Mission: Impossible – ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning

director Christopher McQuarrie shares his honest thoughts about the film’s poor box office performance and won’t accept any excuses. Hitting theaters in summer 2023, the seventh installment in the Mission: Impossible franchise sees Tom Cruise back as Ethan Hunt, this time facing off against an evil AI known as the Enтιтy and its human emissary, Gabriel (Esai Morales). Though Mission: Impossible – ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning reviews were glowing from critics, the film, which carried a COVID-inflated estimated budget of $291 million, was a commercial disappointment, grossing $571 million worldwide.

During a recent interview with Empire, McQuarrie gets candid about Mission: Impossible – ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning not meeting its box office expectations. The director isn’t interested in making any excuses, saying that he and Cruise know that parts of the movie were divisive for audiences. From the sounds of things, he and Cruise are using this to make the upcoming Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning even better. Check out McQuarrie’s comment below:

“It didn’t work for everybody. Elements of the film didn’t work for everybody. I feel it, I hear it, and I respect it. I don’t look at those people and go, ‘They didn’t get it.’ That’s a f*cking cop-out. Tom and I looked at that, as we look at every movie. If the movie made $600 million or six dollars, I would say it could have been better. For everybody that had a great time, we honoured our commitment. For everybody that didn’t, we don’t stop. We do not f*cking stop.”

What McQuarrie’s Comments Mean For Mission: Impossible 7

Other Factors Also Affected The Film’s Box Office Performance

On Rotten Tomatoes, Mission: Impossible – ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning has a 96% score from critics. Sometimes, what works for critics doesn’t work for general audiences, but the audience score for the movie is also an impressive 94%. Now, Rotten Tomatoes scores certainly don’t tell the whole story, but, generally speaking, ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning seems to have been well-received, and there likely wasn’t much negative word-of-mouth working against it.

Instead, ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning was a victim of its theatrical window. The seventh Mission: Impossible movie hit theaters only about a week before the dual release of Oppenheimer and Barbie, and the “Barbenheimer” phenomenon largely took over movie theaters for months. Importantly, the release of Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer meant that ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning lost its IMAX screens after only a week, and PLF (premium large format) showings can make up a considerable portion of the box office on these types of blockbusters.

Our Take On McQuarrie’s Mission: Impossible – ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning Comments

The Final Reckoning Could Have More Success

The upcoming Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning already looks to be on much surer footing purely because it won’t have any major compeтιтion when it releases in May, and it will hold onto its IMAX screens for much longer. Still, it sounds like ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning‘s underperformance resulted in a bit of a re-think from McQuarrie and Cruise about this next movie, and it’s possible that some elements of the previous film won’t be included in the next one.

The AI villain, for example, which was somewhat divisive in ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning, could end up being downplayed in The Final Reckoning in favor of a more human threat. While Mission: Impossible – ᴅᴇᴀᴅ Reckoning‘s quality doesn’t seem to have been a major factor in its underwhelming box office, it’s clear that McQuarrie and Cruise aren’t letting it deter them, and they’re still ᴅᴇᴀᴅ set on providing the most entertaining experience possible for audiences.

Source: Empire