Tom Cruise has confirmed that he will film the next two Mission: Impossible movies back-to-back, ahead of releases in 2021 and 2022.
On Monday (14Jan18), it was reported that Christopher McQuarrie, who wrote and directed the fifth and sixth instalments, 2015’s Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation and 2018’s Mission: Impossible – Fallout, had signed on to continue as writer and director of the seventh and eighth chapters, which would be shot back-to-back and be released in the summers of 2021 and 2022.
Cruise, who has played IMF agent Ethan Hunt in the action franchise since 1996, confirmed the news on Twitter by sharing a video of the M:I logo with fuses burning at both sides. In the caption, he wrote, “Summer 2021 and Summer 2022.”
McQuarrie also confirmed his returning roles by tweeting, “Missions: Accepted #MissionImpossible” and sharing Cruise’s post.
The news comes six months after the release of Fallout, which made more than $790 million at the global box office, a franchise best, and was the best-reviewed instalment so far.
McQuarrie, who won an Oscar for writing 1995 movie The Usual Suspects, will now set to work on developing the script while Cruise finishes shooting Top Gun: Maverick, in which he reprises his role of Pete ‘Maverick’ Mitchell more than 30 years after his original outing in 1986’s Top Gun. The sequel is set for release in June 2020.
Bosses at Paramount Pictures used to switch up directors of the Mission franchise with each installment, but seemed to have settled on McQuarrie since 2015. He has also worked closely with Cruise at other points in his career – writing and directing his 2012 movie Jack Reacher and serving as scribe for his movie The Mummy, Valkyrie and Edge of Tomorrow.
According to Variety, Mission: Impossible is likely to begin filming later in 2019. It is not yet known if franchise regulars Simon Pegg, Ving Rhames and Rebecca Ferguson will return.
