Mark Sims

The Last Jedi is the boldest, strangest and longest Star Wars film, yet!

This is the first Mission I'd seen at a cinema since M:I-III in 2006. I don't know why I'd skipped 4 & 5 but, having watched them since, it's clear that this franchise, unlike others, only improves with age and Fallout continues this trend. Where the first Mission came in the wake of the reinvented Bond franchise in 1996, 007 now struggles to keep up with Tom Cruise's Ethan Hunt and co, at least in terms of plot and action, if not character and pedigree. Hunt has yet to become as iconic a hero as our James but at least the actor is willing to go to great physical lengths to make up for that fact. TC gives as reliable performance as everyone else in this film, with one-time potential Bond, Henry Cavill, giving good villain as the wonderfully named August Walker. Even bit part actors are memorable, such as the woman who plays a Gendarme who catches Hunt and Walker escaping some particularly nasty thugs. Fallout's trailer looked fairly humdrum but for an amusing moment where Tom Cruise is knocked off his bike. In the film, though, this bit comes during one of a few enthralling action scenes in Paris. There's also an amusing 'manhunt' in a toilet! Given that these films are made with location and stunts figured out first, the plot is a pretty engrossing, if familiar, one for the secret agent subgenre. Still, M:I-6 is not only best in franchise but one of the best films of its kind.