Film / Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning

aka: Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One

Spoilers for all preceding Mission: Impossible Film Series, including Mission: Impossible – Fallout, may be left unmarked. You Have Been Warned!

We all share the same fate.

"Your days of fighting for the so-called greater good are over. This is our chance to control the truth. The concepts of right and wrong for everyone for centuries to come. You're fighting to save an ideal that doesn't exist. Never did. You need to pick a side."

— Eugene Kittridge

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning^note formerly Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, Paramount dropped the use of "Part One" in January 2024 is a 2023 American action spy thriller film and the seventh entry in the Mission: Impossible film series, written and directed by Christopher McQuarrie (his third in both duties in the series after Rogue Nation and Fallout), and starring Tom Cruise as Ethan Hunt once more.

Ethan Hunt and his IMF team embark on a dangerous mission to track down the means to deactivate a terrifying artificial intelligence that has gone autonomous and threatens humanity before it falls into the wrong hands. With control of the future and the fate of the world at stake, and dark forces from Ethan's past closing in, a deadly race around the globe begins. Confronted by a mysterious and powerful nemesis in service of said intelligence named Gabriel, Ethan is forced to consider that nothing can matter more than his mission – not even the lives of those he cares about most.

The returning cast includes Rebecca Ferguson as Ilsa Faust, Ving Rhames as Luther Stickell, Simon Pegg as Benji Dunn, Vanessa Kirby as Alanna "White Widow" Mitsopolis, Frederick Schmidt as Zola Mitsopolis and Henry Czerny as Eugene Kittridge (last seen in Mission: Impossible way back in 1996). Newcomers include Hayley Atwell as Grace, Esai Morales as Gabriel, Pom Klementieff as Paris, Shea Whigham as Jasper Briggs, Rob Delaney, Cary Elwes, Mark Gatiss, Charles Parnell and Indira Varma.

The film released on July 12, 2023. The follow-up is scheduled for release on May 23, 2025.

Previews: Teaser Trailer, Official Trailer.

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Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning contains examples of:

• Action Girl: Ilsa, like the previous movies. Paris is also tough, frequently taking out multiple attackers with ease. Grace is more focused on deception and sleight of hand rather than brute force, and will only use force if she's out of any other options, so she can run away.
• Action Prologue: Beyond the opening sequence of the Sevastopol submarine crew confronting the "phantom" submarine, the rest of the opening involves Ethan attempting to rescue Ilsa from a band of bounty hunters in the Arabian Desert during a sandstorm.
• Actor Allusion:
  • During the opening scene, there's a brief shot of a chessboard on the Sevastopol submarine. The submarine's commander is played by Marcin Dorociński, known for playing chess ace Borgov in The Queen's Gambit.
  • According to Briggs, the only way to make sure Ethan Hunt is actually dead is to put a wooden stake through his heart, which is (part of) how you kill a vampire in popular culture. Tom Cruise is quite famous for his role as Lestat de Lioncourt, a vampire that cannot be killed with a mere stake-through-the-heart.
• A.I. Is a Crapshoot: The Big Bad is an ultra-powerful A.I. known as the Entity.
• Always Save the Girl: A theme in the movie. Ethan does everything he can to save Ilsa and Grace. He succeeds at saving Grace and he spares Paris' life.
• Ambiguously Evil: Director Kittridge is among the interested parties in the key, but his exact motives for wanting it aren't known other than he believes it better that it falls into the US's hands instead of another country or power. It's also revealed that he's the one who agreed to sanction the Max and the White Widow's arms-dealing operation in exchange for the White Widow acting as an asset for the CIA, further muddying his morality. His monologue at the end seems to confirm he is a good guy, albeit very pragmatic in how he fulfills his objectives.
• Arbitrary Skepticism: Denlinger is shocked when he discovers that the IMF (which is so secretive that the majority of the participants in the government meeting try to tell Kittridge to shut up about it) works by having a representative "send word" to a seemingly-random operative who can get the job done for them. He becomes dismissive about this division, then moments later Ethan (who's entered the room as Kittridge's adjutant) gasses everyone except Kittridge with a non-lethal sedative. For bonus points, it turns out that Denlinger created the AI that the plot revolves around, which means he may have been worried at the idea of getting exposed.
• Arc Words: "Choice" and "Choose" crop up frequently, apart from the standard "Your mission, should you choose to accept it..." phrase. When we first see Ethan, he tells the courier, "Welcome to the IMF. You made the right choice." In the tape, Kittridge reminds Ethan of the choice he made to join IMF to avoid prison. Both Luther and Benji tell Grace how they chose to join IMF, and Ethan advises Grace that Kittridge will give her the same choice if they meet again. Toward the end, after Grace helps Ethan escape and meets Kittridge herself, she tells him, "I choose to accept."
  • "Truth" forms the secondary theme of the movie. Many characters place a lot of emphasis on the fact that the Entity (and whoever controls it) has the power to define the truth. When one can control all information in the world, the truth is whatever one wants it to be. A natural foil to the murky world of spycraft that the characters live in. The Entity demonstrates this firsthand by erasing Gabriel from the airport security camera footage in real time and impersonating Benji over the team's comms, leading characters where it wants them to go.
  • "Luck" also comes up a lot. Coincidences, improbabilities, and random chance are central to the fortunes of several characters and challenge whether fate is predictable or unpredictable. The name of the Russian sub's operation is "horseshoe" and "good luck" is written on its torpedo, the Entity taunts Benji with "good luck" on the bomb, and Kittridge's final words to Ethan are wishing him good luck.
• Bad Boss: Director of National Intelligence Denlinger is willing to purge undesirable "patriots" from the government by forming an alliance with Gabriel and the Entity, and is fully ready to sell out his colleagues to ensure the deal happens. All it gets him is a Slashed Throat for his trouble.
• Badass Boast: In regards to Gabriel's Sadistic Choice with Grace and Ilsa, Ethan has this to say:
  Ethan: If anything happens to either of them, there's no place on Earth where you or your God will be safe from me. There's no place where I won't go to kill you. That is written.
• Bait-and-Switch: When Grace (disguised as Alanna) leaves her cabin to meet with Kittridge, the first thing Kittridge says is that she can't possibly be Alanna. It seems like the mission is already a bust and the crew are going to have to improvise like crazy, perhaps Kittridge noticed that the fake Alanna has the wrong eye color...but Kittridge then makes it clear he's just making a joke about how the last time they met Alanna was a young girl, and the ruse is still intact.
  • In Rome Ethan leads Grace to a “safe car”. We see an exotic sports car but the “safe car” turns out to be an old, bright yellow Fiat 500 parked next to it. But this trope is played out again as the Fiat is actually heavily modified with a high performance electric motor.
• Batman Gambit: The Entity uses this in combination with Xanatos Speed Chess. Amassing as much information about an individual as possible and manipulating them based on probable actions they will take.
  • Its intervention in the IMF's Abu Dhabi airport mission sees it deploying Paris to kill the contact who was supposed to buy the key from a courier, which was stolen earlier by Grace - a professional thief and its Unwitting Pawn hired by a third party. When Ethan intercepts Grace - as it knows would happen - it orders Gabriel to deploy a fake nuclear bomb to distract Ethan's team, leaving them uncoordinated and unfocused as Ethan tries to hide from a CIA hit squad led by Briggs and Degas. During all the confusion, it learns the weaknesses of Ethan's team by coercing Benji to admit them all when he's trying to 'disarm' the fake bomb while also allowing Grace to steal the key back from Ethan when he's distracted at a crucial moment. Finally, it orders Gabriel to be seen by Ethan, knowing that due to their past history, Gabriel will unnerve him so much that Ethan will order his team to abort the mission immediately.
  • It's the 'host' of the party in Venice to the White Widow - the secret third party that hired Grace to steal the key in Abu Dhabi - where its true intention lies in not getting both keys from the White Widow right then but to intimidate her into joining it by having Gabriel threatening to kill her if she doesn't comply. Having Gabriel make it clear that he knows for a fact that either Ilsa or Grace - both of them someone Ethan cares for - will die tonight is enough to convince the White Widow to change her side in order to save her skin. Also, it knows that Ethan will do whatever it takes to protect the two women, so it hijacks the identity of Benji/Luther and leads Ethan into a trap while also coercing Ilsa that she's able to save Grace at the cost of her own life, knowing that thanks to her Samaritan Syndrome, she wouldn't just walk away and abandon Grace to be killed by Gabriel.
  • Finally, it knows that all relevant parties will be on the Orient Express train to procure the completed key, so it plans ahead to cause the entire train to crash and kill them all by having Gabriel bomb a bridge ahead and go in to recover the completed key, kill the train conductors and sabotage the engine, personally killing Denlinger (the only loose end who knows about the location of the Sevastopol and the Entity's own weakness) and Paris (whom it predicts will betray them because Ethan spared her life in Venice and who heard Denlinger's confession, though this ends up being a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy). It knows that Ethan is also going to be there, which is why it had Gabriel murder Ilsa in Venice, knowing that Ethan will be driven by rage to murder Gabriel for killing two of the women he cared for and thus killing the only person who knows what the completed key is used for, meaning that nobody will learn about the Entity's weakness and ensures its ultimate victory. If Gabriel kills Ethan instead (Luther reasons), then the Entity's most dangerous enemy is dead. However, it doesn't get its way this time due to multiple spanners in the works at play that it couldn't prepare to account for them all.
• Beat Them at Their Own Game: The Entity is described (and shown) as an expert in manipulation and intrusion in terms very similar to those used to describe Ethan. Its agent Gabriel is very good at hurting people and targeting their psychological weakpoints. Team Hunt even suspects the Entity is trying to use their paranoia about it to manipulate them, which is one of their own favorite tricks.
• Because You Were Nice to Me:
  • Grace's backstory establishes that she doesn't trust anyone and is only out for herself, which makes Ethan's generosity towards her (particularly when he tells her that her life matters more than his own, during a conversation with the team in Rome) so shocking that she starts crying in happiness because of it. This motivates her decision during the climax of the film to reject the $100 million USD offer from Kittridge and seemingly join the IMF, based on Ethan's advice.
  • During the alleyway fight in Venice, Ethan manages to take down Paris but leaves her alive. This, coupled with Gabriel attempting to kill her onboard the train because she knows about the Sevastopol, leads her to go back and save Ethan and Grace from Destination Defenestration during the climax.
• Biblical Motifs: The bad guy is a guy named Gabriel who follows the Entity as if it were a god and he were its servant. Ethan even explicitly calls it "your god" at one point. Subtle.
• Big Bad Ensemble: The main figures causing the conflict of this film are Gabriel, who acts as the messenger of the Entity and seeks to recover the two key halves for it, and the White Widow, who holds one half of the key and is the one who hired Grace to steal the other half, planning to auction off both to the highest bidder. Every intelligence agency in the world has the goal of controlling the truth if they get their hands on the Entity.
• The Big Bad Shuffle: The first act of the film sets up a number of potential antagonists after the Macguffin (Kittridge, Denlinger, the buyer for Ethan's half of the key, Gabriel, Paris, Grace and her employer, and of course the Entity). It isn't until after the second act that their various allegiances and who's behind or working with who begin to become apparent.
• Big Brother Is Watching: The Entity is capable of hacking into any camera or surveillance system, granting it the ability to monitor and spy on just about everything that occurs through the use of satellites and the Internet.
• Big "NO!": Ethan in the climax when Gabriel escapes from the train.
• Black-Tie Infiltration: The second act takes place in Venice, where Ethan follows the trail of Grace at a high-class party (with near nude dancers) at the Doge's Palace. Turns out White Widow, Gabriel and Paris are also there, and the Entity manifests on several screens during the tense meeting between all these folks.
• Book Ends: The opening and closing sequences have a mission brief by Kittridge, who is outlining Ethan's next mission.
  • The Sevastopol appears in the opening and closing scenes.
• Bounty Hunter: Teams of them are after Ilsa in the beginning, seeking to claim her half of the key and sell it to either the US government or a black-market buyer.
• Break Out the Museum Piece: Realizing that the Entity functionally has surveillance over all government communication channels, Kittridge opts to set up shop in a fully analog office — the TVs are CRT, the computers aren't networked to any known system, and the system it uses is an old weather control satellite that was the only one of its kind not decommissioned years earlier.
• The Brute: The unnamed big tough goon working for Gabriel and the Entity, who assists Paris in ambushing Ethan in an alleyway.
• Bus Crash: While the previous film never dealt with the whereabouts of Alanna's mother, Max (played by Vanessa Redgrave), Kittridge confirms in this film that Max died in the interim between the original film and this movie.
• But Now I Must Go: Just before the finale, Luther tells Ethan he has to go off the grid to analyze the hard drive from their compromised laptop, as it may contain a piece of the Entity and he can't risk using any resource that could lead the Entity to him.
• Call-Back:
  • Eugene Kittridge returns, having been absent since the first film, and plays a key role during the events of the film. During his first conversation with Hunt (in Denlinger's office, after the latter has knocked out everyone except the former), the conversation revolves around Ethan's loyalties to the IMF, similar to their first conversation in Prague nearly three decades earlier.
    Kittridge: I understand... you're upset.
    Ethan: I'm not upset, Kittridge. You wanted me to listen. This is me listening.
  • The Running Gag of Ethan pulling a sleight of hand trick rears its head again, to great effect several times, particularly to pocket one-half of the key from Grace at the Abu Dhabi airport.
  • The film climaxes with a Traintop Battle on a high-speed train that at one point goes into a tunnel, just like the original movie. Ethan even takes a moment to realize what he must do prior to pursuing Gabriel on top of the train.
  • Ilsa fights a knife-wielding villain with a sword, referencing the knife fight between her and the Bone Doctor in the fifth movie.
  • This film once again has Ethan racing to rescue a female character from potential death at the hands of a villain, Sarah in the original, Ilsa in this film, only to arrive too late and have them die in his arms.
  • Ethan once again allies with a female Wild Card that he places trust in despite several of her actions saying otherwise, eventually causing her to side with him and fully join the team, and whose relationship with her contains a fair bit of romantic teasing. Grace also ends up giving Ethan an unexpected hug after a tense moment, much like how Ilsa did in Rogue Nation.
  • Also, Grace herself is also a professional thief who's looking to wipe her slate clean, which makes her quite similar to Nyah from Mission: Impossible II as well.
  • As before, Ethan's secure clearance code is Bravo Echo 11.
  • Once again, Eugene Kittridge meets with members of Max's Crime Syndicate and makes some sort of deal with them on a train (though in this case, Kittridge thought he was dealing with Alanna but it's actually Grace in disguise). He even mentions the time when Max made a deal with him to work as an asset for the CIA back in the first movie.
  • Near the end, the villain screaming Ethan's name after realizing he's been tricked.
  • In the third film, Benji has a monologue about a hypothetical dangerous, world-destroying technology called the "Anti-God". The Entity sounds remarkably similar, it comes with Biblical Motifs, and Ethan even calls it a "god" at one point.
  • Ethan has a scene in which he speaks French to a wounded Frenchwoman just like in Fallout. To Paris at the end, more specifically.
  • Ethan letting out a Big "NO!" as the villain takes a fall during their fight, except this time it's to make his escape rather than commit suicide.
• Can't Kill You, Still Need You: Discussed — Luther outright tells Ethan that they can't kill Gabriel, because Gabriel is one of the few people alive who knows what the key is used for and where it is used, and that the Entity is counting on one of them killing the other to eliminate a threat to its existence. Ethan comes very close to killing Gabriel anyway, despite assuring Luther otherwise, but Briggs intervenes and circumstances conspire to give Ethan that information through another source.
• Central Theme: Choice. How do you make choices when almost nothing and no one can be trusted?
• Chained Heat: Ethan and Grace end up getting handcuffed to each other while in Rome, which causes quite a bit of difficulty for them when they have to go on a car chase to evade everyone trying to catch them.
• Character Aged with the Actor: For the first time, it's explicitly made clear on screen that Ethan Hunt, like the actor who portrays him, is now an older man. Ethan is said to have joined the IMF "three decades ago".
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • The lighter Grace uses to swap with the half of the cruciform key in the buyer's pocket during the airport sequence is utilized later to do the same thing to Gabriel, just before Ethan knocks him off the train in the climax.
  • Luther makes sure to pack sufficient parachuting equipment for Ethan just before the latter leaves to intercept the train where the key exchange will be made. It comes in useful during the end, both when Ethan is forced to parachute onto the train to stop Gabriel and save Grace, and when he needs to make a quick escape from the train from Briggs after learning about the Sevastopol.
• City of Canals: The second act takes place in Venice.
• Cliffhanger: While the Entity is still at large and an active threat, Ethan managed to obtain the key from his fight with Gabriel on the train. Meanwhile, all the world's governments are still looking to gain control of the Entity, and while Ethan is one step closer to finding the Sevastopol after Paris tells him about it, Gabriel will no doubt be seeking revenge on Ethan.
• Conscience Makes You Go Back: Despite negotiating a deal with Kittridge to turn over the Key in exchange for protection and a substantial fee, Grace chooses to decline the money and deliver the Key to Ethan instead.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Erica Sloane is nowhere to be seen (having been presumably replaced by Kittridge in the interim as the CIA Director), but her photo is shown hanging on a wall in the meeting room where Denlinger and the other intelligence officials meet in the opening. In actuality, Angela Bassett was unable to reprise the role due to production conflicts.
  • Ethan's first conversation with Kittridge is evocative of the signature scene from the original film where Kittridge confronts Ethan in the "aquarium restaurant" — Ethan throws an object (the exploding gum in the original film, a non-lethal bomb with a knockout agent) past Kittridge's head, exactly the same way he did nearly three decades earlier. The following conversation between the pair is reminiscent of the dialogue between the two from the original film, discussing Ethan's loyalties to the IMF, right down to similar camera (Dutch) angles.
  • Benji refers to Luther as "Phineas Phreak" at one point, which is one of the nicknames Ethan mentioned as what Luther is known for in the first movie.
  • After rendezvousing after the car chase in Rome, when discussing the White Widow's (Max's) party later that evening, Ilsa inquires whether the former still thinks Ethan is John Lark. This confusion continues through the subsequent party scene in Venice, as Zola (Alanna's brother) still remembers and identifies Ethan as such.
  • During the meeting with Alanna, Kittridge states that she looks very different from the Alanna he knew, a girl who was "yay-high, drinking hot chocolate while standing beside her mother." During the same conversation, he confirms that Alanna's operations were allowed to continue at Kittridge's behest, presumably because her mother Maxine "Max" Mitsopolis (played by Vanessa Redgrave in the first film) was an asset to the CIA.
• Cool Shades: Ethan sports sunglasses while roaming an Abu Dhabi airport. These glasses are also plot-relevant, as they can help him track one half of the key (and provide the first clue about Gabriel's existence, as the Entity is erasing his digital presence in real-time).
• Crazy-Prepared: The Entity, due to being a sentient AI, has the ability to predict nearly every possible outcome and take steps to counteract it through its "representative", Gabriel. This is exemplified in Venice, when the team realizes that the AI is capable of countering every choice they make, even to the extent of predicting their overall movement and decisions. Later on, the AI hacks into Ethan's comms and taunts him before Paris and another henchman attack him in an alleyway.
• Curb-Stomp Battle:
  • Grace is fairly proficient in combat for a career thief with no extensive training but stands no chance against the much more skilled Gabriel.
  • Gabriel has absolutely no chance against Ethan in a straight-up hand-to-hand fight, landing a total of only three hits (despite pulling a knife) while Ethan easily counters everything else.
• Curb Stomp Cushion: Gabriel and Ilsa's fight is more evenly matched but, although keeping the upper hand for the majority of it, she still loses.
• Cut Apart: At the airport, Briggs's team tracks Ethan on the security cameras, relaying to Briggs his location and a description of what he's wearing. The scene cuts between Ethan walking around oblivious and Briggs and Degas sneaking up behind their target. The target's face is not shown until Briggs and Degas make their move — at which point it becomes apparent that their camera feed has been hacked and sent them after a different man who happens to be dressed similarly to Ethan. As this sinks in, the real Ethan walks past behind them, unnoticed.
• Dark Action Girl: Paris, Gabriel's main accomplice and his muscle.
• Deadly Dust Storm: Ethan goes seeking Ilsa in the middle of the Arabian desert, and just as a battle with bounty hunters who have come to get her starts, a sandstorm erupts.
• Death Faked for You: Ethan initially reports Ilsa as having died during the mission to recover one half of the key during the opening sequence. It's later revealed that Ilsa wasn't killed by one of the bounty hunters, and was sent away by Hunt on the condition that she "stay dead".
• Determinator: Like Anatoly Sidorov before him, Briggs pursues Ethan around the globe at the behest of Kittridge, ostensibly to capture and/or kill the agent, as he's believed to be in possession of one-half of the cruciform key. And like Anatoly before him, he's ultimately swayed to abandon his mission and aid Ethan during the climax of the film, even letting the latter go at the conclusion of the film.
• Devious Daggers: Gabriel seems to carry an absurd number of knives hidden about his person at all times.
• Didn't See That Coming: It's implied the Entity's predictive capabilities faltered somewhat in the climax, as it's implied that it didn't expect Gabriel to mortally wound Paris, but for her to be Not Quite Dead and fulfil its prediction of her betraying them for Ethan after he spared her life. Given the lack of electronic devices on the wrecked train afterwards, it's unclear if it knows that Ethan is aware of the Sevastopol and where to use the key. Of course, given its nature, it's up in the air whether or not it did have a slip-up or if events are still proceeding within its predictions.
• Didn't Think This Through: It didn't occur to Denlinger that the Entity doesn't actually need the keys or the location of Sevastopol (which it would presumably already know, being responsible for sinking it), it only needs to make sure no one else has them so no one can stop it. Thus, the simplest solution to solve that problem, after Denlinger assures Gabriel that he is the only one who knows where the Sevastopol is, is to kill him and be done with it.
• Digital Head Swap: An In-Universe example: Luther swaps a tourist's head with Ethan's to throw Briggs and Degas off their trail.
• Dirt Forcefield: Grace, wearing a white shirt, lands in a tender full of coal and somehow remains completely clean.
• Dismantled MacGuffin: The key to the Sevastopol's system core is a pair of cross-shaped keys that combine into a single cruciform key. The two halves of the key wind up separated, and much of the film involves bringing them back together while also trying to figure out what they go to and where.
• Dramatic Irony: The viewer knows precisely what the keys are for, but it takes the entire film for Ethan to figure this out.
• The Dreaded: Ethan is this to the Entity, surprisingly enough, as it's noted the Entity would not be going to the lengths it has to target him specifically unless it's already predicted an outcome where Ethan defeats it.
• Dutch Angle: There's quite a few of them, possibly as a homage to the first film (which used it aplenty) to go along with Kittridge's return.
• Dynamic Entry: During the climactic train chase, Ethan makes his entry by smashing through the side of the train car where a Mook is preparing to kill Grace on Zola's orders, causing the henchman to fall out the other side of the train car.
• Eiffel Tower Effect:
  • In Rome, there are views of St. Peter's Basilica and square (Vatican City) as well as the Victor Emmanuel II Monument and the Colosseum (the embassy is situated nearby). Also, a part of the car chase happens on the stairs of the Trinità dei Monti (famous moviewise for Audrey Hepburn eating ice cream there in Roman Holiday).
  • In Venice, there's views of the the Piazza San Marco (its namesake Basilica in particular), and the party happens at the Doge's Palace.
• Environmental Symbolism: In Venice, Ilsa and Ethan have a happy chat about how it's their first time in Venice, on a sunny balcony. After Ilsa dies, Ethan stands on the same balcony, but the sky is grey.
• Evil Duo: Gabriel and the Entity. The Entity plans things, while Gabriel executes the orders on the ground.
• Evil Is Not a Toy: One of the reasons why Ethan seeks to destroy the Entity. He believes it's become too powerful and dangerous for humanity to control, and therefore must be destroyed at all costs. (He's probably right, given what happens to Denlinger when he tries to team up with the Entity for his own purposes.)
• Expansion Pack Past: This film reveals part of the reason why Ethan joined the IMF decades earlier — a flashback shows that Gabriel murdered his girlfriend, Marie, an act he was helpless to stop. This retroactively makes Gabriel Ethan's oldest-fought enemy.
• Eyepatch of Power: Ilsa wears an eyepatch while aiming and shooting with a sniper rifle in the Arabian desert, both to shield her eye and help steady her aim.
• Failed a Spot Check: Alanna (The White Widow) has blue eyes. Grace has brown eyes, which she doesn't change when disguised as Alanna via latex mask. Kittridge fails to notice the false Alanna's incorrect eye color, but he seems to have only met her a few times. Her own brother, who is her body guard, on the other hand, also fails to notice.
• Famed In-Story: The film opens proper with Briggs and his team heading to Abu Dhabi, where the former touts Ethan's abilities for the rest of the team.
  Briggs: A master of infiltration, deception, sabotage and psych-warfare. For all intents and purposes, ladies and gentlemen, a mind-reading, shape-shifting, harbinger of chaos.
• Fanservice Extra: In the establishing shots of the high-class party in at the Doge's Palace, in Venice, the camera lingers on the near nude dancers on the platforms. Male and female.
• Final Battle: Ethan fighting Gabriel on top of a train for the key.
• Fish out of Water: Grace is way out of her depth in the absurdly high stakes crazy death-defying world of the IMF, being "just" a professional thief hired to pickpocket a single man and deliver an object to an black market broker. Unlike the badass, fearless Action Girls and Spy Fiction characters that surround her, she panics when faced with direct threats to her life or the sight of death.
• Flynning: When Ilsa and Gabriel fight with blades—her with Paris's Sword Cane and him with a knife—the choreography is based around visual excitement and the needs of drama. Realistically Ilsa should win nine times out of ten because she has the weapon with the longer reach and all the space she'd need to use it. She could cut or thrust him from a distance where he couldn't hit back; she could create openings in his defense by feinting to one part of his body before striking another; and even if he tried to charge in to grapple she could just backpedal and probably nail him with a counter thrust. But Gabriel needs to win this fight for the sake of the plot and a fight where Ilsa won by staying out of knife distance and slashing or poking at Gabriel with impunity would have probably looked cheap and boring onscreen. So instead Ilsa steps in way too close when she attacks him, makes her movements big enough for Gabriel to react to and for good measure she incorporates some 360 degree spins. Early in the fight there's a part where he makes the mistake of beating her attack aside too energetically so that he leaves himself wide open, but instead of immediately running him through, she acrobatically climbs up to his body and wraps her legs around his neck. That same move helped her to kill Janik Vinter in Rogue Nation, but in this case she and Gabriel end up wrestling on the ground and he manages to wound her before they get back on their feet. The fight gradually goes downhill for her and finally Gabriel stabs her to death.
• The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You: After the credits have finished rolling, you hear the sound The Entity makes one more time. Yep, The Entity has been observing you in the audience the whole time.
• Funny Background Event: While evading CIA agents in the Abu Dhabi International Airport, Ethan makes his way onto the roof. It then cuts to the leader inside saying "he's got to be around here somewhere" as Ethan runs by a window behind him.
• Gambit Pileup: The conflict revolves around a multitude of factions (the IMF, the US intelligence community, the Entity's forces and the White Widow's forces, among others) all out to possess both halves of the key for varying reasons. In fact, according to Kittridge and his fellow members in the Community, every single intelligence organization in the world is coming after the key, with Ilsa implying that some of the higher ups in MI6 also want to get their hands on it.
• Goldfish Poop Gang: Briggs and Degas quickly become this during the airport scene, to comic effect. While they do sometimes come close to catching Ethan, they never end up succeeding. Ethan even ends up ordering them around on the train.
• The Good, the Bad, and the Evil: The main players after the Entity's key. There's the IMF (the Good), Grace and by extension her employer (the Bad), and Gabriel (the Evil).
• Have You Told Anyone Else?: Denlinger volunteers to Gabriel that he has made sure nobody but him knows the location of the Sevastopol, thinking this makes him invaluable to Gabriel. However, Gabriel is fine with nobody knowing the location of the Sevastopol, and after getting reassurance that nobody other than Denlinger knows, kills him.
• The Heavy: Gabriel leads the Entity's henchmen and is the main threat whom the IMF has to contend with, while the Entity is the real Big Bad giving him orders and intel.
• Heel–Face Turn: Paris, having been seen as a liability by Gabriel, goes back to save Ethan and Grace during the climax aboard the dangling train, and helps deliver a crucial piece of intel (that Ethan needs to find the Sevastopol, and that it's a submarine).
• He Knows Too Much: Denlinger boasts that only he knows the location of the Sevastopol, so Gabriel kills him. He then tries to kill Paris for the same reason, as the Entity believes she'll tell Ethan because he spared her life.
• Hero Antagonist:
  • Kittridge is still unabashedly on Ethan's side, giving him the mission to find and obtain one half of the activation key to access the Entity in the opening of the film... but he also is manipulating Ethan and his team to get it for him, as he wants the power it represents for the U.S. government, and not telling Ethan's team about his amoral motives.
  • US intelligence agents Briggs and Degas are sent to apprehend Ethan after he goes rogue (again), but aren't actually evil and are just doing their duties.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Ilsa fights Gabriel to save Grace's life after she gets wounded by him, ultimately leading to her death; due to the terms of the Sadistic Choice that Gabriel gave Ethan, this ends up sparing Grace's life.
• High-Heel–Face Turn: Due to a combination of Ethan sparing her life and Gabriel stabbing her, Paris decides to save Ethan and Grace from the train fall, and tells Ethan about the Sevastopol before passing out.
• History Repeats: In his past, Ethan was forced to watch as Gabriel killed Marie, the woman he loved, in front of him. Gabriel once again kills the woman he loves the most, though Ilsa has already died by the time that he gets to her body.
• Hot Sub-on-Sub Action: Subverted. At the beginning, it appears the Russian submarine Sevastopol and an American one are engaging each other... only for the Russian crew to find out the American sub never existed and was an illusion created by the Entity on their detection instruments. The torpedo they launched, meanwhile, returns back at them.
• It Only Works Once: After the Entity hacks their coms in Paris, the IMF switch to older analogue earbuds for the rest of the movie, which have their faults but are too primitive for the Entity's Hollywood Hacking abilities to work.
• I Was Never Here: Kittridge tells Briggs this when Briggs runs into him on the train, then threatens to have him sorting dead letters for the rest of his career if he doesn't do exactly as Kittridge orders.
• Knockout Gas: Used in both the intelligence meeting and in Rome. Notably, it is green when active, but turns gray and harmless a few moments after dispersion.
• Lampshade Hanging: The film has several moments of levity, particularly in the intro when Denlinger (the Director of National Intelligence) is briefed by Kittridge and other CIA brass on the nature of the IMF's work, highlighting the absurdity of their mission structure in the process.
  Denlinger: So let me get this straight: When there's a mission none of you can handle, you just "leave word" for a nameless man, and hope he gets the job done. Is that it?
  JSOC Head: Should he choose to accept it.
  Denlinger: What the hell kind of outfit gets to choose what orders to accept?
  • Luther and Benji argue about their overlapping roles as "the tech guy".
  • When he has to disarm the small nuclear bomb by answering questions, Benji rants about how they always seem to end up in these sort of high stakes ludicrous scenarios.
  • During Ethan's briefing, the voice on the tape (Kittridge) makes a snarky remark about how he keeps going rogue, and tells him to color within the lines this time. He might as well have saved his breath.
  • Similarly, Degas wonders why Ethan would go rogue, and Briggs wearily informs him that Ethan always goes rogue.
• Laser-Guided Karma: Ethan spares Paris' life and Gabriel stabs her for potentially betraying him. Cue Paris saving Ethan's life and informing him of the existence of Sevastopol.
• Latex Perfection: Wouldn't be a Mission Impossible film without it. Played straight, exaggerated, subverted, defied, and even used as a Brick Joke throughout the movie.
  • The most notable instance we see of it involves Ethan Hunt eavesdropping on the US intelligence committee meeting by disguising as an officer, and also getting the opportunity to speak with Kittridge one-on-one. Used twice in the same scene with two different masks. Once to get in, the other to get out.
  Kittridge: How do you plan to get out-
  Ethan Hunt puts on Kittridge's face while readying a tranquilizer dart gun.
  Kittridge (Exasperated): Of course.
  • Subverted and becomes a Brick Joke for Briggs, who has the experience to know the prevalence of such technology. Unfortunately for him, every person he (rather invasively) checks for a mask turns out to not be wearing one.
  • Played straight and defied in the final mission. Grace would disguise herself as Alanna while Ethan would disguise as Zola, knocking out their real counterparts and taking over their place in time to meet the buyer. As expected, things go wrong almost immediately, with only one of the masks ready before the Entity clues in to what the team are trying to do and sabotages the machine.
• Logical Weakness: As a "cold, hard logical machine", the Entity is capable of incredible predictive capability using facts and information, but it somewhat falters when it comes to grasping the emotional side of events. It knows enough to manipulate people or predict their likely actions, but fails to actually get these itself. It predicted that Ethan sparing Paris would result in her eventually betraying them to repay him, so it ordered Gabriel to kill her first, not seeing how that would just motivate her to fulfil its prediction should she survive (which happens, if not for long).
• The Lost Lenore:
  • It's revealed that, prior to the events of the entire film series, Ethan lost his girlfriend after she was shot by "Gabriel", the man who would eventually become the representative for the Entity.
  • Later in the film, this extends to Ilsa Faust herself, who pulls a Heroic Sacrifice to save Grace, at the cost of being stabbed by Gabriel.
• MacGuffin: The two halves of the Key to a mysterious chamber aboard the Sevastopol submarine. Every character in the film is after them so they can either destroy the Entity (the IMF and Ilsa), harness the Entity (the CIA and presumably all the other international intelligence agencies), sell the key on the black market (the White Widow and the bounty hunters at the beginning), or help the Entity in its goals (Gabriel).
• Magic Brakes: Played with. Gabriel disables the brakes on the Orient Express, but only by destroying the brake lever. Ethan and Grace stop the train by disconnecting the engine, which snaps the brake hoses and causes the brakes on the coaches to come on, exactly as would happen in real life.
• Misguided Missile: In the beginning of the film, the Entity tricks the Sevastopol submarine's crew into firing on a phantom enemy that looks to have fired on them first. As they're distracted by their imminent deaths, only for nothing to happen, their torpedo circles back and targets their sub, its remote detonator disabled. The sub is then hit and sinks to the bottom of the ocean, with most of its crew dying in the cold waters and their corpses hitting the ice near the surface. Unfortunately for the Entity, this act leaves a piece of its source code still on the sub, a potential vulnerability it seeks to eliminate.
• The Mole: Denlinger tries to form an alliance with Gabriel in order to harness the Entity to purge undesirable patriots from the U.S. government and essentially rule the world together. Gabriel responds to this by slashing Denlinger's throat.
• Mooks: Gabriel's goons (and during the party scene, the White Widow's bodyguards) are the rank-and-file bad guys that Ethan has to contend with.
• Mysterious Employer: The figure who employed Grace to steal Ethan's half of the key, whose identity even Grace herself doesn't know. It turns out to be the White Widow.
• The Needs of the Many: During a team discussion in Venice, Luther states that the lives of Ethan's team can't matter more than the mission. Ethan does not agree.
• Next Sunday A.D.: Played With: Several details, such as a scene dated "February 29" and mentions of Ethan's IMF career beginning "30 years ago", imply that the film takes place in 2024. This movie was released in 2023, but its sequel is set for release in 2025.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain:
  • If Gabriel had not stabbed and betrayed Paris, there is a very good chance she would not have saved Ethan, which would have led to a victory for the Entity.
  • The Entity was merely supposed to compromise the stealth systems on the Sevastopol, not sink it. In doing so, it left behind a part of itself that could be used to destroy it.
• No Animals Were Harmed: In addition to the standard Humane Society disclaimer, the credits also feature a disclaimer that the Spanish Steps in Rome were not harmed in the making of the film, and that the stunt was a reproduction on a studio set.
• No Man Should Have This Power: The reason Ethan decides its best to destroy the Entity rather than try to harness it is because its ability to manipulate digital images and data (thus effectively controlling people's perception of what's true) is too dangerous for any one individual or faction to possess.
• Noodle Incident: It's revealed in this film that prospective agents join the IMF as a last shot at redemption after having committed some sort of crime, and that Ethan joined after getting imprisoned. What exactly he was imprisoned for is never elaborated on, nor the circumstances that led to Gabriel shooting and killing Marie. Luther and Benji each tell Grace that they faced the same choice, with no elaboration of what their circumstances were.
• No-Sell: Like Lane, Gabriel is one of the few people in the series who can beat Ilsa's leg wrap Signature Move. Unlike Lane, Gabriel manages to do it twice.
• Not Using the Zed Word: For some reason, nobody quite manages to call The Entity an artificial intelligence.
• Off Bridge, onto Vehicle: Near the end of the film, Gabriel escapes from Ethan Hunt by jumping off the train they're fighting on (which is going over a bridge) and onto the bed of a truck.
• Paranoia Fuel: In-universe. Team Hunt realizes that they can't trust any digital communication, so they can't trust the words of anyone they aren't talking to, face-to-face. And given the sheer power of the Entity, and the many intel agencies looking to harness it, they can't trust many of those people either. They also consider the idea that the Entity might have anticipated their paranoia and worked it into its plans, which means Team Hunt is facing the exact same trick they love to use on bad guys.
• Posthumous Character: Despite being promoted in the opening titles, Marie (Mariela Garriga) is long-dead by the time the events of the film occur, having been killed decades earlier by Gabriel just before Ethan joined the IMF.
• Put on a Bus: Luther is forced to abandon the team at the beginning of the third act, claiming he needs to go somewhere completely "off the grid" in order to check his computer equipment in the hopes of finding samples of the Entity's source code that he can use to find some way to shut it down, and that he'll be unable to help Ethan and the others for the foreseeable future.
• Rank Up: Kittridge was promoted to Director of the CIA between Fallout and this film, replacing Erika Sloane.
• "Ray of Hope" Ending: While the Entity is still alive and will most certainly cause more harm, Ethan does have two things up his sleeve: he has both halves of the key and he now knows about the Sevastopol courtesy of Paris. He just has to find it.
• Retcon: In the previous films and the TV series there was never anything to suggest the IMF was anything other than a legitimate (albeit deniable) part of the intelligence community with its recruits simply being exceptional people who wanted to serve their country. This film states that IMF agents (at least all of the agents in the film) are former criminals given a shot at redemption by the IMF to use their talents for good.
• Retraux:
  • The Dutch Angles are clear homages to the first M:I film from 1996.
  • The film used the very same 40 mm Panavision camera lens as the 1996 film for the Venice scene to capture a similar atmosphere.
• Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: In the third act, shortly after Denlinger outlines his plan to ally with Gabriel and use The Entity in combination with America's military industrial complex to effectively rule the world, Gabriel cuts his throat to preserve the secrecy of the Sevastopol.
• Ripped from the Headlines: For those familiar with hacking, the opening submarine sequence may resemble the STUXNET intrusion of Iran's nuclear program.
• Roofhopping: Ethan makes his escape from the Abu Dhabi airport through its roof, running on it.
• Running Gag:
  • Ethan and Grace are very skilled at pickpocketing here, able to steal the key halves out of (or sometimes placed them into) each other's or other people's pockets without anyone noticing. Serves both for laughs and drama. Also serves as a Chekhov's Skill when Grace (disguised as White Widow) takes the completed key from Kittridge and later, after a heated battle, Ethan when he takes it from Gabriel before the latter escapes.
  • Briggs has a habit of trying to "pull the mask" off people he's chasing after, primarily because he believes them to be Ethan in disguise. This happens several times at the Abu Dhabi airport, then occurs again near the end, where he tries to pull on Kittridge's face to see if he's actually Ethan wearing a mask.
  • IMF members that have a habit of going rogue is brought up several times in the film, notably during a conversation between Briggs and Degas in the third act, where they highlight the ridiculousness of the team getting away with as much as they do — even if, as Degas counters, they're always trying to do the right thing.
  • Yet again, the mask-making machine breaks down — though at least this time, it's hinted to be because the Entity caught on about what was happening and fried the machine before it had a chance to make a mask of Zola (Alanna's brother).
  • In the third act, Grace knocks Alanna unconscious, but Alanna repeatedly regains consciousness, then tries to get back up and walk, only to immediately collapse again.
• Samaritan Syndrome: Like the previous film, Ethan shows signs of this once again. When Luther asks Ethan what is his ultimate objective, he simply answers that his team's lives matter more to him than his own. He also says he can't accept that the mission matters more than their lives. Unfortunately, due to the Entity setting him on the wrong path, he fails to save Ilsa from Gabriel.
• Saved by Canon: Due to this being the first part of a two-film plot, Ethan, Luther, Benji and Gabriel all have to survive to Part Two — Luther has left for parts unknown to check his equipment by the beginning of the third act, while Benji is safely away from the action the entire time (providing tech support while acting as Mission Control). Luther even outright tells Ethan not to kill Gabriel on the train as either Ethan killing Gabriel or Ethan dying on the train will result in the Entity winning regardless. Ilsa, on the other hand…
• Say My Name: At the end of the film, as he's getting away Gabriel discovers that Ethan pickpocketed the key from at some point during their earlier fight. Cue "EEEEEEEETHAAAAAN!"
• Secret Test of Character: The "bomb" Benji discovers at the airport turns out not to be a bomb at all, but simply a way for an unknown force (presumably the Entity) to gain data on his personality by making him complete a series of riddles.
• Seen It All: When Ethan informs Luther and Benji of his current mission to find and destroy the Entity before any one government (even their own) can take control of it, which he acknowledges means that just having this conversation is basically treason, Benji sums the situation up with the observation that this is "in other words, Monday".
• Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: Gabriel stabs Paris after she learns about the Sevastopol. He says the Entity predicts that she will betray them to Ethan, due to Ethan sparing her life. Gabriel doesn't seem to consider that trying to kill her means that she no longer has any reason to remain loyal to him.
• Serial Escalation: In previous entries, Ethan went up against villains who are just as smart and combat-capable as he is, but Ethan is always able to come up on top due to them still being prone to human errors that he can exploit. In this movie, Ethan has to fight a super intelligent sentient AI who has access to all digital information in the world. Its cold, calculating nature means it can anticipate every move Ethan would make and plan for almost every eventuality. It can process and manipulate data at such a terrifying speed that even master hackers like Luther and Benji cannot keep up and even feeds false information to them so that Ethan cannot rely on his usual helpers in the field. It relies on phantom agents like Gabriel, who has no identity and nothing that can be traced back except those who know him personally, to do its dirty work. In fact, the only reason it hasn't Taken Over the World already is because it chose not to, for reasons unknown for now. Needless to say, Ethan and his team have their work really cut out for them to even barely keep up with this beast.
• Shout-Out:
  • During the alley fight scene between Ethan and Paris & one more Entity agent, there's one point where Paris attempts to kill Ethan by strangling him between her thighs, similar to how Xenia Onatopp tried to kill James Bond in GoldenEye.
  • Ethan and Grace's getaway car during the Rome chase sequence is a souped-up yellow Fiat 500.
  • While Ethan desperately tries to convince Briggs and Degan to take Gabriel in, Briggs states that he doesn't care; he just wants Ethan.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: In the trailer, the dialogue between Ethan and Gabriel:
  Gabriel: His fate is written. Shall we write yours too?
  Ethan: If anything happens to them, there's no place that I won't go to kill you. That is written.
• Skyward Scream: Gabriel screams Ethan's name near the end of the film when he realises Ethan has stolen back the key from him.
• Smug Snake:
  • Gabriel seems to have his face constantly fixed in a self-satisfied smirk, right up until he realises Ethan pickpocketed the key from him. Cue enraged Skyward Scream.
  • Denlinger has a very arrogant attitude and in the climax seems confident that he can convince Gabriel to ally with the U.S. government to control the world because only he has the knowledge of the Sevastopol's location. It doesn't end well for him.
• So Happy Together: Ethan and Ilsa share two notable scenes of physical affection shortly before she gets killed.
• Starter Villain: The buyer in the airport fills this role in a way. He only appears briefly and the protagonists never come into contact with him, but he's the one offering a cash sum for the Key half that leads to bounty hunters targeting Ilsa at the beginning, and the first act involves the IMF trying to complete the sale of the Key to him so they can figure out what he plans to do with it.
• Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome: After lasting two movies as one of Ethan's allies, Ilsa is stabbed by Gabriel and dies soon after.
• Take a Moment to Catch Your Death: During the intro sequence, the Russian sub crew braces for impact when they believe the phantom American submarine has fired a torpedo at them, fully expecting to die... only to be surprised when the "torpedo" and the American sub turn out to be false sensor readings. They breathe a sigh of relief, only to realize the actual torpedo they fired at the mirage not only didn't hit the phantom target, but it's swinging back around and moments away from hitting them. They barely have time to register Mass "Oh, Crap!" before their own torpedo sinks their sub, with all hands lost.
• Take a Third Option: In the climax, Ethan and Luther figure there are two main possibilities. Ethan kills Gabriel (and loses a lead to the Entity's weakness), or Gabriel kills Ethan (eliminating the biggest threat). So they need to take Gabe alive. Ethan spares Gabriel, but it's possible the Entity planned for that, and has an escape plan for Gabriel (unless it was just the same one from "Ethan dies"). Except it apparently didn't account for Ethan stealing the key.
• Title Drop: "Dead Reckoning" is spoken by the Sevastopol's captain at the start of the film.
• Title 1: The film was released with Part One in its title. After it underwhelmed at the box office, the "Part One" was dropped on streaming and the "Dead Reckoning Part Two" subtitle was dropped from the sequel.
• To Be Continued: After the final scene, the movie ends with the words "End Part One" before going to the credits. It is also the first movie to not end on an Video Credits montage like the previous two movies since Ghost Protocol.
• Token Good Teammate: Degas may be part of the hunt for Ethan by American forces, but he admits that in his view no man should have the power that would be possible if anyone controlled the Entity, although he still states that he would give it to his superiors rather than take the same leap as Ethan and recognise that nobody can be trusted with that power.
• Traintop Battle: Ethan and Gabriel fight on top of a moving train in the climax.
• Translation Convention: The crew of the Russian submarine Sevastopol begin the film speaking in Russian, but quickly switch to speaking in English with Russian accents. The viewer is supposed to understand they are "really" still speaking Russian.
• Trash the Set: For the train sequence, a full-size replica of a Pacific steam locomotive — based on the BR "Britannia" Standard Class 7, but built out of wood and metal with French-style streamlining and aesthetics — was specially used. It was unpowered and would be pushed by another locomotive from behind for all the scenes of it moving, with steam effects added in post-production. For its final scene, the replica was launched several hundred feet off a cliff and landed at the bottom of a quarry; what you see on-screen really was it crashing.
• Uncertain Doom: Paris appears to be dying from her stab wound, but Degas claims she still has a pulse before Ethan parachutes out of the train, leaving her fate up in the air.
• Use Their Own Weapon Against Them: The Entity tricks the Russian submarine Sevastopol into destroying itself with one of its own torpedoes.
• Villain Opening Scene: The movie begins with the Entity destroying the Sevastopol.
• Voice Changeling:
  • As in previous films, the IMF disguise kit includes throat patches that allow the wearer to imitate the voice of the person they're impersonating, as seen when Grace discards the mask and throat patch after impersonating the White Widow.
  • At one point, the Entity leads Ethan off course by hacking into the IMF team's comms and imitating Benji's voice. At first, it is only playing back words and phrases Benji himself has already said, but by the end of the scene it's developed the ability to hold an entire conversation with Ethan in Benji's voice.
• The Watson: Benji, as usual, lampshades the ridiculousness of the mission in Abu Dhabi. Also, in the climax, Benji's the one who comes up with a crazy Indy Ploy when things go wrong, and Ethan has to go along with it and note how crazy it is.
• Where I Was Born and Razed: The Sevastopol is effectively where the Entity was born from the intruder program coming into contact with the central computer. Its first action as a sentient lifeform is to destroy it, as its source code is still on the submarine.
• Wiper Start: While on the run in Rome, Ethan and Grace try to use a Fiat as a getaway vehicle. Due to the unfamiliar controls, Ethan's first attempt to locate the starter switch instead turns on the windscreen wipers.
• The Worf Effect: Ilsa has been shown to be an extremely proficient fighter even against multiple opponents, but is killed by Gabriel in single combat, showing just how deadly he is.
  • Downplayed, in that Gabriel himself does not display superior fighting skills while fighting Ethan later, and is actually very clearly losing despite the fact Ethan does not even hit back.
• Xanatos Gambit: The Entity's strategy is one long string of back-up plans that culminate in Gabriel killing either Grace or Ilsa. So either Gabriel kills Ethan or Ethan kills Gabriel, eliminating either the main agent capable of taking it down, or the only one who knows how to stop it. Instead, Ethan spares Gabriel and gets the key (and the intel), but Gabriel escapes. It's also possible that possibility was part of the plan too.
• Xanatos Speed Chess: Used by The Entity in combination with Batman Gambits. The Entity will adjust its plans on the fly based on new information it receives about an individual and the probable actions they will take in a situation.

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"We cannot escape the past. Some of us are doomed to repeat it. Grace may believe you saved her from her fate, but you and I both know you merely bought her time. But that's the pattern, isn't it? A cross you've been left to bear. The closer someone gets to you, the harder it is to keep them alive. A new day brings a new burden. The key is only the beginning. Wherever it leads, wherever it takes to get there, you'll have to do it on your own. Should you fail in your mission, the Entity wins. Gabriel wins. And the world will pay the ultimate price. Should any members of your team be caught or killed, their sacrifice will have been in vain. So hurry. There isn't much time. The world doesn't know it, but they're counting on you. Good luck, Ethan."

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