There's Only 1 Actor Who Has Fought Ethan Hunt & John Wick

Mission: Impossible and John Wick are two of the best modern action franchises, allowing Tom Cruise and Keanu Reeves to showcase their leading man abilities in different ways. Although Cruise’s series began almost two decades before Reeves’, the franchises have collectively been examples of modern action spectacles for roughly the last decade. Mission: Impossible and John Wick both push their stars to do more impressive practical action sequences, with Cruise relying more on big-scale, unbelievable set pieces, while Reeves commands the screen with intricately designed fights and shootouts.

Cruise’s Ethan Hunt has remained a daring spy who will risk his own life to save the lives of others, no matter how much danger that puts him in. Meanwhile, Reeves’ John Wick has continued to work his way through the ᴀssᴀssin underworld for a variety of vengeful reasons. They’ve wowed audiences with each new installment and villainous plot they’ve defeated, becoming more heroic every time. But, how compelling they are is often enhanced by the foe they’re up against. One lucky actor has had the privilege of fighting both Ethan Hunt and John Wick even.

Michael Nyqvist Is The Only Actor To Be A Villain In Mission: Impossible & John Wick

He’s Great At Playing Russian Bad Guys

Across the seven, soon to be eight, Mission: Impossible movies and the four, soon to be five, John Wick movies, audiences have seen some big-name actors step into the franchises as villains. Jon Voight, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Léa Seydoux, Henry Cavill, Sean Harris, and Esai Morales have all done it on the Mission: Impossible side, while Common, Ruby Rose, Bill Skarsgård, Mark Dacascos, and others have been John Wick villains.

Currently, actor Michael Nyqvist is the only actor who has been a villain in both franchises. He is best known for his role in the Swedish trilogy of The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo movies, but he’s also challenged both Ethan Hunt and John Wick on different occasions. While there could be some overlap between the stunt performers or henchmen actors in the various films, Nyqvist remains the only person who can say they were a main villain in Mission: Impossible and John Wick.

Nyqvist first got the challenge of being Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol‘s villain. His character, Kurt Hendricks, is the main antagonist of the fourth installment in Tom Cruise’s franchise. He’s responsible for the Kremlin bombing and nearly starting a nuclear war between Russia and the United States. This was only avoided because of the heroics of Ethan Hunt and his IMF team, but only after Michael Nyqvist’s Mission: Impossible villain got the chance to fight Tom Cruise in the finale.

Three years after being Ghost Protocol‘s villain, Nyqvist was part of the cast of the first John Wick. He played Viggo Tarasov, a powerful Russian crime boss. Viggo played a key role in John Wick’s life, bringing him aboard the Russian crime scene and orchestrating the “impossible task” that John had to complete to be free of the ᴀssᴀssin life. It was years later that Viggo and John’s lives crossed again when Viggo’s son killed John’s dog, setting off a ᴅᴇᴀᴅly chain of events. In the end, Nyqvist’s villain is left to fight Keanu Reeves by himself.

Michael Nyqvist’s Villains Both Died Fighting Ethan Hunt & John Wick

How They Died Is Very Different

Thanks to his villainous experience with Mission: Impossible and John Wick, Michael Nyqvist is in a company all his own. He’s the only actor to be a main villain in both franchises. The way the stories develop also means he’s the only one who has fought both Ethan Hunt and John Wick. That’s a notable achievement for Nyqvist and shows how great he is at occupying these Russian villain roles in major action franchises.

Unfortunately for Nyqvist, neither of his villains made it out of their interactions with the franchise heroes alive. Ethan is indirectly responsible for Kurt Hendricks’ death in Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol‘s ending. Kurt jumps off a ledge to keep the case that can disarm the missile away from Ethan. While he survives the fall, technically, he dies shortly after seeing Ethan stop his plan. John Wick stabs Viggo in the neck with a knife, making him one of John Wick’s many victims. His demises are par for the course for most Mission: Impossible and John Wick villains.

Mission: Impossible

The Mission: Impossible franchise is an American action spy series that began with the 1996 film Mission: Impossible and has since become one of the most successful and long-running franchises in Hollywood. The films follow Ethan Hunt, an agent of the Impossible Missions Force (IMF), as he takes on various high-stakes missions around the world, often involving intricate heists, double-crosses, and death-defying stunts. The franchise is renowned for its intense action sequences, particularly those performed by Tom Cruise, who insists on doing many of his own stunts.
John Wick

“John Wick” is a neo-noir action-thriller franchise centered around a retired hitman who returns to the criminal underworld to seek vengeance. Known for its intense and stylistic action sequences, the franchise has redefined modern action cinema with its choreographed gunfights, hand-to-hand combat, and intricate world-building. The series explores themes of loyalty, honor, and survival in a secret society of ᴀssᴀssins.