thank you for Zach for staying all the way and for Bree and Andy for sticking with us. From the get go. Uh, we really appreciate it. Uh, final words, Mike, uh, just about this franchise, all of our franchises, the next movie and what's ahead. Uh, go mission impossible. What great sage advice for a co-host. Love it. I wish Daniel was here. I'm not gonna lie, Zach. You said you prepared by bringing dumb facts to this podcast. I want you to know that The preparation you did for this podcast is in some total more preparation than I've done for any of the podcasts over any of the rewatch series that we've done. And on that note, friends, we will leave you. We will be back for a recap of this movie, The Final Reckoning. We will do a post-game reactions, all the things, and talk about this final question mark installment. Thank you for joining us. More to come as we count down to the final reckoning.
