History Trivia / MissionImpossible

* AwardCategoryFraud: "The Seal" got Music/LaloSchifrin an UsefulNotes/EmmyAward nomination for Outstanding Achievement in Musical Composition - even though a) the episode was almost completely tracked with music written for other episodes... and b) the only piece of original music in the episode was written by Jacques Urbont!

* TheWikiRule: [[http://missionimpossible.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page The Mission: Impossible Wiki]].

* RealLifeRelative: In the revival, Barney Collier's son Grant was played by Greg Morris's son Phil. Greg reprised his role as Barney in three episodes of the revival ("The Condemned" and "The Golden Serpent" parts 1 and 2).

* NamesTheSame: Dan Briggs is no relation to the Dan Briggs in ''Series/TheFelonySquad'', which premiered the same year..

* HostilityOnTheSet: The relationship between the producers and Steven Hill became increasingly tense due to difficulties everyone had accommodating Hill's observance of the Jewish Sabbath (leading to a reduction in Hill's role and his absence in some episodes) and an incident where he refused to perform a stunt and locked himself in his trailer, necessitating that the entire episode be rewritten and reshot without him.

* RippedFromTheHeadlines: "The Legend" from Season 1 involves a Nazi war criminal who has been released after a twenty-year sentence in Spandau Prison. At the time of production, Albert Speer had just done the same sentence, although in his case, he instead focused on writing memoirs that made himself out to be the "good Nazi", distorting his own actions massively.

* AwardCategoryFraud: "The Seal" got Music/LaloSchifrin a Emmy nomination for Outstanding Achievement in Musical Composition - even though a) the episode was almost completely tracked with music written for other episodes... and b) the only piece of original music in the episode was written by Jacques Urbont!

** In one season one episode it was literal - the team was trying to trick a Russian spy into believing that the compound they were holding him in outside Los Angeles was actually a KGB facility near Moscow.

** The self-destructing [=CDs=] seen in the 1980s revival series appear to act like [=DVDs=] - even though [=DVDs=] weren't introduced until the 1990s.
*** They were meant to be miniaturized laserdiscs (video discs that were read using laser like a CD, but were the size of a long-play record), which existed since the mid-80s.

* FakeNationality: Israeli-born Nehemiah Persoff played the BigBad three times: once as an Arabian, once as a Latin American, and once as an Eastern European.
** The team adopt numerous ones in-universe, but the WhatTheHellIsThatAccent-worthy "Australian" one Paris puts on in "Chico" is notable because [[spoiler: it's ''meant'' to be fake, as part of a persona which the week's BigBad is supposed to unmask as fake, as part of the IM Force's plan]].
*** Barbara Luna (from New York City) played a Latin American and an Asian in the original series, and a Latin American BigBad in the revival.

* RippedFromTheHeadlines: "The Legend" from Season 1 involves a Nazi war criminal who has been released after a twenty-year sentence in Spandau Prison. At the time of production, Albert Speer had just done the same sentence, although in his case, he instead focussed on writing memoirs that made himself out to be the "good Nazi", distorting his own actions massively.

** Since ''M:I'' shared the Desilu/Creator/{{Paramount}} soundstages and some production personel with ''[[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries Star Trek]]'', it should come as no surprise that Creator/WilliamShatner guest starred twice as a BigBad ("Encore" and "Cocaine" - sadly for ''Franchise/StarTrek'' fans, both came after Creator/LeonardNimoy's tenure as an IMF agent... although the latter episode did reunite him with Barbara Anderson, alias Lenore Karidian from "The Conscience Of The King") and Creator/GeorgeTakei as an IMF member ("The Carriers"). Creator/LeonardNimoy became an SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute of Creator/MartinLandau's character -- four years after Landau had turned down the role of Mr Spock for ''[[Series/{{Star Trek|The Original Series}} Star Trek]]'''s first pilot "The Cage" in 1965. Herb Solow was production manager for both shows. Ricardo Montalban (Khan Noonien Singh) played a season one BigBad, who was one of the only villains to be directly killed by the IMF team.

* UnintentionalPeriodPiece: The series clearly dates itself by a combination of two factors: on the one hand, while the conflict with the Soviet Bloc could carry the stories into the 1980s, several episodes dealing with Nazis keep it from going later into the 1970s as concerns about Nazis plotting a fourth Reich faded from popular culture. Also, many episodes mention then-extravagant amounts of money that would be considered rather paltry in the 2010s thanks to fifty years of inflation.

* RealLifeWritesThePlot: Dan Briggs was replaced by Jim Phelps because Steven Hill's observance of the Jewish Sabbath[[note]]a clause in his contract allowed him to leave early on Friday and be absent on Saturday, which are usually incredibly busy on TV productions as everyone tries to make up for any delays that occurs from Monday to Friday[[/note]] became too difficult to work around.

* ThrowItIn: Because the characters were stoic and spoke very little by design, Peter Graves once decided to throw in an unscripted smile to try and convey Jim Phelps' appreciation of a job well done only to get chewed out for "editorializing". However, the shot with his smile ended up being used in the final cut.

* CreatorBacklash: Paul Playdon, script consultant in seasons three and four, was so ashamed of his own "Time Bomb" ([[OldShame as were many who worked on the episode]]) that he actually ''left the show''. (While he contributed "The Catafalque" in season five and has story credit on season six's "The Tram," he never returned as a staff member.)

* AlanSmithee: Used in both the original series and the revival - due to Meyer Dolinsky's script for the original's "Live Bait" being changed drastically en route to the screen, one "Michael Adams" receives co-teleplay and story credit; the revival's remake of "The Condemned" credits "John Truman" with the story[[note]]the script was by the show's supervising producer, Australian TV veteran Ted Roberts (whose credits include a lot of action series.... and ''Series/ACountryPractice'') and series executive producer, American TV veteran Michael Fisher who put in a lot of time writing action shows not a few on Creator/AaronSpelling's dime.[[/note]] because Laurence Heath, author of the original, took his name off the remake (as did William Read Woodfield with the remake of "The Legacy").

* AlanSmithee: Used in both the original series and the revival - due to Meyer Dolinsky's script for the original's "Live Bait" being changed drastically en route to the screen, one "Michael Adams" receives co-teleplay and story credit; the revival's remake of "The Condemned" credits "John Truman" with the story[[note]]the script was by the show's supervising producer, Australian TV veteran Ted Roberts (whose credits include a lot of action series.... and ''Series/ACountryPractice'') and series executive producer, American TV veteran Michael Fisher who put a lot of writing action shows not a few on Creator/AaronSpelling's dime.[[/note]] because Laurence Heath, author of the original, took his name off the remake (as did William Read Woodfield with the remake of "The Legacy").

* AlanSmithee: Used in both the original series and the revival - due to Meyer Dolinsky's script for the original's "Live Bait" being changed drastically en route to the screen, one "Michael Adams" receives co-teleplay and story credit; the revival's remake of "The Condemned" credits "John Truman" with the story because Laurence Heath, author of the original, took his name off the remake (as did William Read Woodfield with the remake of "The Legacy").