Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning director Christopher McQuarrie explains the unusual thing that inspired one of the movie’s big stunts after Tom Cruise unexpectedly crashed his Q&A. McQuarrie has been the driving creative force behind the Mission: Impossible movies for several years now. He first signed on to direct Rogue Nation in 2015 and then helmed three more movies in the franchise. Next week will see the release of Ethan Hunt’s final chapter Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, which will premiere at the Cannes Film Festival before opening in theaters worldwide.

While McQuarrie was giving a Masterclass at Cannes, attended by ScreenRant‘s Graeme Guttmann, Cruise unexpectedly showed up and joined him on stage. This prompted the director to discuss their working relationship, and he revealed how Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning‘s “craziest stunt” came to be. This scene apparently had its origins in a TikTok video McQuarrie sent Cruise. Instead of laughing, Cruise enthusiastically responded “I could do that!” And so, a sequence where Cruise is “on the wing of the plane” was born. Check out the full quote from McQuarrie below:

The craziest stunt in the film, towards the very, very end of the film, was the result of my foolishly showing Tom a TikTok video, thinking he’d simply be amused by it. And he said, ‘I could do that!’ And I said, ‘No you can’t!’ And he said, ‘Yes!’ And then we went about developing the process… I’m often asked, does Tom suggest something that I say no [to]? No. Do I regret suggesting many things to Tom? Yes.

In the midst of those sequences, when he’s on the wing of the plane– The fun of our back-and-forth is, we start all these movies with each asking the other, ‘What do you want to do with this one?’ And I knew I had a submarine sequence because of where the last movie left off, and Tom wanted to do a wingwalking sequence. And it’s in the midst of those sequences when you’re being utterly crushed by your ambitions that the one whose idea it wasn’t would turn to the one whose idea it was, and pause and say, ‘You wanted this. This was your idea.’ Our ideas come back to teach us a lesson or two.

What This Means For Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning

Cruise Is Known For His Big Stunts

This story aligns with the expectations of Cruise given his history. The action star is known for his daring atтιтude when it comes to stunt work, often performing his own stunts for movies. This has been particularly the case in the Mission: Impossible movies, where Cruise performed terrifying stunts such as hanging off the end of a commercial jet plane and holding his breath underwater for long periods. The wing walking scene is the latest in the series of daring stunts that Cruise has done for the big screen.

McQuarrie was not the only one to think that Cruise’s wing walking would be unwise. In a recent interview with GQ, McQuarrie explained how he and Cruise met with professional wing walkers to plan the stunt. Several professionals gave them sentiments along the lines of “That will never happen. You can never do that.” They worked around these initial hurdles and found wing walkers that would help make the stunt happen. The resistance faced by those with experience proves just how out there Cruise’s final The Final Reckoning stunt is.

Our Take On The Final Reckoning Stunt Work

It Has Been Heavily Featured In The Trailer

The wing walking has been capitalized on in the marketing campaign for Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning. Some initial reactions to the movie have said that it is less action-packed than many of the franchise’s other installments, but that the available action sequences pay off. McQuarrie’s description of this stunt and its unbelievable nature instilled confidence in me that this is indeed the case, making the movie a rewarding experience even if the action scenes are more scarce than in other films in the franchise.

Source: GQ