‘Mission: Impossible’ Movie Draft
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Hello and welcome back to House of R. I'm Joanna Robson. Joining me as always, almost always, is Mallory Rubin. But we are tripling the R's on the podcast today because we've got Rob Mahoney here. Unbelievable.

An honor to be here. You know, I didn't want to bring it up, but I saw people were saying online, not enough arse. Just needed a little bit more. And I'm happy to provide upon your invitation. Oh my gosh. Thanks so much for being here. Thrilled. If you're watching this on video, we are together in studio.

Our pal John Richter has created some of the best art that has ever graced a house of our podcast. Frankly astonishing. It really is beautiful. It's really, really beautiful. In honor of Rob being here, we got some very special art. So you might want to switch over to YouTube or the Spotify app to watch this on video.

Well, I mean, for the audio listeners, would you like to describe what it is? No, I think you should. I think you have to, and I think you need to do it with accompanying sound effects. I mean, the sound effects are very important. I don't know if the space is quite conducive to the full arm-cocking walker motion. How big are you trying to pretend your muscles are? No, no, not that. Perfect.

He's got wingspan. I don't want to punch either you or my crucial laptop with all of the information about what we're podcasting about. But you got to get your straight. You got to get the sound effects in order. Very important if you're going to cock your arms before you brawl in a bathroom. Okay, so we're here to talk about Mission Impossible. We sure are. Rob's made allusion to one of the missions impossible, which is Fallout. And if you're not watching, the art of Rob behind us is Henry Cavill-esque mustache-

arms being reloaded. Aspirational on the stash front. And we were told you would reload your arms for us on this podcast. I think we might have to hit a point in the draft where it makes sense. And again, I'm going to have to try not to punch anybody or anything as doing it. Are you saying that if you don't get to draft Henry Cavill, you won't reload your arms for us? No comment. Great. Cool, cool, cool. All right. So we're doing a little mini Mission Impossible draft. We were just mere days after

a gargantuan big picture 2000 movie draft. Yeah. And this is just like a little draftito. Like just a little thing that we're doing here today. That's right. That's right. This is not the biplane stunt of drafts. Sure. What stunt is it? That's not, I'm not going to reveal anything else. Great. Okay. Um,

Just to peek behind the curtain, something that Mallory decided to do under her own steam, no one asked her to do this, was rewatch all of the Mission Impossible movies. I mean, just for the sheer pleasure of it. Yeah. And since she had all that information rattling around in her head, we were like, why not do a Mission Impossible draft? I know you've already forgotten 75% of it. That was three weeks ago. As you know, at this point in my life, we're

Within or outside of like three hours, it's a wrap. And I think that one of the relationships that I have to the Mission Impossible franchise, a franchise that I adore, is that when I'm watching each movie, it all feels very clear to me. And then as soon as I'm not watching it,

You're like, what were they talking about? Yeah, in mushes. That's just great franchise filmmaking as far as I'm concerned. Oh, is that what franchise filmmaking is? Yeah. It's really a great novel text. It is one contained work of lore and stunt and human achievement. And who's to say if it happens in chapter two or chapter five? Does it really matter? And evolving hair. For our purposes today, it will matter a little bit. Maybe so. Which movie these things came from. So what we are doing today is...

And before I get into the specifics, let's just do some quick program reminders. Next week, at some point next week, Mallory and I are doing one of our favorite traditions, which is this summer hype

I love a hype meter. Love a hype meter. This is when we really get our ducks in a row about what's coming up. Yes. What we're excited about. Yes. What the big obvious things are. Yes. I know what your number one is. And what some of the like niche-ier, less obvious things are. It's very exciting. Is there anything? I can't wait. What's at the top of your summer hype list, Rob Money? I'm actually genuinely very excited for Fantastic Four. Mm-hmm.

I'm excited to be wooed, to be honest with you. Not like a character set that I have a huge relationship to. And so I'm looking forward to, like, can I get an Iron Man, Captain America type experience out of this? Where it's like, can you make me care about these people I don't care about? Right. Before we draft today, is there anything you'd like to say about Vanessa Kirby specifically that might tip anything about your board? Absolutely not. Great question. But I'm a human being. So I think we're on a lot. I think you can probably assume. We're on a lot.

I'm flesh and blood. All right. So that's what we're doing. Over on the Ringiverse, the Midnight Boys, pew, pew, will be doing a reaction to Ballerina, the new sort of film in the John Wick universe, which I have heard actually incredible things about. So that's very exciting. Can't wait to check that out. So that is what is happening on the Ringiverse. Love it. How can folks keep track of...

That medium amount of content, I will say. Yeah. Compared to like some of our previous weeks where we were all doing like double, triple pods. Here's what I'd recommend. Let's keep it simple. Follow the pods. Sure. Follow House of R. Follow the ringerverse.

You want to tease any NBA Finals group chat action over here? Yeah, follow the Ringer NBA show. Here we go. If you are so inclined. Yeah. Maybe we'll get into some stuff on there. Maybe we'll talk Fantastic Four. I don't know. It's entirely possible. Justin Barry, you're famously a huge MCU fan. And was as well. Look, there's been a lot of Superman cross promo in the NBA playoffs. That's true. Not very successful. Involving players who have since been eliminated.

It didn't go well. It happens. You got to make your bets and then. Molly, if you had to guess, when I, when quiz by Rob and other Ringer employees yesterday about who was playing in the NBA finals, how many teams do you think I got? Correct.

Zero. I got one right. She did get one. Oklahoma City? Yeah. Now, was she primed the day before by a previous conversation? Maybe, but I remembered. You did. It's important. Okay. Good for you. Anyway. People can follow along by following the pods on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts and also follow on YouTube, the Ringerverse YouTube channel. You can watch full video episodes of House of R and Midnight Boys Pew Pew on Ringerverse YouTube channel and on Spotify. Also, follow...

Follow the ringer verse on the social media platform of your choosing, whatever that might be these days. And of course, send us your emails. The inbox is always open. If you have things that you're excited for this summer, get your emails to us before the hype draft hobbitsanddragonsatgmail.com. Yeah. And if you haven't had a chance to listen to our Tony Gilroy interview, which was amazing. Thank you, Tony. Um, we,

We ran some listener thoughts and premises past Tony, so you never know what an email to hobbitsanddragons at gmail.com. You never know where it might reach. It's true. All right. Spoiler warning. Yeah. All of Mission Impossible. Okay. So the newest one included. Final Reckoning, we are good to spoil. We're a couple weeks out. I think Final Reckoning is okay, though. I'm happy to tip my hand on this. Won't be very relevant to what I have to talk about today. We'll see. Okay. Okay.

Also the Mission Impossible TV show if you choose to reference it. That is allowed as well. Okay. Um.

Is there a series of novels? Is there any other media to consume in the Mission Impossible series? Certainly a robust fan fiction universe. There was a video. I feel like I played a Nintendo 64 Mission Impossible game. I remember just playing the mask level over and over and over. That sounds fun. It was incredibly fun. Otherwise, very difficult game for someone like me who just wanted to shoot stuff. Turns out the speed of the first Mission Impossible, not conducive to a nine-year-old. Right. No, that's just like...

adult dramatic interpersonal relationships. Brian De Palma, what a treat. What a joy. This message is brought to you by Apple Card. For a limited time, get a new Apple Card and get $150 bonus daily cash when you spend $150 or more at Nike in your first 30 days using your new Apple Card with Apple Pay. Visit apple.co slash Nike promo for important offer details. Subject to credit approval, offer valid

Only for new Apple Card accounts open by June 15th, 2025. To qualify, you must spend $150 or more on Nike purchases within the U.S. Offer may not be available elsewhere. Additional terms and limitations apply. All right. So here are the categories we're drafting today. We've got Pick Your Ethan Hunt. There's two reasons why this category exists. You're like, hey, isn't that the same character played by the same actor in all of those movies? Yeah.

Number one, Arjuna Ramkapala, our wonderful producer, and Mallory were both like, we should do Ethan Hunt hair. And I drew a line and said, let's just call it Pick Your Ethan Hunt.

It's basically a hair category, though. Though Rob made the point, you tried to make the point the other day that he's basically a different character in every movie. I mean, I think there's kind of sections of the series in which he evolves. Eras, for sure. But for example, the version of Ethan that we see in The Final Reckoning is unrecognizable to me based on any of the other movies. Like the self-seriousness.

the complete lack of interpersonal chemistry with basically anyone else in the story. Very, very strange version of Ethan that I will not be selecting. Happy to tip my hand on that.

But otherwise, yeah, I think there's like chunks of Ethan. You know, there's the great stages of Ethan Hunt. Okay, so when you pick your Ethan, you will have to talk about his hair, obviously. And also, I guess, where he is psychologically and emotionally. Probably romantically. Yeah, exactly. Where he is romantically and how much trauma, either personal or on behalf of the world. Or physical. Is he gang or physical trauma? Spoiler alert, it's a lot. Yeah, sure is. And then we've got a double category, two teammates.

You're building your own IMF team. So it's going to be Ethan and two teammates. And that's going to be your little skeleton crew for this particular operation. I pushed hard for...

sex symbol love interest love interest and Joe was like get with the fucking times let's just call it if you want to do that inside of one of the team member picks you can they're usually under the teammate umbrella they're under the teammate umbrella they're on the team yeah sometimes they go in and out well that's up to you how you construct your team team member or if you want to put the entity on your team I support you talk about a sex symbol yeah

Teammate should be someone who has been on an IMF team before, but we're willing to bend and stretch and break for that. You can make a case for something else. Similarly, the next category can mutate a bit because that is the villain category. Yeah. And there are characters who go back and forth inside of this franchise, whether they're on the team or... I've got some people in both columns as candidates. So there's that. Then we have the MacGuffin. Mm-hmm.

Do you want me to explain what a MacGuffin is? Do it. Go for it. Yeah. I got to teach my nephew what a MacGuffin was the other day. How did he take the news? And also what IMAX was. I think he just blinked at me outlishly. It was like, interesting. I've seen five films ever in my life. Okay. So there's two definitions of MacGuffin. But basically, a MacGuffin is a thing...

That we are chasing inside of a story. And in some interpretations of there's basically the Spielberg version of the Hitchcock version. And in some version, the MacGuffin means nothing. You don't need to know what it does. It's plans. It's, you know, it's microfiche. It's whatever. It's the Maltese Falcon. It's like whatever it is. It doesn't matter what it does. You just need to find it.

And then in the Spielberg version, it's like the Ark of the Covenant and we know why we are chasing it, the Holy Grail, et cetera. It is very crucial to the plot.

I would say Mission Impossible gives us both flavors of MacGuffin inside of this franchise. But you can pick either. But it is the thing that we are going after. And once we start talking about it, you will know. If you're even confused now, you will know exactly what we're talking about. The animating device for the plot of a given movie. Sure. Like, what is Ethan chasing? Yeah. What do we need? What do we want? What does the villain want? Yes. Are we at cross purposes, et cetera? Yeah. Device slash gadget. Yeah.

Mission Impossible is a very tech-friendly franchise. There's a lot of improbable tech on display here. But also some very probable tech. I think they actually do a pretty good balance of both, of like, this could never exist. And also, like, if we just made this select tiny advancement in X technology, I could see this being a plausible thing. And so I like how they walk that line. I think this is the category that...

maybe when you're prepping for this very draft, you think about it a little bit differently than if we had done this draft earlier in the franchise because some of these things actually do or could exist. That doesn't mean it wouldn't be the thing you pick, but maybe that reveals something about what we value or are looking for in our device or gadget. I value artificial intelligence and robot delivery workers and the advancement of all technology of all kinds. Yeah, I know that about you, Rob. It's the worst thing about our friendship. Okay. That's what I'm about. I don't know what to tell you. Last.

Last but not least. Yeah. And this is another core component of Mission Impossible, which is the stunts. This is a robust field. How do you want to define stunt? Let's talk about it. This is something we had a question about. My fundamental question, is a fight scene inherently a stunt? I had an eight-hour conversation with my husband about this at home because I think there could have been a case to have a whole separate category just for fights. Yeah. But because we don't,

I would posit that while they certainly could and maybe should be distinct, since they're not, you should be allowed to pick a fight as your stunt if you want. It's up to you, right, to make the case. I mostly disagree. And then that's a part of your movie. But how about we allow the one fight we're all thinking about?

Well, I think I'm thinking of one fight and I'm also thinking of one kind of more elaborate set piece that is action oriented, but is not a guy hanging off a biplane. You know, it's like I think there is the level of like this is Tom Cruise doing ridiculous shit or and maybe the earlier installments is stunt double before he lost his goddamn mind. And then there's like, OK, there's this big, elaborate espionage action oriented sequence that is. I think that's a stunt for sure. You think that's a stunt? I might push back on like it depends how long the sequence is.

Two and a half hours. Some of those sequences are like a quarter of the movie. And I'm like, you know, everything that happens in this location. Oh, you're thinking of stunt as a very specific one, like quick moment? No, no. They're like set pieces. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But like sometimes those set pieces involve like four different things inside of one set piece. Yes. But I'm thinking more about it that way.

Honestly, the real like action stunner that we think of as this iconic Mission Impossible thing in part because of the caliber of and mania, frankly, of the stunt work involved inside of it. The good news is we're not going very deep. We're only making three selections. We can also rename it in real time as stunt slash set piece. But I just don't think there are so many sort of.

Like we have done in this franchise that I can't believe we're going to get so far deep that we're going to be like, is that a stunt? Do you know? Yeah. I don't know. Okay. I'm not sure. Let's go through it. And maybe in the honorable mentions, we can litigate some of that stuff. I have so many honorable mentions. Okay. So those are our categories. We will be going in order randomly generated by our producer, Carlos Chiriboga. Carlos, are you on the line?

Yeah, I'm here. Can you guys hear me? Yeah, we can hear you. Awesome. All right. So I'm just going to get right into it. Our first pick is going to be from Mallory Rubin. Typical.

Our second pick is coming from Rob. Okay. Whoa! This is the same? And our third pick is Joanna. Okay, so the entity is real. That's what just happened because as we learned from these films, there's a plan. Yeah. I tried to randomly generate earlier and came up with the same order and they all cried foul and said that I had... Listen, did we damage three and a half years of carefully built trust with each other by telling Joanna that she could not set the draft order that Carlos then set in identical fashion anyway? No.

I think that we might not agree on what the stunt is, but we can't agree that that happened. I don't regret it at all. We can't agree that that happened. I would do it all over again. Really? Because you are but a human. Carlos put on the entity interfacing helmet and saw the mathematical truth of the universe. The entity coffin. Will you be selecting that as your device slash gadget? Honestly, a truly hilarious device. I cannot believe it's in that movie.

Wild stuff. What are we doing? At the end of this, I haven't prepped you for this, but at the end of this, I vaguely know our rankings of the movies, but I thought maybe at the end we might want to do like a quick rapid fire. Like what's our current Mission Impossible ranking? Provided we can remember what's in what, then yes, I will agree to participate. I mean, we all know actually because we talked about this recently, but just in case you forgot, I thought we should not refresh ourselves before we do this draft.

So, Molly Rubin. Yeah. Going first in any category, and I think I know exactly what you're going to do. Would you like to make your first draft selection? Okay. Tell me honestly after I do this if you guys agree or disagree with this kind of blanket insight observation on approach. My feeling personally when prepping for this was, first of all, vibes only. This is my new...

Trying to, in my old age, spent a lot of time before the pause day talking about how my heart was racing, just in general. I'm trying to calm down a little bit. Okay. I've been a little more chill in recent drafts. Yeah. Is this having fun? That's how you would describe the 2000s draft? Or the 2000 draft yesterday? I would refer you to some, just crunch some tape from the past. Yeah. Yes, absolutely. She didn't direct any of it out at us. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, fair. And so I am like coming to this mostly just excited to be here with my pals. I thought that

Mission Impossible The Final Reckoning was a quite confounding and perplexing film to me. Some things inside of it that I liked a lot, but mostly just a lot of thinking face emoji stuff for me in the cineplex. However, what a wonderful opportunity to just look back at the franchise as a whole, a franchise that all three of us love and have had so much fun with over the years. So when I was thinking about these categories and looking at it,

In part because it's only three of us today. In part because the franchise, even when it's bad, it's like donuts or pizza to me. It's still fucking delicious and I love it and I want as much of it as I can get. I'm like, there are so many ways I could go here. I'm fine. You're saying you love a bad donut or a bad piece of pizza? I would prefer a great one, but it's still delicious if I have a bad donut. I'm also not sure there is a bad donut.

This is what I mean. And I'm not sure there's a bad mission impossible. Exactly. But, but, so like any other pick in the draft today, I could go a hundred different ways. I do think there's only one number one pick though. Okay. Personally. I'm curious if you guys agree.

I think, and this is not a category I would have targeted high probably if I didn't have this pick. Yep. But because I have it, I have to go device slash gadget. Oh. And I have to take the mask maker. It's the number one. It's right because... For the device. But I have to say, I don't think this would be my number one overall pick. It's not my number one pick, but it is clear number one. I couldn't risk...

That one of you took it because then I don't have the I don't have the secret sauce of a Mission Impossible movie in my Mission Impossible. It's totally fair. We're building the best Mission Impossible movie. This is like the cornerstone. I have a number of different ways I could go with an Ethan. If I don't have the mask maker, I can't do the the the Davian swap.

in the vatican you know how will i make my film and so that is what i will be selecting number one of course the latex mask i mean except and i also it's i get so many versions of it because i get it it's in it's in every film yeah do we want to do i'm not locked into a point in time do you do you get all the mask makers you have to pick a specific movie mask maker you get all the i get all the mask makers i get all the malfunctioning ones that's right exactly that's part of the fun i get them

Here's my question. Yes. Because I actually have it listed separately on here. Do you get the voice changer strip? Oh, yeah. I think that's part of the same thing. I don't know because it doesn't show up until the second one. I know, but I still think it's part of the experience of how they're masking identity. You don't get it until the second movie. So it's not de facto with the mask situation. I'm happy to make my selection starting from the second film on, but.

But yeah, I think that comes with it. I think it's a package deal. I disagree, but okay. Let's not fight so early. Okay. You're welcome to select the voice, Esker, if you want. Oh, thanks so much. I'll...

You'll loan it out to me. Thanks ever so much. Oh, I'm thrilled to have the mask maker. How fun. I completely agree with you. Like, it's hard to imagine a Mission Impossible movie without one. That said, having recently rewatched Mission Impossible 2, it is possible to do too many masks in a movie. No question. They go way, way too far. It's also possible, if we're staying with that film, to have a line in a movie that you don't need to have in a movie. You know, you could say, that's what you call getting your gun off. A lot of things happen in that movie that shouldn't. And yet, I love it! Thanks.

I love it! Genuinely better than I remembered. It's fun! I had a nice experience re-watching. You had a nice experience with Mr. Buzz will do? Just as a throw it on, like, yes. Did that feel like a good use of Tenderway Newton to you inside of a given property? Is there a bad use? I don't know of a bad use. Is there a bad use? I'm just saying, I don't feel like we are exploring our full potential of that particular person. I'm just saying, like, you know, there's sometimes where you learn something about a filmmaker based on, like, what appears in their movie and kind of what they gravitate towards. Sinners is a great example. It's like,

I'm learning some stuff about Ryan Coogler as a person by watching this movie. It's like I learned a lot about John Woo watching MI2, in particular, how interested he is in watching Dandy Newton straddle people. Like, that's just a passion point, clearly. And I say who among us, you know? I'm just saying we can diversify.

Well, doves, motorcycles, and tending and straddling people. It's not a bad suite of stuff. You know what gets me every fucking time? The dove. The dove is good. Especially because there's a bait and switch where it's like, first it's just some pigeons. Yeah. And it's like, he's not going to do it. He's just going to cop out with the pigeons. Yeah. But then come the doves. It's really a stroke of genius. He's like, the people expect doves from me and I will deliver.

Rob Honey, what is your number one pick? I think I'm going to go team member first and I'm going to go Ilsa. Yeah, of course. Off the top. I mean, this was the downside of my pick. That was my first pick, yeah. It's just like, you're not getting Ilsa, basically. So do I need to pick Ilsa from a particular movie or I get all Ilsa across the screen? No, you get all Ilsa. No one else can pick Ilsa now.

I'm jealous. For me, I'm a huge sucker for a cat and the bat type dynamic. And so the Ethan Elsa stuff, especially in Rogue Nation, I would say, is so great. Anytime you can't quite tell someone's motives, it's super charged in terms of their chemistry together. Also love all of the former agents in this. And so it's like, if you're a former MI6, if you're a former IMF, you know all the tricks of the trade, but you're leveraged by a terrorist organization. Now we're fucking talking. Yeah.

Listen, it's not a pick I made. It's a pick a competitor made, but I don't mind saying it's the single most important performance in the history of film. Thank you. It is astonishing. It is powerful. It is important. Quite. In general, I like some variety in life, but I think if I had to choose just one thing to watch forever until I died, I'd at least consider watching Ilsa.

take people down to the ground with just the power of her thighs. The thighs are quite powerful. It would be in the consideration set. In the yellow gown. In the, like, chartreuse gown from the Vienna opera sequence. The opera sequence is extraordinary. Unbelievable. I also think you can tell how good all the Ilsa stuff is by the fact that once they introduce Grace in the later movies...

They're like chasing the Elsa thing so hard. Like even some of the set pieces are like the interrogation sequence where Ethan has to kind of shimmy his way up the column to get free. They almost like carbon copy it in a lot of ways with Grace later. An unpopular opinion that I had when Dead Reckoning came out is that I thought that movie was bad and I did not like it. And mainly because...

They killed off Ilse Faust, which was. It's a good scene. Rebecca Ferguson's preference. Right. Because she was like, you.

you made me sit around for years and years and years and I can't do anything else. And she was like, in a recent interview, she's like, I made two Dune movies in the time it would have taken to make one Mission Impossible movie. And they were, and she said they weren't really going to use me the way that they had in the past. And so I just didn't really want to do that. And this was actually while clearly supporting Rob's pick, thinking it's a great one and being jealous that neither of us got to make it. That's an area where we can take him down a peg here because wasn't, wasn't our shared wife, Rebecca Ferguson, also like, Elsa doesn't really want to be on a team. Stop putting me on a team.

I think the best team is... Why are you trying to take an independent, strong woman and lock her into a man-led team dynamic, Rob? Who's locking anyone into anything? We did like a few... Just like, how many minutes has it been since you were like, vibes only, chill, I will not be attacking people. I'm good. You know what? Like, whoever finishes third in this draft, probably me, is going to be in the position of being the Mission Impossible 2 of the draft results, the worst one. And guess what? It's...

It's established canon. There's still a dove. Established canon aside in this very episode that that's still a fucking banger. Still good. There's still a dove. Ilsa. Man, I love Ilsa. I mean, one last note on Ilsa. Just ridiculous that she's barely acknowledged at all in Final Reckoning. Like she dies and it's like,

They almost forgot she existed. Here's the mistake they made. Because when Michelle Monaghan shows up inside the franchise as his wife and then leaves, you're kind of like, okay, Michelle Monaghan's gone and she bumps around in some of the other movies, but it's just sort of like, okay. But they establish Ilsa and establish her in Rogue One and then underline it in Fallout as like,

This is Ethan's soulmate. She matters. And then they're like, LOL, we found another brunette. Grace is here. Turns out there are more. She's about the same. It's fine. Don't worry about it. It's tough. Okay. So you'll be selecting Grace? Yeah, everyone's favorite, Grace. I love Haley Atwell. I might pick Grace later. It's a bad rap, honestly. I love Haley Atwell. It's not her fault. She's not Rebecca Ferguson. Okay. Exactly. There's only one Ferguson. Okay.

Listen, you care a lot about hair and you have one chance to take the Ethan hair you want. I'm not the one who introduced the Ethan hair category. Don't make me burn my pick on which Ethan it is. I know, but it's more because I care about you and I know how passionate you are about hair.

I wanted you to have a chance to engage with Ethan's hair. I'm taking... Chill Mallory is still Machiavellian as hell. It's really a sight to behold. The thing is, I know what you guys do and don't care about. And so I think the thing that I care most about, you don't care about. So it means I can probably save it for later. It's quite presumptuous. Here's what I will say. Not a mind game. Sincere. I...

I do not think that the affection for and devotion to specific elements of the Mission Impossible films maps on that closely to the film ranking. Genuinely. For me, at least. I would agree. There's stuff in some of the movies that are low on my list and I'm like, this is fucking electric. Doesn't mean it's my favorite movie, though. Okay, I'm going to take the thing... Okay, I'm going to take...

In the villain category. Yeah. Oh. I'll be taking Philip Seymour Hoffman's Owen Davian from Mission Impossible 3. Yeah, dude, of course. Which is by far and away the best Mission Impossible villain. It's not even particularly close. The best performance in any of these movies. It's just not even really particularly close. Mission Impossible 3, an only okay movie. It rises up the rankings because of Philip Seymour Hoffman in that movie. Yeah. So. Your favorite performer. Yes.

My favorite actor. I mean, but I also think villain is a bit... I don't think the Mission Impossible villains are all that great, generally. And so I think the... Well, the villain is the impossibility. It's the very concept of the difficulty of what we're undertaking. Or is the high the impossibility? I think... No, I think the limits of the... It really makes you think. ...human muscular skeletal system is the real enemy. It's time. It's time on Tom Cruise's body and what he is capable of. I mean...

Disagree. The final reckoning. How many minutes... Let's actually guess. I don't know the answer to this. Let's guess and then see if we can confirm it at some point. And by we, I mean everybody who's here with us today. How many minutes would you guess a 62-year-old Tom Cruise spent in his boxer briefs... It's a lot. ...fighting people or...

And did that delight you? Managing an ascent of 500 feet from a continental shelf in Final Reckoning. Did it delight me? I thought it was astonishing. Frankly, astonishing. Well, he does multiple fight scenes in Boxer Briefs. Yes. And, of course, yeah, the underwater ascent in Boxer Briefs. So that he could then be cradled in the near-new mood in a decompression chamber by Haley Atwell's Grace. And, like, again, I say who among us. I get it. I get it. I'm going to guess that he was in his Boxer Briefs because that movie is...

And I say this as someone who, with the self-awareness of someone who routinely records a four-hour podcast, that movie is quite long. I think he's probably in his boxer briefs for like somewhere between 17 to 23 minutes. Do you think that's right or wrong? Honestly, it feels accurate. And I bet in terms of the filming of those scenes, it was like, let's go again on the fight scene. Yeah, so what limit of the human form? But I'm just talking about the next movie, which he's of course not going to do until he absolutely does it. Wink, wink, nod, nod. Yes. Come on.

The decompression chamber was so funny because he comes up. Yeah, he's got to be like resuscitated in it. Hayley Atwell is in her parka because, yeah, they're in fucking Russia. But all of a sudden she's in the decompression chamber. Parka's open. Yeah. Cleavage. Yeah. Gratuitous cleavage shot as she brings him back to life. Well, as I learned from the Val Kilmer classic, The Saint, sometimes it takes body warmth to convey hypothermia. Wow. That's exactly. You're not a scientist. Voyage is a Mimi. As you have said, you're not a scientist. Yeah.

but you are a scholar of cinema and the human experience sometimes you have to expose your cleavage in order to save someone from right but they're wrong exactly right it's about sacrifice I have a question for you about Davian yeah um

Do you think it's a... Is it what hue exactly do they use to spray paint his beautifully reddish cheeks on the mask, in the mask machine? It wasn't going to be that, but now I'm interested. Now I'm interested in the answer to that. I think it's like a salmon pink. It's quite beautiful. Lovely, like a coral? Yeah, yeah. It's whatever little spray gun they use to like rose up doll cheeks. Ultimately, I think that's what they're working with. Yes. I think that's right. Does the... Again, we said spoilers for all Mission Impossible films. Does the Billy Crudup of it all, does the Musgrave reveal...

in any way diminish the impact of Davian as a villainous force for you because yet again, for the second time then in three movies at that point...

The real villain is the secretly duplicitous, nefarious force inside of Ethan's sacred space. It's a great question, but I ask you, has anyone walked out of a Mission Impossible movie or a Mission Impossible rewatch being like, that Billy Crudup villain is iconic and memorable and will stick with me forever? Just going to quickly move someone down my list. Just called out.

Tough luck for John Musgrave. Okay, so that is my top pick is Owen Damien. Yeah, where are you going next on your snake turn? This is really tough, guys. Because I really think Max Machine and Ilsa Faust were like, those are the two unbeatable, you have to have them. I guess I'll take teammate just so I'm not like so many picks down the teammate list later. I just realized I can make Ilsa be in my movie with the mask. Who's taking away a woman's agency now? Wow.

You've given me something to reflect on after I've made a billion dollar banger. Okay. Not before though. All right. Profit first, questions later. Is that, do we want to give her that? That because she has the mask, now all the characters are in a movie? No. I think it's just in some ways. No, you did not get Rebecca Ferguson to show up to the set of your movie. Absolutely not. Absolutely not. I've got a lot of archival footage that I can scan. Yeah. If you want to do the final reckoning clip show, we might let you do some of that. Sure, sure, sure.

I'm going to take Benji Dunn. I'm going to take Simon Pegg off the board. It's a good pick. Good old Benji. That's my guy in the chair. Sometimes the guy in the fields loves the opera. Benji Dunn. I also think he's very important. You need someone on the team to be fussed in order for everyone to understand how impossible the mission is. And so if someone isn't freaking out, and it's usually Benji, then I just don't buy it. He's also incredibly... I mean, some other people sort of rise to the level of this, but Benji Dunn is like the...

The kitten you have to protect, the puppy you have to protect on a given mission if Benji's in trouble, like, we're devastated. So, you know, he can mostly take care of himself, but not the way that Ilsa can take care of herself. Yeah, like, does he need his lung reinflated by someone else every now and then? I mean, yeah. Does he need some help with the Hoax Cipher bomb?

Because he can't figure out the answers to the questions on his own. He does. But does that make me love him any less to Joanna's point? No, it goes the other way. Makes me love him more. And the point being is to the voting population. Wow. Straight to the voters. My fellow Americans. Went into legit stump speech mode staring into the camera. To the gingers among you. I now have a double ginger cast. So I would just like to say I think I deserve the ginger vote at least.

It's manipulative at best. Astonishing. I don't know how to respond to what just happened. Remarkable bit of podcasting. Thank you. Molly Rubin. No, no, Rob Mahoney. Rob Mahoney. I am going to go villain as well. Okay. And I'm going to take Solomon Lane.

Interesting. There cannot be a draft without first a great suffering and the greater the suffering and the greater the draft ultimately. Now, as we pointed out, you get Solomon Lane in all of the movies. So you don't have to pick. But if you had to pick, do you pick well coiffed

I look at home in this record store. Yeah. Rogue Nation or do you pick scraggly? I've been in some tough cells. Fallout, Solomon Lane. I would pick Fallout, Solomon Lane. Okay. I think I do like the idea of a villain who has like, I am also a sucker for like the villain behind bars, but still pulling the strings. You know, like he technically have him contained. You think you are ahead of him in his game. And yet-

His ambitions are big enough that you don't know what the hell he's doing. You know, why is he blowing up the supply chain? I don't fucking know. Why is he pinning it on Ethan Hunt? I really couldn't tell you. But anarchy, you know, it really serves everybody. Yeah. You know. All right. So Sean Harris is Solomon Lane. One of our most distinctly voiced. Oh, my God. The gravel. The gravel on that. And the gravel plus the nasal. Yeah. I have a question. So this was what was on my mind pre-pod.

Obviously, inarguably, Solomon Lane is a villain and a great villain pick. Okay. You're drafting a team that I strongly consider drafting. I don't mind admitting it. I'm basically drafting Fallout. I don't mind admitting that that is my favorite. I think you could make a credible case that the Syndicate is a MacGuffin. Discuss. Oh, 100%. I have it in both categories. Okay.

Here's the question, then. Because we have said that something can't be picked across categories, but is the syndicate, because it's bigger than just Lane, still eligible to be picked as a MacGuffin or is it off the board now? I think the syndicate is off the board. The syndicate is off the board, but the apostles are not off the board. That's what I would say. Okay. Okay. All right. All right, everyone.

Well, I mean, my first pick is easy. I can't believe Luther is still here. This is the... I'm astonished. I don't understand. He was my number one ranked team member, so I will be... That's not true. Yes. Because Ilsa is your number one. How do I show you my board without showing you the rest? After the draft, I will show you my board. Luther is the top of my board. Over Ilsa Faust. Yes. With all due respect to Luther, absolutely not. Bullshit. I'll show you. Absolutely not. Absolute bullshit. I'll show you. Ilsa... I love Luther. Luther...

For me, it's Ilsa Benji Luther. That's the ranking. I have the same. Here's the thing about Luther. Would my heart have led me to pick Ilsa if I had had the second pick overall? Probably. Is that the body part you're using for that? I think it's sort of a full body. It's all going right.

Okay, Luther. First of all, again, just the sheer swath of the presence across the franchise gives me a lot of flexibility, but also it gives me something even more important than plot flexibility. It gives me an emotional depth that simply cannot be matched. The relationship between Luther and Ethan is, I think, to me, irrefutably the central relationship in Mission Impossible, right? Other than between Ethan and mankind, right? Or Ethan and gravity. Right.

Also that. Yes. Should we sing Defying Gravity? No? No? I would love to hear it, y'all. I thought you were going to leave us. No. I can Cynthia that thing. Can I just say that yesterday Rob Mahoney hit me with a howdy partner and now you just deployed a y'all? What is... I mean, you're a man from Texas. Am I not entitled to my own culture? No, but here's my question. Does it come out stronger when you're in Los Angeles? Do you have something to prove in Los Angeles? What would I have to prove to these Angelinas? Wow. I mean... No.

When do you think my Baltimore comes out the most? Is it when I'm upset? When I'm excited? When you're the most passionate. When I'm talking about the Baltimore Orioles record. When she's on a tear. When you're on a tear, that's when your vowels move. I've never... But I will say this. You gotta look out for vowel movement. Especially as you get older, it gets a little dicey. Just to be clear, she said vowels. Yeah, that's what my vowels...

But six of one, half a dozen of the, half a deuce of the other. So like the, the thing is, um, Mallory, I've never met drunk Mallory. Oh, so I don't know how Baltimore. We've had a beer or two, but never. No. So I don't know how Baltimore in a drunk Mallory gets.

That's usually when a regional accent comes out. Interesting. Maybe one day we'll find out. I'm too old now to... I can't handle the hangovers. I'm not made of strong enough stuff. So, Luther. A deep, emotional, and meaningful relationship between Luther and Ethan, which is, I think, a heartbeat that we need in the film. And also, there's nobody who is going to be able to come up with the thing we need more quickly and more reliably than Luther. He is the consummate

guy in the chair he is the one who is always able to act Ethan goes and does a thing but he without Luther he has no shot yeah I actually believe that that's true um Rob I have a quick question for you please um if Mallory drafts Luther does she then get an entire closet of hats to go with I think it goes without saying the answer she knew

The hat is part of all the many hats are part of the deal. Okay. I think it comes as a package. But you're right. Especially not to, again, make your case for you, Mal. But if Ilsa's like the flighty issue really part of your team element, like you got your ride or die. Exactly. Luther will never abandon you literally until his deathbed. My life is oriented around relying on a few people.

On the one hand, yes. On the other hand, I will say Luther consisted across the franchise, but often minimally in the film. Yes. Simon Pegg, Benji, once he joins the franchise is number two screen time in most of the movies. That's true. The minimal usage is a note I have on your favorite Mission Impossible movie.

We'll get there. We'll get there later. We'll get there. It is a problem that I have with the film now. It's not a problem. I'll say the other case for Luther is you need someone who's literally going to explain what's happening in the movie. And he unfortunately gets saddled with a lot of exposition. You know what? And when he is gone, when he is torn away from us, could any of us figure out what the fuck was happening? No.

We really could not. We could not, folks. I don't know that that was Luther's fault. I genuinely recommended to somebody that they could walk in 90 minutes late and have a great time. I think that's the case with The Final Reckoning, unfortunately. The first fine? Like missing the first 90? Or would you take a different stretch of 90 off? I mean, if you could pick and choose and Frankenstein that thing, there are many, many ways you could do it. But I think you could legitimately walk in 90 minutes late and have a really fine time at the movies. Okay, fine. Okay, guys, I am torn on what to do with my next pick. Luther was...

Really easy for me. I really wanted... There are a couple things here I really want. Oh, man. This is hard because it's a small draft, so all the things are fun. All good choices. Okay, you know what? I'm going to... I think that for me, if Solomon Lane had been here at Villain, I would have taken him. But he's not. And so I... And the stunts are just... It's so deep. It's such a deep field. I'm going MacGuffin. And I am taking what is, to me...

I think this is, I won't be surprised if we disagree on this and you guys have a different MacGuffin at the top of your list. To me, there's a clear number one MacGuffin and a lot of the other ones are quite silly. I'm going Knocklist. Yeah, Knocklist. That's the number one. Yeah, of course it is. I'm thrilled to have it. Oh, guys, I have three so far of my number ones in my category. You're making Mission Impossible the first Mission Impossible movie. Yeah.

I do like that movie quite a bit. It's very good. I'll be going into some later films, I think, elsewhere in the category set. There's nothing wrong with the first Mission Impossible movie, but it doesn't represent a lot of breadth of choice here. Well, I don't agree because Knocklist, yes, of course. But The Mask Maker is every movie.

And so is Luther. I'm just saying all three elements that you have are present in the first. Are the first. But two of the three are present in every single other movie. Yeah. So, all right. Knockless, welcome to the fucking team.

Bob Mahoney. Very good pick. And I think, too, it also, in terms of the two MacGuffin types you laid out, Joe. Yes. This is one that is not nonsense. Oh, yeah, exactly. It is not a key that opens a door, that opens a crate, that gives the entity some control of a nuclear silo. That dupes an AI into thinking that it's... Exactly. And here's the other thing about this. Like, again, I love this franchise, sincerely. I will never tire of rewatching it. One of the things that I lament a little bit, even though many of my favorite movies are in the...

Not the last two, to be clear, but in the Rogue Nation Fallout range. And I think those films are awe-inspiring. The back half of this franchise, we just get into like, everything's about nukes.

You know, like, the specific, are we going for the triple plutonium cores or does... Did you see what she just did? She just pivoted to say the back half of the franchise is not that good to emphasize the fact that her picks from the beginning of the franchise... The human stakes of betrayal. No, I love the knock list. I love the first Mission Impossible movie, but, like, the knock list is so specific. It feels really rooted not just in the specificity of that film, but, like, spy culture. And you're saying the chimera is not... You're saying the chimera is not...

I am not ashamed to tell you that Chimera was pretty high on my MacGuffin ranking. I had it on mine. Honestly, pretty high on my MacGuffin ranking. But of course, part of the reason is because you don't just get Chimera. You get Bellerophon. You do. And you get capitalism with it. It's an important trio. Okay. Rob Mahoney. Back to you in the studio, Rob.

I'm going to go gadget. To me, there was a clear number one. Mal's already taken it. To me, there's a clear number two, and it's the projection screen from Ghost Protocol. The Kremlin, like, heist. The umbrella hallway projector. This, to me, is like what I was talking about. Like, almost practical. Like, I think you could maybe pull off a slight time-delayed version of this exact thing. That sequence of rules. Wow.

And so it's just like an incredible creation in terms of like a cinematic device. I have the technical term for it in my list here and it says that umbrella hallway projector thing. That's the one, yeah. That is the trademark, I think. In the script, that's how they describe it. Interesting. So the fact that it's

kind of like glitchy and Benji's face pops up at like 80 feet. That's human error. That's Benji human error. Yeah. But shouldn't the capacity for human error be factored into the tech myth? No. These are professionally trained agents. You're saying your glitchy mask maker that like doesn't work I would say 85% of the time.

And you're coming from the hallway projector? If you walk too fast, the mask maker breaks. That's just like a volume thing. Like the sample size is just so much larger. My team right now is Ethan to be named later. Yeah. Ilse Faust. Other teammate to be named later. I think they can work the projector. Okay. Fascinating. That is a really fun movie scene. Very cool. Okay. Will you be picking another ginger? How long can you keep it going? What else we got?

I don't know that I have any other options. Unless I'm forgetting a key ginger in the franchise. I'm picking what I consider, because I love a ginger, personally. Gingers if you're voting, if you're watching. This is ridiculous. I love a ginger. So I consider ginger to be the highest praise. So I'm going to pick what I consider to be the ginger of stunts. Wow. Oh. Yeah.

I didn't pick this first. It's the most important thing for me. I didn't pick it first because I know you don't care about it as much as I do. But it is the Burj Khalifa in Ghost Protocol. It's great. Which is, I think, one of the best. Oh, I know it's great. Fantastic. I know it's one of the best stunts of all time. You guys are just fallout pilled in a way that I don't understand. It's an amazing movie. Top to bottom amazing action movie. I'm just saying, I don't think I can watch individual stunt scenes from any other Mission Impossible. Well, no.

one exception with one other exception I can just put on the Burj Khalifa sequence because there's so much going on there's a stunt aspect of it there's the fact that they were actually they were a little lower on it but they were actually on the Burj Khalifa when they did this um

So Tommy Cruise, you know, risking life and limb for our entertainment as per usual. There's the tension of the time element, the tension of it. What is going on in the rooms with all our other characters while he's doing it? It's not just like, look what I can do, which is, you know, what some of the stunts across this franchise are. This is like. In a great way. What is going to happen to all of these characters we care about? Our favorite characters.

character of all time, Brant. What is going to happen to all of them in the room? I might have to pick Brant. If he does not. Honestly, my second team member, don't roll it out.

So the Burj Khalifa belongs to me. Unimpeachable. I mean, I have no notes. Yeah, it's a great pick. It's also like, to your point, it's encapsulating so many different things at once, not just as a watchable experience, but like it is stunt, it is tech, it is great Tom Cruise hair. We're hitting all categories within this one. Travelogue too? Sure. Which like is a huge part of the Mission Impossible experience. It's just like stunning. It's really rooting yourself in a different place. It's just absolutely stunning. It's honestly between that

And the elevator fight scene in Captain America and Winter Soldier for like my favorite stunt action sequences of all time. Those are great. Those are like my top two ever. Burj Khalifa, Ghost Protocol. And the thing, well, whatever. I'll talk about why Ghost Protocol is so great later. You'll just have to remind us what happens in it. It's so easy. Legitimately, Ghost Protocol and Rogue Nation to me are one movie.

And I don't know how to articulate that because plot-wise, it's just not true. But time and my life-wise, I just cannot keep them straight. Okay. I mean, obviously, the actual shared text is Rogue Nation and Fallout. It is. This is why it's confusing. Yeah, Rogue Nation and Fallout are the sisters. Those are a legit part one and part two. Yeah. Okay. So I've got a teammate, a villain, a stunt, all of which are top tier as far as I'm concerned. The gingers of those categories. The gingers of those categories. Yes.

I'm going to go with MacGuffin just so I'm not stuck with Chimera. And I'm just going to take the rabbit's foot off the table. Because of its like... I can't believe you had the gall to say I was going hard on one movie. And you're here in 3, 4. But obviously you get the rabbit's foot later in your favorite film as well. That's what I'm saying. Rabbit's foot across franchise. Well. Benji across franchise.

Owen Davian, three. Yes. Burj Khalifa, four. Yeah, you're very rooted in the middle. I think if this works out as... And isn't that where we should be inside of a franchise? Wow. Joe's just trying to bring both sides of the aisle together. Yeah, exactly. Oh, man. Rabbit's foot. So...

This is a... The anti-god. Exactly. It's a, just in case people don't know and haven't seen Final Reckoning, it is a liquid form of a code that eventually becomes the entity. How does that work? Oh, that's not my responsibility. That's not my responsibility to explain to you. I mean, I have a hard time understanding the technology that leads like a vinyl wax record to play music. And so the idea of turning code into liquid, I just can't even fathom. I don't need to know. And that's the beauty of a MacGuffin.

But I will say, in terms of evocative name, Chimera and Bellerophon's pretty good. Rabbit's Foot is very good in terms of the name of a MacGuffin. Rabbit's Foot is a great name. And to have it associated with both Philip Seymour Hoffman and then the abysmal end of the franchise is just like a fascinating journey. So the way that people lost their shit when the final reckoning trailer came out and they're like, the Rabbit's Foot is coming back! It's back. My husband was one of those people. He was freaking out because, of course...

One of the kind of brilliant strokes of Mission Impossible 3 is that we don't ever actually really learn anything ultimately about the rabbit's foot. And I would contend that the impulse, desire,

so deep need that the people making Mission Impossible The Final Reckoning had to give us that answer was one of the most misguided things in the history of the franchise. So if we had done this draft two weeks ago, this is a good pick. Yes, I don't need this to be the Podcova module and liquid code and what the who. I deeply agree. I do not give a shit what Rabbit's Foot does. Keep it a mystery. I care that it unites the franchise. It links the franchise together. And I care that it's really fun to say.

I think it is also great design. Great design. Extremely fun to say. I think it also only works within the context of your team because what does Owen Davies want? The rabbit foot. When does he want it now? Other than that, I really don't know what it is or it's for other than the design. It's like yellow liquid and red liquid, just kind of a ginger liquid. If you're thinking about it. So now you're putting yourself too far on that corner. You know, and as even as scaling, um,

The windows, we do have like a kind of golden reflection. Yeah, we get a sort of gingery sandstorm moment. That's the other part that I didn't say earlier about the Burj Khalifa stunt is because you not only have everything's out of the room, but then a sandstorm starts coming and you can see it coming. Yeah. I love that movie. Oh my God.

The NBA playoffs are here, and I'm getting my bets in on FanDuel. Talk to me, Chuck GPT. What do you know? All sorts of interesting stuff. Even Charles Barkley's greatest fear. Hey, nobody needs to know that. New customers bet $5 to get 200 in bonus bets if you win. FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook.

21 plus and present in Illinois. Must be first online real money wager. $5 deposit required. Bonus issued is non-withdrawable bonus pass that expires seven days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See full terms at fanduel.com slash sportsbook. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER. Okay. Rob Mahoney. So you guys have already gotten your MacGuffins, so I'm cleared out there. Yeah, you can... I'm good. And I have a teammate, a villain, and a gadget. So I need... What do I need to fight with Mallory for is the question before this kind of yo-yo's back to me. I mean...

Why don't you try to gaslight Rob about how much he cares about hair?

I really think this would be a great place to take your Ethan. You can talk more about the constitution of the human form, the constitution of the human soul. You have sent us a number of gifts of Ethan running. I think it's probably important that you stayed on the record at some point, that you have the courage to stay on the record at some point, which run you found most memorable and mesmerizing. I did think that was courageous. Thank you.

You should probably pick your Ethan. I'm going to take a stunt. Uh-huh.

I tried. I actually am going to go with the biplane sequence from Final Reckoning for my stunt. I'm ready to, I'm about to rip out my hot, serious hot takes on you. Go ahead. You don't like the biplane. I'll wait till you speak for once. This is a guest courtesy that she would not afford me. I really appreciate it. In terms of the unfathomability scale, I just legitimately do not understand how they executed it, how they pulled it off. It does not make any sense.

Does it involve Gabriel? Sure. Does it have to? I just kind of pretend he's not there. How? But how? But how can you pretend he's not there? Here's the thing. At bare minimum, no one likes Gabriel. You get to watch him try to jump out of a plane and then kill himself on the back end of the plane by accident. While laughing like a cartoon villain. You know, we all have our kinks. Again,

Aside from Morales, you deserve better than this. Genuinely. Not his fault. Should not have been in that movie at all. His plot should have reconciled and finished. Should have reckoned. Or should have reckoned. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In the dead reckoning and not the final reckoning. I just think it's one of the most technically impressive things that they've ever done. And in terms of what... When I think about...

What are the only reasons to see Final Reckoning? I think that is the number one thing I would tell people is that sequence in particular. I also think, I mean, we can get into the other stunts and the other things, but like the submarine sequence is equally impressive and like technically, I think, beautiful to watch and kind of breathtaking in its own way. But for me, the biplane is the selling point of that movie in a way that no other stunt is the selling point for any other Mission Impossible movie because frankly, those movies are better.

I strongly disagree. I'll say, I don't think that this is a unique opinion. I think a lot of people agree with you and thought that was amazing. This was one of most of the reasons that I did not care for the recently released version

blockbuster mission impossible colon the final reckoning uh most of those reasons have to do with basically trying to like avengers endgame time heist scrapbook together our memories of things where i'm like you're actually diluting and diminishing this thing not enhancing that stuff is bad the nature of how it was edited the completely befuddling honestly nonsensical plot um

But you can kind of always make your piece of that stuff if the set pieces are extraordinary. And obviously on some level, the biplane sequence is extraordinary. It's visually breathtaking. I agree with you. The fact that Tom Cruise is actually doing that is so batshit bonkers to me. I can't believe we're alive at a time where a thing like that is happening or allowed to happen. Wild. However...

Here's the thing I could not stop thinking about while watching it, and I have not stopped thinking about since seeing the movie. It is, to me, a way less impressive version of the helicopter chase in Fallout. The helicopter chase is good, but it's almost like too extended a sequence to be a stunt. Do you think so? You can pick it. It's on my list. You don't think that counts? It's very good, but it like... Helicopter. I wrote helicopter Kashmir. That counts. Yeah, I would say so. Do you include the other elements of the fight that sort of lead into it and follow it? Is that part of it?

I would argue it is part of it. I would say everything that happens in the helicopters. Okay. He doesn't like when he's dangling from that. Oh God, what am I? I was rewatching it the other day with a friend and they were like, what are they transporting? Like beach balls? Like, I don't know.

I don't know what's in that like laundry and stuff for the long medical camp. Hammocks. Anyway, so everything was starting from him jumping a hold of the rope to when they exit the helicopters on the cliff is what I would say the helicopter catchphrase. I'm willing to. Interesting. Okay, that'll impact whether I actually pick it as my stunt.

put a pin for a second and where we're ranking it as a stunt for the purposes of this draft and just sticking to like its role in a mission impossible movie. I think that stretch and fallout is just more like gobsmacking and jaw dropping and making it more, uh, tactile and like retrograde so that Tom Cruise could climb around on it was not as impressive. And here's the bigger sin to me. It,

ends in the exact same way, plot-wise. It's the final millisecond of him defusing the thing to save everyone. I'm like, we just saw this. Mallory, that's Mission Impossible. But that's happening too much. Right, I think at the end. I would say it's all of that with a dash of the Airbus from Rogue One sequence, like also in the main, like him being on the side of the door and it's like, not that door, that whole sequence as well. Because in terms of like,

He's actually on the plane. And also the way that Kristen McQuarrie has talked about the way that Tom Cruise would just sort of like, he's like, he's actor and director and stuntman. He's turning his head to catch the light in a certain way. And like, blah, blah, blah. Like all of that is the performance inside of the stunt. And,

and I agree by the time we got to Final Reckoning I was like I've I already been to the airport I already seen this wow so what I'm hearing from both of you is you think you could do it you could be Tom on the side of the pipeline I don't think we need to assert that in order to critique it I think

for me the way it went for our dear friend Gabriel just like a rudder into the middle of my fucking cranium but that doesn't have a bearing on how I consumed that piece of cinema I just think Tom Cruise almost died for us and we should show a little gratitude he almost died for us many times but this time most of all and most final of all

And most reckoning. My favorite, actually my favorite Tom Cruise injured himself stunt is the one in Rogue Nation where he like falls off his motorcycle and then you watch him limp out of frame. He's not going to lose that take. Because he actually fucked up his knee. Oh man. Okay. I'm here on the turn. Remember how much you care about hair?

I have some kind of, I think, hot takes on Ethan's hair across the franchise, actually. We're going to get there. Can't wait. Okay, I'm going to take you behind the curtain. I'm going with my... I'm going to pick my stunt now. I'm going behind the curtain a little bit. So I have three kind of 1A, 1B, 1C top of my stunt leaderboard contenders here. Okay. One of them is the helicopter sequence from Fallout that we were just discussing. However, if we're limiting it to...

that exact from the climb up the laundry bin to before we start. Like, if I can't also get the fight on the cliffside... There's no way. There's no way. Then that has a bearing, I think, on how I'm at least considering it. One of my other, you know, top considerations here is, of course, the descent for the knock list. Yeah.

But I have the necklace. To continue. You don't get the stunt. No, but I just, I don't think I want to linger in that necklace. Absolutely. You don't want to keep remaking Mission Impossible 1. Especially, frankly, because I'm probably going to have to take Jim Phillips as my villain. We'll see what happens. But I'm not sure I can. I don't know what will happen with villain. I've got a couple rounds to figure it out. But it's got dark in a hurry there.

So, yeah, I don't think I— While I love that sequence, I don't think I want to go double knock list with my picks. I agree. You're weighted too heavily. Yeah, and so I'm really— You don't want to over-knock. You can't over-knock. Never over-knock. Again, until I welcome Jim Phelps to my team in a couple rounds. And then we'll be entirely possible as well. Jim was my number two villain pick. Jim is number two on my board as well. Well, we're going to talk about it. Solomon Lane was number one. We're going to talk about Jim Phelps. Jim Phelps is number two.

And then the other, of course, top contender and the number one on my stunt list. I just love the Fallout helicopter stretch so much that it's hard for me not to pick it. And I'm Fallout light and that's my favorite movie. But the number one thing on my stunt list is still here. And it is, of course, the fabled inside and outside of the movie, both as a piece of cinema and as a meta. How the fuck did they do this? This is the most astonishing stunt ever recorded and committed to film. It's the motorcycle cliff jump. It's crazy.

Parachuting down on to reach the Orient Express in Dead Reckoning, which is not my favorite Mission Impossible movie. That is not my favorite Mission Impossible movie. But I think that stunt

Which, you know, they took us behind the curtain, allowed us to watch the making of that. The fact that Tom Cruise trained to do that, that they built that ramp, that he actually rides that bike off and jumps and does all of that is so... I feel like I want a reflection of that on my list. Like of what Tom Cruise has given us. The audacity. Because it's one thing... Yeah, like a biplane type stunt on your list is what you're saying. It's one thing it's a testament to core strength to dangle...

Iconically over the knock list. Yeah, it's like anyone with a knee can kind of like, can kind of do the biplane thing. You hook a knee. Knock list really requires something special in the abdominal region. And this, I don't know that there is another person alive.

obviously other than professional stuntmen, but an actor who would have chosen to do this, a franchise that would have supported this attempt. And it is mesmerizing. It is astonishing the way you can watch. You can see like, this is fucking real. They did it when the bike is flipping below him and then he's like, I actually got

get away from the mountain and then he fucking does and he makes his way onto the train a train sequence by the way that in a movie I do not love I also think is like really fucking cool after the blowing up you don't you don't like when they're crawling through the cars no because you don't like Hayley Atwell yeah no I do like Hayley Atwell you wish she had fallen again I might

grace in just a couple rounds. So yeah, so I'm doing the motorcycle cliff jump. That was my number one stunt. I have such affection for the fallout helicopter stretch that I basically just wanted to talk about it a lot. But guess what? I'm about to pick my Ethan. Do you think they blew the motorcycle stunt by putting it in the trailer? At least like the lead up to it in the trailer? No, I think there are some movies where I'm like, boy, I wish I hadn't heard or seen this in the trailer. But that was just like, you know, every now and then in your life, you're fortunate enough for someone to make you a promise and then follow fucking through.

I've heard of that. I don't know if I've experienced it. It's a rare thing, but that happened there. We got it there. So I thought that was great. Okay, so that's my stunt. I thought I was going to save my Ethan for last, but I'm not because, you know, as I have conceded in recent minutes, villain has gotten a little tricky. So I'm going to wait on that. I am taking Ethan from Fallout.

I'm going to do that because then I feel like I get a lot of the things that I love about Fallout with my Ethan. First of all, I think this is good Ethan hair. I like a seasoned man. Would you like to describe the Ethan hair for... So should I... Is this where I should drop my hot take? That I think this is really controversial. This might be my single most controversial opinion about the Mission Impossible franchise. Should we do a social breakout for whatever you're about to say? Look down the camera. I'd be scared. I'd be scared. I'd be scared.

After what you've done to the internet already this week. What could you possibly say? What do you have left to lose?

The long hair is not my favorite. It's not? No. You're like, well. It's fine to be wrong about something. Would you like to describe the fallout hair? I think that the fallout hair is exactly in my Ethan Hunt hair sweet spot. Deeply boring. No. A little bit of. No. Feathery bang. Exactly. I love a feathery bang. It's not so long that while, of course, the long hair looks, the ghost protocol hair, the Mission Impossible 2 hair looks beautiful. Sure. I have fucking eyes. Yeah.

I am always like, I can't help it. There's like a rational part of my mind that I'm like, is this practical? Seriously. It's not down to his waist. He's not going to get caught in the rudder of a biplane. Clearly, we've proven it. Well, he was sort of in an intermediate length in Mission Impossible.

the final reckoning I don't also I'm not partial to the super short spiky hair either I will be returning to the first Mission Impossible later when I welcome Jim Phelps to the club but yeah Fallout is like a great the hair is styled and tight it's not too wild but it has a little bit of length and a little bit of volume to it it can blow in the wind I like that

This is where Ethan's relationships are the most interesting to me, his relationships with other people, because he has this magnetic thing going with Ilsa. And we're just like, just do it. Go. Be with her. Why? Fuck the world. Honestly?

Fuck the world. Go be with Ilsa. It's what any of us would do. That's what I would do in drafting her first for my team. It's a great endorsement, Mallory. Thank you. As you know, I love that pick. The way that he thinks about his team here, the way that we have to watch him move in and out of like, is a character like Alana a villain or a team member? Maybe that will also be coming up in discussion in very short order on this very podcast.

And the stunt work, the physicality, the action, the decision making, the willingness, always with Ethan, but in a just astonishing way here to put his life on the line for everyone. Like, what we watch in that helicopter sequence and on that cliff with Ethan and Walker is to me like...

actual Pantheon cinema. It's just unbelievable. And then you have that extra element of, like, really tugging on the heartstrings when... Because Jules is there, right? And, like, I love that stretch in the hospital bed at the end. He's so worried about everybody. They're so worried about him. It's...

Jules, Ethan, they're all, and you're like, will this guy ever just like let himself rest and be happy? I love it. I think what I'm discovering, I love it. I love Fallout. Is that my relationship to the Mission Impossible characters is pretty shallow compared to the

Death of emotional investment. Because like the hospital stuff, I'm just like, okay, I don't know. See, I'm like, Ethan Hunt is one of the great superheroes in our lives and we have to watch him suffer and yearn. And we, what do the three of us agree on? We love a yearn. We do love a yearn. We do love a yearn. But I think that like Ethan Hunt. And we love watching him use his teeth to pull the clip out of a detonator. We have it all here.

It's all of it. I think Ethan Hunt in the first Mission Impossible movie where he's dealing with personal betrayal and all these other things, there is like emotional depth there. And ever after, I think it is gloss and shine and a haircut.

I think in three, there's some. There's some in three. The stakes are quite personal in three. But yeah, I don't look to Ethan Hunt for emotional resonance. I look for the thrill of the chase. Let me say to you as your cherished colleague and dear friend, open your heart to this experience. I really love how you just called yourself cherished and dear.

And I will say back to you as your favorite co-worker and best friend in the world. Yeah, well, you didn't bring me fucking powdered cordyceps yesterday. Joanna did. I did bring Mallory powdered cordyceps. Is that a pro? I feel like you don't want the cordyceps.

I thought it was your way of saying to me. I was in New York and I was thinking about you. Exactly. And I brought you powder. I brought you an infection. You're processing it as, yeah, I'm infecting you with a plague. See, I would never give you a plague. I took it as, you're always on my mind. And also, should the apocalypse come, I'd like to spend it with you. I would. That's very sweet. Speaking of plagues. I'm not on the road, guys. I'm leaving you behind. Guys, I have four of my top picks. Would you like to pick your Macomb?

Do it. I don't want to pick my MacGuffin because I don't need to. I would like to now have the conversation Mal just alluded to about is Alana Mitsopoulos, a.k.a. the White Widow, a teammate? Yes. Let me tell you this. She's smart.

smoking hot. So I think she can be whatever you want. In that case, she's my teammate. She's in both categories. She's a villain as well. I thought about it in villain and to our larger conversation about the villains in this series, I think the big bads are mostly quite bad, but the mid-bads are usually quite good. Whether they're bureaucrats or double agents or guys who are cocking their biceps in a bathroom. I think all of those things work pretty well. And how'd that go? I mean, a spectacular fight scene. Yeah, yeah. Remind me what it looked like.

I don't know. I didn't draft it, so I couldn't tell you. Just one of the great Mission Impossible characters, the White Widow. Should we have put... Okay. Great Mission Impossible characters? ...Asian Walker's arms in the MacGuffin category? In Gadget, at least. Yeah. Still good. Still good. Yeah, so I'm just doubling down on potential flightiness. Here's my mentality. In the end, it's going to be Ethan. Right?

He's going to be the one executing the impossible thing, doing the impossible stunt. How we get there along the way, it's always going to be a little dicey. Things aren't always going to go according to plan. So why not lean into two highly capable people who may end up deserting me when I need them most? Okay. So let's just throw some true facts out here. And Rob is nothing if not a feminist. Rob's a feminist. He's got an all-female team. Without question, Rob has the hottest team. And I have also not allegedly tried to mask...

Turn someone into a mask slave by forcing them into my movie. I don't. No, but you have said that you're here for the robots to ensure that they get what's theirs. Rob has the hottest team. That's clear. That's inarguable. I think Rob has some serious trust issues, though, on his team. It's Mission Impossible. What are we doing if not betraying each other? It's on Mission Difficult. Excuse me, Sir Anthony Hopkins. See, I think the mission...

The missions that you guys are constructing are too easy, are too simple. I want stunts that will kill you. Yeah. I want a team that will probably betray you. You want to project Kalifa with faulty gloves is not going to kill you. You want to project a team that will fail. That will fail. I want a biplane in the air. It's the tallest building in the world, right? Well, you better draft those climbing gloves or I don't know how you're getting up it.

There's ropes. We've got things. I was wondering about that. Climbing the Burj Khalifa with ropes doesn't hit the same. I can assure you. I don't know. Getting the knock list without a harness doesn't hit the same either, does it? Oh, man. How's Molly going to get the knock list? Stroll right in, I guess. I'm not too worried about it. Maybe I'll be drafting Don Lowe as my second team member. And he can help with the vault. So it might be necessary, actually.

Okay, Alana, the white laugh boy. Okay, interesting. She's great. Look, I need characters who, again, are putting Ethan in compromising positions. And who better, honestly, than her? Phrasing, great. Okay, here's a problem that I've encountered for myself. Yeah. Which is that the next thing I want to do...

It involves me doubling down on my overcommitment to Mission Impossible 3. I am fine with you doing it and I support it as long as you, when I pick Jim Phelps soon, don't accuse me of doing that with the first Mission Impossible. Then I would like to draft for my team someone that will bring a depth of emotionality to the story.

Someone who we got way too little time with. Oh, interesting. This is an interesting pick. And it is Keri Russell's Lindsay Ferris in Mission Impossible 3. Wow. How about that? She was Ethan Hunt's first trainee. Uh-huh. He's emotionally invested in her. And if anyone has seen The Americans, you know that we deserved way more time with Keri Russell as a spy. So I would like to build a better movie that involves...

Lindsay Ferris not getting a bomb detonated in her head. Yes.

But getting to survive and with love and respect to Simon Pegg, this bumps up the hotness scale on my team. Wow. Shots fired at the ginger vote. Sheesh. So you're drafting a movie based on things that that character has never done before. This is what I was going to ask. Yeah. So you're projecting. You're scouting the talent. I would like to see more of what she can do. Right. And I think it's great stuff. Okay. She was trained by Ethan Hunt. You're less high on her, for example, getting...

Tough beat. If you want to draft Josh Holloway, I will support you. Considering it's still in my... You are less high on, we have to say it, the wrong mole. Like, thought it was someone it wasn't inside of the IMF. So that's concerning, right? That's concerning. However, I do think the use of the micro dot was compelling. Yeah.

I don't really blame her for the explosive pellet going off in her brain. That was a tough beat. It wasn't her fault. No. It was there to establish stakes. Yeah, so that Ethan could bite a stick later. How scary Owen is. Yeah. And how scary it would be to watch Michelle Monaghan get her people blown out by a bomb inside of her head. It certainly would be quite scary. But guess what? What? Now I get to pick hair. Wasn't her. Translator in a mask. Mask maker.

Since I don't have to pick my MacGuffin, since you already picked yours, now it's time for me to talk about Ethan Hunt, which Ethan Hunt I want. On a hair base, I think it's easy and it's Mission Impossible 2. Great hair. Sensational. Just absolutely the best. And I think we didn't pick it as a stunt, but I think the...

Free solo climbing of the rock face in Moab, Utah is one of the coolest things I've ever seen. And I also had to device the Oakleys that he throws at the camera and they blow up like incredibly cool. This is like and they released that. I want to say we take you back in time at like the MTV Movie Awards. They like showed that opening sequence and we were like, what the fuck is going to be the coolest movie ever? It wasn't.

It's not. But I think if I think if I pick Ethan Hunt from the second one, I want him to stay in his like rock climbing capris and like tank top. Like that's that's the only thing that I'm really that interested in, which means that I kind of want to pick Ghost Protocol Ethan Hunt because he's got similarly great long hair.

without the need to keep him on a rock in order to enjoy his presence. But now, once again, I'm scared that I am too mid-franchise-centric. Not scared, just questioning. So... Can I ask you a question about this particular Ethan with regard to his hair? Mm-hmm.

Are we worried about post-sandstorm Ethan? Like that's a lot of conditioning work that needs to be done after that sandstorm. Like he's kind of a fixer-upper by the end of this movie. It's great. How do you feel about that? No, it's a great question. As someone who enjoys the beach, like the sand in your hair question is a really good one. I would ask in response, does it matter if all you're doing is hurling yourself over the edge of a very tall parking garage? I'm just saying into the future.

And again, once again, I say to you, I say to you, my love of Ghost Protocol also includes his flaws. Which is a parking garage-centric closer to the movie. Very strange stuff at the end of that film. Just a lot of concrete happening. Very strange stuff at the end of that movie. Actually, you know what I'm going to do? I think you just picked. Nope. I'm going to pick Brush Cut, Mission Impossible 1. So you just laid out a whole case and then walked it back? What a twist! What happened there? Wow.

I just don't feel he's like very represented in my in anything that we have here. And I just want like fresh faced. He's just starting out. What would his life have been if like at the beginning he had Benji on his side? You know what I mean? That's what I want. Interesting. It's interesting you say that because you know who he did have on his side right at the start? Luther. Luther. Yeah. And he got absolutely duped for most of that movie. He did. Yeah.

It's fine. But to be so young. It had been disavowed and to be brought back from a team. If you would like to pick Emilio Estevez, also I would support it. Chris and Scott Thomas. There's a lot of options here of people who die right away. Their screen time is ample. Almost Lindsay-esque. That's what I'm saying. Josh Holloway. I consider Paul Patton. And I will say, I think the most important thing that's ever happened in all of cinema is when

Paula Patton's character Jane donkey kicks Leia Sidhu out of so good the Birchcliff that one also to dodge to me what is such like a classic action movie pitfall which is like we have the one female agent hero and the one female villain and they must fight and it's like that scene has actual personal stakes and actual plot reasons to be happening and is a fucking good fight scene I call that the Proxima Midnight yeah

Shout out to Carrie Coon. Oh, man. Interfinite shower. Okay, wait. So then I get my next pick, right? You do, yeah. That's my last pick. Well, I think you just made two picks. No, you just made two. You picked Lindsay and I did. Well, you made three because you picked Ghost Protocol, Ethan, and then OG. And also in my two, Ethan. That's true. A lot of Ethan selection being made. I'm picking Original Flavor, Ethan Hunt. Okay.

I'm going to go ahead and take Ghost Protocol, Ethan. And take him off the board. Both of my categories at this point are... I'm pretty boxed in. I need a MacGuffin. I need an Ethan. You guys have already selected those. I consider this your tacit acknowledgement that Ghost Protocol is a great film. It is a good film. You actually have it pretty high. It's Mallory Rubin who's the problem. I quite like Ghost Protocol. I have it in the middle. You should be one of my favorites. You told me the other day it was the second worst Mission Impossible movie. In the immediate...

In the immediate haze of having finished my rewatch, I was just not vibing with it. It used to be one of my absolute favorites. I will reveal where it landed in my final order. It's in the middle. I have three clear tiers, and it is in the middle tier. I think that's fair. A lot of hair versatility. Not just running through the sandstorm. Not just the Burj Khalifa, but our guy knows how to wear tux. It's a great mid-cut. Very good mid-cut. In Mr.

Mission Impossible 2 is just long all the time. Yes. In Ghost Protocol, you can sort of slick back the... It's a little mulledy. You can sort of slick back the long ends of the back and it looks convincingly mid-cut. So, yeah. I'm feeling like for the third Ethan to get Ghost Protocol Ethan, let's fucking go. Was there another Ethan you were considering? I was considering two on Hair Alone. Yeah. Hair Alone. It's compelling. It's really compelling. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

Eat shit later series, Ethan. Yeah, no one was going to pick final. Post Fallout, there's nothing to recommend there. Ethan, I don't think. Though again, quite a long stretch of the final movie takes place in boxer briefs, which I do admire. I also say about Ghost Protocol, Ethan, is he is like freshly off having like

Let his wife go live her life elsewhere. It's true. And so he's like nursing this sort of broken heart. It's sad boy, Ethan. Yeah, sad boy, Ethan. It's very good.

He's sort of awful. I gotta say, it's always sad boy Ethan. There's like no vibes with him and Paula Patton because she's sad over Josh Holloway. So it's just sort of like... See, I disagree. I think there's a pretty good vibe. No, like good vibes, but I wouldn't say like, will they, won't they vibes? Because I feel like they're both like heartbroken. It's definitely more heartbreak, but there is just like a pure...

organic chemistry that happens when you put them in like the ball gown and the tux and the seduction of like can I getting this guy to show you his art collection upstairs she's so good at that she's wonderful Mallory's skeptical the hot member of the team entering a fancy function in a gown between Maggie Q and Paula Patton and Rebecca Ferguson is just one of my favorite stiff competition yeah very stiff okay let's next

Okay, so I have my final two picks during the turn, and I have to take my second team member on my villain. Team member, a lot of good and interesting choices, albeit not the top of the field, but plenty of Alana-esque, you know? You can make the case. Better than Lindsey, certainly, who I had 13th on my list. Villain, it's a thinner field. I have Jim Phelps as my second ranked villain, as previously mentioned. Yeah.

I can't bring myself to engage with the Kurt Hendricks, Cobalt ghost protocol. I can't. Um, if this were, I was going to say, if this were a comedy draft, I might get it. The man is a hundred percent underbite. No personality. Just wild stuff. Astonishing stuff. Uh, for the previously discussed reasons, I will not be selecting Musgrave. I, I, I think that Gabriel is like a,

truly terrible villain. Yes. Really, really, really. No, I'd agree. Actually, like, bad? Oh, yeah. I'd have an easier time making the case for the entity, but it's also just not for me and I don't think particularly well executed. And so my choices for villain are ultimately Jim Phelps or Walker, John Lark. Those are my choices. Hmm. This is interesting because I'd like to commit more fully to Fallout.

But I think that Jim Phelps is a stronger villain. I do. Jim Phelps is a really good villain. Yeah, so I'm going to take Jim Phelps. Welcome to the team. Here's why I like the Jim Phelps pick as my villain. Not only because...

Great, just in a vacuum, interesting villain, right? Yes, definitely. Good performance. The De Palma energy and the treachery and the betrayal. Ethan realizing what's happening because of a stamp inside of a Bible. All great stuff. The extra element of Claire and the way that the mistrust seeps deeper into the team. How deep does the rot go? All of that inside of the first Mission Impossible film is wonderful. Leads to Jon Voight doing some

stunt work in a in the channel that I don't think any of us ever expected we would see but that's not relevant to the current discussion great glasses glasses acting certainly wonderful glasses acting yeah the reason that I really like having Jim Phelps as my villain though is because it's one of the most essential like original wounds for Ethan very true and it's such a recurring beat across the rest of the franchise that

The treachery inside of the IMF, the question of whether Ethan can trust anybody in leadership, the number of times that Ethan is...

is either actively or kind of like subtly and passively-ish, like disavowed, cast off, blamed, framed by the unit and the country and the world that he serves. It's so shameful. And you understand where it all stems from and how it would affect him and what it would wash up for him every time. So Jim Phelps, welcome to the club. Team member! Mm-hmm.

You know... One counterpoint on Jim Phelps. Hit me. It gives me more time to think of team member. He's literally barely in the movie, and I would say within that, barely gets a chance to be a villain in the movie. Here's something that I will say. Some things can be subtle. Not everything has to be fucking a rudder into your brain on a biplane. It is Mission Impossible. Something for... A bit of cultural education for the children. I mean, I know that there are plenty of people who don't know that Mission Impossible was originally a TV show, which it was. And the fact that Jim Phelps was the, like,

heroic lead of that TV show when they when they adapted to a film they're like let's make him the villain was a really cool smart choice twist for the you know the people who love the TV show going into um

The movie. I love that about Jim Phelps. I would say, though, by drafting Jim Phelps, you're also drafting Shea Whigham as his son into your movie. I'm not. And I would say the single dumbest... Briggs is not a part of my story. Not a part of my world. The single dumbest part of Final Reckoning is when Briggs shows up at the end, pulls out his gun, and he pulls the bait and switch and shake. Oh, my sweet lord. What are they doing? It's really bad. That was a horrible scene. Really bad. Yeah.

Not relevant for my pick. It's almost like the thing about the Christian McQuarrie era of Mission Impossible is they got away for so long with just like making movies up as they went. Yes. And then it just, the wheels fell off every single vehicle in the final movie. Oh man. Okay. So one final teammate for you? Yeah, I think. Good luck beating Elizabeth Jennings from The Americans, which is who I drafted. That's not who you drafted. Yeah, I did. Matthew Reeves, also not eligible. Master of Wigs and Accents. Yes.

Does that mean that if I take Paris, I'm also taking Mantis? Yeah. Yeah? Is that how it works? Yeah. Um, hmm. I'm definitely going to take a hot chick. For sure. I don't mind saying it. I'm sorry, I don't mind saying it. Uh,

I think I need it. I think my movie needs that. You know, again, with respect to Brant, you know, I need... So you're saying Vanessa Redgrave is max because I would support it. I mean, that would be great. It has some of the, you know, in the bloodline that Rob has chosen on his team with Alana. It's just some trust issues there, I think. Definitely. A...

Are you picking Grace? I think I'm going to pick Grace. I'm not sure, though. I'm still deciding here because I could do Paris. Oh, you're going to Joe this thing where you pick it and then you walk it back. I could do Julia. I mean, not IMF, but ends up being involved in so many of the missions at various points in various films. Julia definitely counts less useful than Lindsay Ferris, I would say. Only one of them had their brain exploded.

Within four minutes. Only one of them decided to marry Wes Bentley. And I think that's a bigger market. Wow. Very fair. I could pick Paris. I could pick Naya. I could pick William Donlo. Talk about a needle mover on the social vote. Should I pick Kittredge?

We'll not be doing that. Okay. I think part of why I really like the third Mission Impossible movie, part of why three and four are not top tier to me, but are middle tiers, like the teams are just not as good. The teams are not as good. I am going to pick Grace. I am. I'm going to pick Grace.

I don't think that... It's a good pick. The argument for Grace is an argument for the movies that Grace is in, is what I will say. And I think that Grace gives me street smarts, right? Okay. Fastest hands in the business could come into play in a lot of different ways. In every business, apparently. Just in the world. Yeah. Yeah. So if I need in a one millionth of a second someone to grab Joanna's MacGuffin,

I've got grace to do it. If I need someone to cuddle and cradle, Ethan is his decompression sickness. Warm him with her bosom. We'll use his body. I have that. You know, someone who made the choice, right? Who made the choice. This becomes a big part of the canon in the later movies. It really does somehow. Yeah.

You know, I like that Grace is like brought into this, but has her own life and her own history and her own skills. And then those become like the utility that she already has and the choices that she already made for herself are then deployed in this interesting way inside of this like world saving apparatus. I am not a fan of Dead Reckoning or Final Reckoning as movies, but I do like the Grace character. I do. This is another pick where if we had if you had made this pick a month ago, I

I think I would have been more on board with it. Because Grace in Dead Reckoning. Good character. Delightful, charming, light touch. Grace in the final Reckoning. The car chase. Look, the car chase in Rome. The Mini Cooper car chase. See, that was one I was curious about. Is that a stunt? Yeah. Fiat 500. Oh, I'm so sorry. I don't know.

I don't think I'm pronouncing that correctly, but... Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a great... I thought someone might pick that as their device gadget, and you still might, perhaps, because you need a device gadget, actually. I don't even know what car it is, so yeah, I definitely am going to pick it. I just would have liked, in the scope of a... Quick thinker? ...two-hour, 45-minute Final Reckoning movie or whatever the runtime is, like, give her something more to do than bosom warming and dog sledding. I agree, but that, like, is not her fault. That's the movie's fault. But that's half her runtime. Maybe more. I just think she's such a blatant, transparent...

uh-oh, Rebecca Ferguson doesn't want to be in our movie anymore. Let's just port in Hayley Atwell. Well, guess what? Uh-oh. I couldn't draft Rebecca Ferguson. So you want Rebecca Ferguson in the first round. And so in this round, I'll take the next best thing, I guess.

Grace, welcome to the club. I had across my seven categories, one, two, three, four, five of my top picks, and I had one number two, and Grace was my fourth ranked teammate. No, sorry. Yes, fourth ranked teammate, actually. That's great. I love that you love the first Mission Impossible movie. That's wonderful. I'm really counterbalancing that with the Grace pick as well. Are we all teammates off the board? Do you have two teammates, Jo? I do. Jo just needs device and gadget, I think, right? Is that right?

Honestly, as far as the later movies go, Paris was pretty tempting. I really like Paris' whole deal. Stabby, stabby aggro Paris in particular I think is super fun. But there's just not quite enough there. That plus a little comic relief is maybe not quite enough to hang together as a go-to TV. Yeah, I think it's a little tough. A little tough. All right, Rob, you're down to your MacGuffin. I'm down to my MacGuffin. Will you be doing Chimera? Please do it. I'm going to take Julia as my MacGuffin. No? No.

Julia in Mission Impossible Fallout is straight up bait to get Ethan. Bait is different from MacGuffin. Is it? Yeah. What would you say is the difference between bait and MacGuffin? She's a damsel tied to a train track. That's a MacGuffin. That's not a MacGuffin. What's the difference between a cruciform key that needs to unlock a lock versus you need to come to this place so we can fight? He doesn't even know she's there. She's just there. You made Joe mad. You made Joanna mad.

This is not my fault. This is Fallout's fault. That's not bad. I'm not mad. I have a serious question for you and I want you. That was so party guys of you. You're very animated, Joanna and Colton. That was supporting you.

Okay, what if the... Was that because you wanted another beautiful woman on your little grid on Instagram? I'm just trying to support women. I don't know what you're talking about. Be honest. I just think the ultimate MacGuffin is... By calling a woman a thing, a MacGuffin? I didn't do that. Is that better than Mallory saying, if I've got the mask maker, I can make any woman? Take it up with Christopher McQuarrie. Take it up with the writing team from Mission Impossible Fallout. I didn't do it. Writing team?

Is Tommy and Chris in the trailer at lunch? Basically so. Okay. I think that the ultimate MacGuffin is love, but apparently we disagree. You know what? Fuck it. I will go with Chimera. Hell yeah. What a twist.

It's a pretty generic chemical weapon, if we're being honest about it. But the fact that you can infect people with it and then sell them the cure is a devious bit of capitalism that I have to salute. It also reminds me a lot, I find myself thinking a lot about Jackie Chan this week, apparently, of the movie The Tuxedo. Did you guys see The Tuxedo? Yeah, I've seen The Tuxedo. The devious master plan is to create a bottled water that also makes you thirsty, so you will buy more bottled water, but they over calibrate and it kills you.

But all of which is to say... Thanks for bringing up the tuxedo on this podcast. I'm just here for supply and demand, ultimately, right? We're creating an infection like the one that you introduced to Mallory. And I'm here with the cure, Mal. I'm here to help you. You can't cure, of course. Maybe you can't, but ultimately we can. Is this the only... So obviously some of our characters or some elements like the Masked Maker go across films. Is this the only pick that is specific to...

to Mission Impossible 2 that was taken today? I mean, nothing was taken out of Mission Impossible 2. You know, it's like they left all that stuff for dead. My favorite part of it, I actually think

I think, again, especially because of the nuke bloat over the rest of the franchise, I actually think bioweapon, big pharma, insidious intent, profiting from the stock options, all of that is actually, I think, kind of interesting. The success of execution. Minimal. Sure. We can quibble, but the thing to me about

in the second Mission Impossible movie that I just, no matter how many times I see this movie, simply cannot get over, is that they feel compelled to explain what is ultimately, I think, fairly easy to understand in the swath of confounding Mission Impossible things, which is like, made the bad thing so that we can make the good thing and then make money from it. Pretty straightforward. So,

seven times in the movie. They explain the exact same thing. John Waller was just ahead of his time in terms of the studio notes that people get these days, which is like, if people are looking at their phones, you have to explain the thing seven times. To be fair, I did rewatch it while basically on my computer, and it was a great time. I didn't miss a single plot point in Mission Impossible 2. Did you watch any Mission Impossible movies last night, Rob? No, I ended up doing some greatest hits, clip jumping instead, instead of watching in full. You know, I need to be selective. I need to be targeted. Sure, sure.

Got a lot to do. All right. It's my pick and it's the last pick. Is that correct? Last pick of the draft, baby. I can't believe y'all kept Julia out of this draft. Like I was just trying to open the door for her. Should I take Julia as my teammate into the grave? Definitely could. She's a very good spy as we know. Goes fine for her. She's at the White Lotus. Let her be. Yep. Um,

That all went great. Guys, should my last pick of this draft be Chewing Gum? Because I'm thinking about it. I, first of all... As a gadget? Yeah. Yeah, the Exploding Gum. Exploding Gum is so iconic. I give you one more limit to attacking how many first film picks I've made if you do that. So that would be welcome for me personally. I think that's a great pick. Here's what I'm considering.

Let's just go through the process with me, shall we? Yeah. You don't need the climbing gloves. I don't need the climbing gloves. I want the climbing gloves. I think you very much need the climbing gloves. No, I want the climbing gloves, but I have a whiff of them because I have the Burj Khalifa, right? Yes. That would be over-indexing on Burj Khalifa. Okay. I want the chewing gum just because it is iconic from the original and then brought back again later. Yeah. Have you considered taking the brain bomb so that you can figure out how to stop it and keep Lindsay alive for more than six minutes in your movie? It's a great question. Study the tech? Yeah.

injectable transponder sure yeah pretty basic I actually think the best like the most useful out of all the tech I genuinely think this are the contact lenses that can identify anyone and also I don't know Xerox something just by looking at it or whatever it is the smart lenses that's one of the things that was on my mind at the beginning of the pod when we were talking about things that now actually like exist that they've like made it's just not very grade friendly I don't know what the social team is gonna do it would be like Renner's eyeball yeah Renner's eyeball with the like yeah um

All right, smart lenses. Because Mallory gave them a quippy name, I will go with smart lenses rather than what did I have written here? Face ID contact slash coffee machine contact.

How do you feel about like an AR... How big are the cells on your spreadsheet? I'll show you why they're so large later. How do you feel about this check? Oh, no, I can show you now. It's over. It's not over. Oh, you have won my last pick? No, I'm just saying, you know, it's never over. I have...

a photo of Ethan in my Ethan column from every movie just so we could like know what the hair looks like. Unbelievable. Well, great, great, great. Could you go through the color coordination on your, on your spreadsheet? The colors indicate if it's only in one movie is color coded to that movie. The key being down here at the bottom. But then if it's a cross franchise, then it's just, you don't color code inspiring work. I do colored text. Oh, you know what? You know what? I was inspired by Rob.

The mirror at the end of the drafts, because I did not cheat, glimpse I got of your 2000 big pick draft spreadsheet that was like a split, like a diopter sort of spreadsheet approach. I have a complex process that Joe likes to screen watch as we're doing these drafts. Two years running. Absolutely not. Despicable behavior. Absolutely not.

If anyone watches the tape, I actively cheated away from you. I gave you my cold shoulder because you accused me of looking at your screen last time. That's called the bait and switch. Like you're looking over the shoulder as you turn. I'm practically Grace. That's just me. A little slate of hands. All right. So that's what you're picking, the smart lenses. I am picking the smart lenses. Okay. Not the smart car. You don't want the little, the zippy car for the car chase. Nobody picks self-destructing messages.

as their gadget. I don't... It is very mission impossible, but it's not the most practical. I would pick...

A specific one. So I'd pick like the Utah Oakleys. But they seem so dangerous. I like a nice gentle white puff of smoke that has no risk of burning my face off. What about a record store booth? That one's good. Would the flute sniper rifle have counted? That was on my list. I didn't know if like weapons are gadgets or not. Flute gun was here. The program that Benji has that like turns it to a monitor. That's a good one. I like that one. That one's really sick. I like that. The speed wing, the halo jump kit.

The metal eating orange foam from Mission Impossible 3. Yeah. Yeah. I do like that. Decompression chamber. Entity communication coffin as previously discussed. Can't believe that made it. Oh my God. All right. Try it on would have been a good one. Let's read our final teams. Yeah. And then talk about some of the other honorable mentions that we didn't get to. That sounds great. And then do our ranking and then call it a day. Shall we? Okay. So Rob Mahoney, would you like to share your...

I would love to. My Ethan is Ghost Protocol Ethan. Right. My team is Ilsa Faust and Alana the White Widow. My villain is Solomon Lane. My MacGuffin is, of course, the Chimera and Bellerophon. Is that right? Yep. My stunt is the biplane stunt escape, complete with Gabriel getting his head smashed in. And my gadget is the hall projection screen. Interesting. That's a great draft. Good job. Thank you, Charlie Irvin. Okay. Okay.

Let's see. My Ethan is Ethan Hunt from the cinematic masterpiece Mission Impossible colon dash Fallout. The whole Mission Data colon Impossible dash Fallout. Fallout Ethan is my Ethan. That's thrilling. My first team member is icon legend Luther. My second team member is Grace. Did you as your gadget select a chair for Luther? Or a hat? Hmm.

Anything. He comes with the hat. He comes with the hat. My villain is Jim Phelps. My MacGuffin is the knock list. My stunt is the bike jump off the cliff to parachute down to the train. And my device slash gadget is the mask maker. Um...

My name is Joanna Robinson, and this is my pick. I picked the original Ethan Hunt from Mission Impossible. 90s Tom Cruise. How can you argue against it? My team is one Benjamin Dunn, played by Simon Pegg, a ginger, and one Lindsay Ferris, played by Keri Russell, who has often russet highlights in her hair. Wow, look at that. My villain is...

could not be more ginger. Philip Seymour Hoffman is Owen Davian, the best villain, clearly, that this franchise has ever seen. My MacGuffin is the rabbit's foot, which is, once again, a liquid form of code that eventually becomes the entity. Yeah.

My stunt is one of the best things that's ever happened in all of cinema, which is the Burj Khalifa climb. And my device gadget are the, and I definitely knew this is what they were called smart lenses that can face ID people and do a number of other things. And those are our mission impossible sort of like constructions drafts final round. Mallory, any honorable mentions you want to talk about? Oh boy. Great question. Let's see. Um,

we've talked about the Fallout helicopter stretch a lot, so nobody picked it, but we don't need to talk about it because it's sort of accounted for with some of our other picks. Okay, you know what I want to talk about on the stunt front that we didn't talk about? The underwater vault red box retrieval. See, I just prefer the Sevastopol to that.

Sevastopol. The Sevastopol. Really? I think it's like a better riff on the same idea. Oh, wow. In terms of like, you need to solve this underwater puzzle in a certain amount of time with all of these moving components. I prefer... But one of them feels like believable and one of them requires... Believable. It's Mission Impossible. And one of them required us to accept that Tom Cruise outside of the patented naval deep sea diving suit would just be fine 500 feet.

Also, he shot himself out of a torpedo tube, but don't worry about it. I did like the stretch inside of the sub. What about the Paris Halo jump? Yeah, that's a great one. It's great, but by the end of the series, it's almost too straightforward to pick. I do really like when Walker's like, you fucked up your

up your oxygen tank great I love the beginning I don't love the whole stunt but the beginning where you follow Tom as he jumps out of the plane and you know that he's actually doing that yeah is really good bananas yes really really good Joe doesn't like it but justice for the train sequence in Dead Reckoning or really it's just basically Uncharted like Uncharted did it and then Mission Impossible tried to do it just hard disagree

We already mentioned the Utah Free Climb. Motorcycle jousting in Mission Impossible 2. Oh, sure. You know? A genuinely maniacal bit of moviemaking. It's just... It defies comprehension in every respect. If you take it out of the context of thinking it's a Mission Impossible movie and it needs to live up to everything that follows it, it's just a fun, dumb action movie that I enjoy watching. Yeah, sure. I mean, I guess the...

Bill and I were talking about this when I gave a really only mid-TV show B+. I like when things know what they are. And the thing is that John Woo's Mission Impossible is also trying to be like Hitchcock while also trying to be a dumb John Woo action film. And I'm like, you're trying too many things at once. What is Anthony Hopkins doing here? I have a lot of questions. Many people are asking. Okay. We very briefly talked about the Rome thing.

car chase sequence, but I think that requires another mention. That's wonderful. Also crucially features my beloved Grace in starring fashion outwitting Ethan. I don't know that I've gotten a bigger laugh all series than when they inexplicably end up changing seats in the middle of that. It's really, really fun. That's really, really good stuff. Should we talk about the bathroom fight more? Do you think we talked about it enough? I think we talked about it enough. Remind me what happens when John Lark...

you know, reenters the fray. I couldn't tell you. I mean, it's getting a little fuzzy, but it is a little bit of a kind of situation. You were looking. Caught it out of my peripheral vision. It's on video. It's live here. Caught it out of my peripheral vision.

That was like a tragedy that you weren't looking into this. But if she had, maybe something bad would have happened. Maybe we would have been leaning in too much. That is genuinely thrilling. The crucial part of that scene is Tom Cruise just getting the ever-living shit kicked out of him. Oh, yeah. Sinks are being destroyed. Getting thrown into sinks and urinals and many things. It's painful. It's disgusting. It's great. Actually, the best part of that whole sequence is when Ilsa pretends that the massive lake of blood on the floor is from someone's nosebleed. Yeah.

You'd be dead, I think, right? That's what happens when Elsa tries to convince you of something. You're like, yeah, I guess. That makes sense. Sounds right. Oh, also, I actually don't know if it's explained and I missed it, but why are there so many people in suits at this rave in Paris? Have you been to many Parisian raves? No one's in suits on the floor. Everyone's in rave gear on the floor. Then you go to the bathroom and it's just businessmen. Why? That's the class system, Jo. Okay, great. Thank you so much for explaining that to me. Okay.

Any device gadgets we missed? I will say Brant's magnetic vest that he has to like jump down an air shaft and it keeps him floating. I'm putting it on there.

Sure. It seemed very hot down there and he was complaining a lot about the temperature. So I get it. Sounds like you. I get it, yeah. Sounds like you every day of our life together. 90 degrees in the studio. And then Arjuna or John is like, it's 67. Yeah. Not a lot of brand talk on this pod in general. I think that's fine. It's one of the reasons that Ghost Protocol. No, Ghost Protocol is great. Has not held up as well for me over time. Here's the deal. It's not a character that matters. I hear you when you're talking about the team. Yeah. Yeah.

And that is a big flaw of Mission Impossible 3. I would say Simon Pegg is so good and so important to the rest of the franchise that he offsets the Renner

you know, factor. Okay, MacGuffin's anything we didn't mention that we want to talk about? It's just nuclear launch codes, nuclear cores, nuclear float, as Mallory called it, the entity itself. Cruciform key. Gotta say it on the pod. Can't conclude the pod without saying cruciform key out loud. I don't think so. I legitimately do like the cruciform key until the point where the Russians just like 3D printed another one. We have one too. That was very, very tough for this like one singular artifact you need to solve the puzzle. It makes Dead Reckoning not a good movie even worse. Okay, in retrospect.

Villains that we didn't talk about. Well, how high up the villain list did you have to be? Because like, how do we feel about henches? I think henches count. Do you know? So like, Lea Seydoux goes protocol. Jean Reno in the first one, right? It's Franz Krieger.

Love Krieger. Laius Adu. Sabimaro. That's another thing. It's like just not nearly enough. Not nearly enough. I agree. It's cruel. It's actively cruel. That's how I feel about Dune 2 as well. Completely. Yeah. Almost any time Laius Adu shows up, I'm like more. Without getting too big into the text of Dune Messiah, is she a bigger part of Dune Messiah? Do we know? Is that a thing we can talk about? Let's not talk about it. All right. She's a sandworm.

Team members. I think we talked about everything we need to talk about. There was one I considered. Like, look, the one presence... Hunley? Well, see, a Baldwin type. Like, we have the guys in the chair. We have the agents in the field. But they're always a problem. Erica Sloan is the one. Erica Sloan. What? You don't...

First of all, don't want Angela Bassett like that. You're just being disrespectful. I did not want Angela Bassett. You have way too many trust issues on your team to even consider that. It's mission impossible. He just wanted another hot woman on his roster and I support that. To be honest, I just want to make the Instagram grid even stronger. I can't really argue with the strategy. I mostly just wanted to say that's the job. Terrible. Sorry. Alright.

All right. I think those are, I mean, and then the Ethans is just all the other Ethans. Okay. So ranking. Of the films. Of the films. Yeah. It varies for me depending on where, which rewatch I'll say. I'm definitively, if we're going to like tier, like the way you're describing Mal, Fallout and OG are the top tier for me. Interesting. Yeah. My tier one is Fallout and Rogue Nation. My tier one is Ghost Protocol and the first Mission Impossible. Okay.

And then it's Rogue Nation. Like, it's really close. Rogue Nation should be in the top two, but I can't. Here's the thing about Ghost Protocol that I just need to explain. Mission Impossible, the first one, huge movie. Huge, huge movie. Mission Impossible 2 happens. Nobody likes it. Everyone thinks it's bad. Mission Impossible 3 happens. Everyone's like, it's not very good. Like, Mission Impossible 3 has only grown in people's estimation, mostly because of Philip Seymour Hoffman. And then Ghost Protocol came along, and everyone's like,

That was how I felt at the time. And Brad Bird was like, here we go. You know, because it was like six years between MI2 and MI3. Five years between MI3 and Ghost Protocol. And then after that, it's just like, we're cooking. I mean, COVID happened. But like, then Macquarie takes over and it's the Macquarie era. But like, you know, if COVID hadn't happened, we would have had a Mission Impossible. Among many other benefits to society, there would have been...

Far more Mission Impossible movies. Of all the sliding doors moments that have been discussed on Ringer Pods, no COVID for more Mission Impossibles is a real doozy. This is blown away right now. Who says no? I'm solving COVID. I'm curing COVID so we can have more Mission Impossible movies. My second tier is the first Mission Impossible, which I love and I'm very fond of, as is probably clear.

Ghost Protocol and three. And my order varies depending on when I rewatch them. This was the one where Ghost Protocol slid down to me, but the third tier is just a distinct thing that Ghost Protocol does not belong in. Yeah. I mean, so if I'm Fallout and OG up top, then Rogue, then Ghost, then Dead Reckoning, I think for me.

And then MI3, Final Reckoning, and my two in the bottom tier. Wow, you have three in the bottom tier. My bottom tier is... The Reckonings. The Reckonings. Dead Reckoning, Final Reckoning, and then two. But I actually, like, even though I think two is clearly, like, is the worst movie in the franchise, I have much more affection for it than The Reckonings. Yes. Much more. Yeah. And I think over time, that might even change. Because two has been at the bottom of the ranking for so long that we're just like, that's where it belongs. I don't know. There's so much, like...

There's so much attrition built up of people disliking it. I don't think it's going to move very much. I don't know. Tell that to Thor the Dark World. You know what I mean? Like these things tend to move around sometimes. Thor the Dark World still sucks, guys. Not to me, and it never has. It's still extremely bad. I've been Ruben Pills.

Like, I don't agree, but like, I will tell you, many people. Oh, no. This is like the years we lived. Y'all gotta get off the ether. It's getting bad in here. The years of our lives we lived through where everyone agreed that the prequels were bad and then that generation grew up and now people are like, Revenge of the Sith is the best Star Wars movie. And that's something we have to deal with. It's not the best Star Wars movie, but it is important. Guys, Obi-Wan is on a lizard for like 40% of that movie. Very important film. It's the reckonings at the bottom for me. Yeah.

I can't argue it. Yeah, to me, the only thing that's saving Dead Reckoning are some of the stunts. And ultimately, like, I've much... The Fiat sequence. The Fiat sequence is wonderful. Really good. Wonderful. And I'm higher on the train. We got the motorcycle. I like Hayley Atwell much more in that movie. I like Pom more in that movie, frankly. Like, I think it has more dynamic elements and a little less mess than Dead Reckoning does. I just think the, like, flashback to, like,

Like, fridging an unknown brunette woman for Ethan Hunt in a flashback is like... Look. In the movie where you also fridge Ilsa Faust, like, it's just like you open the fridge door and there's a mini fridge inside of it and you open the mini fridge and there's one of those little fridges that you keep your cosmetics in and it's just full of dead...

brunette women mission impossible is full of dead brunette women i will say in defense of its uh shaky gender politics at times most of the men who appear in this series are like total red shirt characters like the guy who's in final reckoning i don't even know that guy's name like that character's name who's with them until the end brandt is another great example it's like zero personality male characters other than luther and benji like those are the only two guys who get to do literally anything baldwin

I guess. And Jonathan Rhys-Myers, who we've not mentioned once on this podcast. For good reason. I totally get it. Okay. A lot of zeros. We did it. What a fun way to look back at the franchise. What a time we had. Will we get another Tom Cruise Mission Impossible movie? I think so. What do you think? Yes, absolutely. I mean, of course the answer is yes. When? When will we get it? Here's my favorite. Okay.

Rob and I have been exchanging some like Tom Cruise is an alien clips of late. Yeah. There's a lot. It's a rich text. How many involve him eating popcorn? Most. Yeah. Sure. But my very favorite...

was when someone was like, it was Father's Day, and a red carpet reporter was like, what do you like to do on Father's Day? And Tom Cruise, notoriously not close to the children, was like, just making movies, man. Just having fun making movies. And it was like, wow, okay. Anyway, yes, he has to make more Mission Impossible movies. He has nothing else except more Top Gun movies. The thing I never understand about... I can't wait for the third Top Gun, man. I'm excited. And I...

Like that power. I care nothing about the first Top Gun. Maverick, I'm like galvanized. You know, like he has that ability to make you really, really care about something with spectacle, with his like pure charisma. What I don't understand is all the people who talk to him and talk about like this magical effect he has on you where he zeroes in and you're the most important person in the room. And yet every time you hear him speak, it's like the man has not said one specific thing in his entire life. It is all, I love the movies. What movies? I just love them. I feel like it's like...

You think so? Yeah. Like, if you're in a room with him, it's pheromone-based. Have you had any... Have you had the Tom Cruise cake? How would I have had the Tom Cruise cake? You can order it. Heard a million stories about it. What's your review? It's bad. It's... What? I think everyone who says it's great is... Has been huffing the Tom Cruise pheromones. It's so...

sickly sweet. It's heavily white chocolate based. It's a coconut cake. Yeah, there's coconut and white chocolate chunks in like a very white chocolate frosting in a bunt situation. It is bad. I've never had a bad donut. I've never had a bad coconut cake. I also don't like donuts. All right, so listen.

This has been the Mission Impossible draft where all of my opinions are correct. Gingers, I'm counting on you. I would like to thank Rob Mahoney. Thank y'all. For showing up here today. This was so much fun. You're the best. A blast. Mallory Rubin. I love Mallory Rubin. Thank you for being here. This is my pleasure. Can't wait to get a coffee. Thank you to the entire IMF team who is here with us today. We've got John Richter, Carlos Chiriboga, Chris Thomas, Jomi Adinaron on social, and Arjuna Rangapal.

for holding the whole team together. He is our Ethan Hunt. We value him always. And we'll be back next week for our summer hype meter. We'll see you then. Bye.