History Fridge / MissionImpossible1996

* The opening credits show a montage of images of the plot and the faces of Ethan's initial team. It's meant to look like the opening credits of the original television show, helping to sell the idea that Ethan's initial team is the main cast and not a bunch of {{decoy protagonist}}s and [[FaceHeelTurn secret traitors]].

* FridgeHorror: Secretary Kittridge sent Hunt's [=IMF=] team to retrieve a stolen list of {{Code Name}}s [[spoiler:as part of an internal "[[TheMole mole hunt]]" - and was completely unsurprised when Hunt was the SoleSurvivor, whom he thus believed to be the mole. He effectively ''sacrificed the entire team to catch a single mole.'' The whole "disavow any knowledge" meant the loyal team members were expecting to stake their lives on their talents without a net, but sending them on a SuicideMission without their knowledge? Granted, he was really pissed off afterwards at the deaths and there was really no other way to expose the mole, but dude, that's cold. Justified, but '''cold.''']]
** [[spoiler:Perhaps he wasn't expecting the mole to reveal him/herself by killing the rest of the team, but when he got the news that they all were dead, figured out quickly that this would expose the mole anyway.]]
*** [[spoiler:Additional thought on this: Kittridge did have the other team to watch it was going on, his plan was likely that the mole would reveal him/herself by some actions that the other team would spot, but expected this to be done in a more sneaky way. However, Kittridge throughout the movie is shown to not react all that strongly to anything that happens, even things like seeing Jim alive, so it is likely that he wouldn't react to strongly to the team's deaths either, and that he would quickly figure out that Ethan was apparently a likely mole.]]
** [[spoiler:It's not cold, it's intelligent. If the NOC list gets out in the open, hundreds or thousands of agents across the entire world (not to mention their friends and families) are at ''extreme'' risk of death. Putting the lives of a few agents (who risk their lives on any mission in the first place) is small potatoes considering the [[{{TheNeedsOfTheMany}} greater good]].]]
* Why doesn't Ethan [[spoiler: disguised as Jim]] speak to Claire on the train? Ethan most likely [[spoiler: didn't have the time to make a voice copy of Phelps. As shown in ''Film/MissionImpossibleIII'', it's a very involved process.]]
* FridgeHorror: On the train, Max gets the NOC list and starts uploading it. She fails, but she doesn't fail ''completely''. Chances are that some of the names still made it to the other side, and those people are in terrible danger.
** It's not as bad as you might think. A partial file transmission would be difficult to turn into anything readable now, never mind back then. There's a reasonable good chance that there would be no usefully extractable data at all.
* FridgeBrilliance: When Ethan says he'll go after the disk even after Jim calls "abort", Jim panics. At first you think he's afraid of losing more agents. Sure, he was calm when Jack died, but now maybe the emotion is catching up to him, and maybe he's closer to Ethan and he's really afraid of Ethan getting killed. But in reality, Jack's death was part of Jim's evil plan, whereas Ethan disobeying orders is ''not part of the plan''. Jim thinks Gilitzen has the real disk at this point, and he'll get it when [[spoiler: Kreiger kills Gilitzen]]. If Ethan tracks Gilitzen and recovers the disk, then the entire scheme is foiled and Jim will never get his 6 million dollar payout. He's not panicking because he might lose more agents; he's panicking because he might lose ''the money''.

* Creator/RogerEbert pointed that despite the Langley vault's state-of-the-art security system that goes off at anything "above the sound of a whisper", it doesn't account for the sound of a disk copying data from the drive (which is audible while Ethan is downloading the list), which theoretically should be ''one of the very things it should be protecting against'' when the room is empty.

* FridgeLogic: The BlofeldPloy mentioned on the main page. [[spoiler: After Jim shoots Claire, he punches Ethan to the floor and decides to [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere get the hell off the train.]] So, what, he only put a single bullet in his gun?]]
** [[spoiler: The gun was a ScaramangaSpecial, as shown by the earlier scene where it was being assembled. It was probably only a single-shot gun.]]
** [[spoiler:It actually had two. He used one on Claire, and the second goes off while he was fighting with Ethan.]]

* FridgeBrilliance: When Ethan says he'll go after the disk even after Jim calls "abort", Jim panics. At first you think he's afraid of losing more agents. Sure, he was calm when Jack died, but now maybe the emotion is catching up to him, and maybe he's closer to Ethan and he's really afraid of Ethan getting killed. But in reality, Jack's death was part of Jim's evil plan, whereas Ethan disobeying orders is ''not part of the plan''. Jim thinks Gilitzen has the real disk at this point. If Ethan tracks Gilitzen and recovers the disk, then the entire scheme is foiled and Jim will never get his 6 million dollar payout. He's not panicking because he might lose more agents; he's panicking because he might lose ''the money''.

*** [[spoiler:Additional thought on this: Kittridge did have thew other team to watch it was going on, his plan was likely that the mole would reveal him/herself by some actions that the other team would spot, but expected this to be done in a more sneaky way. However, Kittridge throughout the movie is shown to not react all that strongly to anything that happens, even things like seeing Jim alive, so it is likely that he wouldn't react to strongly to the team's deaths either, and that he would quickly figure out that Ethan was apparently a likely mole.]]

* At the end of Ghost Protocol, why didn't the new iPhones that Ethan handed to his team self-destruct? I thought all mission briefings did that...
** They hadn't listen to the mission statements by the time the credit rolled.
* In Ghost Protocol, [[spoiler: why didn't Hendricks toss the suitcase off the ledge and keep fighting Hunt to buy time?]]
** [[spoiler:I assume he was protecting it with his body, so it wouldn't be too damaged to work.]]
** [[spoiler: He was beat up pretty badly at the time as well, he might not have been thinking clearly.]]

* FridgeHorror: In the first movie, Secretary Kittridge sent Hunt's [=IMF=] team to retrieve a stolen list of {{Code Name}}s [[spoiler:as part of an internal "[[TheMole mole hunt]]" - and was completely unsurprised when Hunt was the SoleSurvivor, whom he thus believed to be the mole. He effectively ''sacrificed the entire team to catch a single mole.'' The whole "disavow any knowledge" meant the loyal team members were expecting to stake their lives on their talents without a net, but sending them on a SuicideMission without their knowledge? Granted, he was really pissed off afterwards at the deaths and there was really no other way to expose the mole, but dude, that's cold. Justified, but '''cold.''']]

*** [[spoiler: Additional thought on this: Kittridge did have thew other team to watch it was going on, his plan was likely that the mole would reveal him/herself by some actions that the other team would spot, but expected this to be done in a more sneaky way. However, Kittridge throughout the movie is shown to not react all that strongly to anything that happens, even things like seeing Jim alive, so it is likely that he wouldn't react to strongly to the team's deaths either, and that he would quickly figure out that Ethan was apparently a likely mole.]]
** [[spoiler: It's not cold, it's intelligent. If the NOC list gets out in the open, hundreds or thousands of agents across the entire world (not to mention their friends and families) are at ''extreme'' risk of death. Putting the lives of a few agents (who risk their lives on any mission in the first place) is small potatoes considering the [[{{TheNeedsOfTheMany}} greater good]].]]
* FridgeHorror / FridgeLogic: In the second movie, Ambrose's plan is to allow Nyah to walk around after she's infected, but Nyah decides to simply kill herself after 20 hours rather than get infected. If the disease is contagious before the 20 hours, how did all the other people who may have gotten chimera get treated? (Presumably biocyte could have done it, but it would seem a bit strange to have biocyte make some extra money in that way after their part in the situation) If the disease is not contagious before the 20 hours, how did Ambrose (who seems pretty smart at that sort of thing) not think of, or otherwise plan for, the possible suicide happening?
** Ambrose may not have believed that Nyah would kill herself to save others, considering her previously-expressed selfishness given her chosen career.
* FridgeBrilliance: (or fridge humor, if it was an article) Venus is an even more appropriate name for Carter in ''Ghost Protocol'' than you might think at first. It is a planet thought to look beautiful, until people got a closer look/got through the clouds, than it became deadly.