How 'Mission: Impossible - Fallout' Is A Remake Of 'Skyfall'
Heads up, this article contains major spoilers for Mission: Impossible -- Fallout. It also contains major spoilers for Skyfall, but considering that movie has been out for six years by this point, any spoiling is more your fault than ours.
Mission: Impossible -- Fallout is a dark, introspective look at Ethan Hunt -- his demons, his regrets, his loyalties. It's very good, and judging by its box office numbers, we aren't the only people to think so.
We couldn't help but notice, however, that it was kinda like another film that took a world-famous spy and set about trying to understand how they ticked: Skyfall.
And it's not just thematic similarities. When you put both of these films side by side, the main plot beats almost exactly sync up. For instance, both Fallout and Skyfall start with the heroes hunting down a stolen MacGuffin. In Fallout, it's a cache of plutonium cores. In Skyfall, it's a computer drive containing the identities of MI6's undercover agents.
Both missions end in failure after someone makes a bad judgment call. In Fallout, Ethan chooses to save one of his team over retrieving the plutonium. In Skyfall, M winds up getting 007 shot off a bridge to his apparent death.
Both MacGuffins wind up in the hands of the bad guys, which leads to the head of a major spy agency getting chewed out by a tough, no-nonsense superior.
The hero sets about unscrewing the mess, only to discover that the Big Bad is a disgruntled spy. In Fallout, it's the CIA's August Walker. In Skyfall, it's Raoul Silva, an MI6 agent who was burned by M during a mission.
The head of the agency gets chewed out again, only to be interrupted when the bad guys attack whilst dressed in disguise.
The hero chases the Big Bad through the streets of London, only to lose them.
The final act of the movie takes place in a desolate, snowy location that dun dun dunnn has a personal connection to the heroes. In Fallout, it's a medical camp where Ethan's ex-wife works. In Skyfall, it's the lodge belonging to 007's dead parents.
HELICOPTER FIGHT
Both the hero and villain fight one last time hand-to-hand, which ends with the bad guy getting stabbed. In Fallout, this is via helicopter hook. In Skyfall, it's via throwing knife.
The hero finishes with a sense of closure over his personal demons, and the head of the agency, who was killed by the Big Bad, gets replaced by the tough, no-nonsense superior we saw earlier. Just to make it clear, these similarities aren't necessarily a bad thing. We loved Fallout and we loved Skyfall. It's just ... we're a little worried that this means that the next Mission: Impossible is going to end with Ethan discovering that the new Big Bad is his long-lost adopted brother, and we don't think our hearts can take that much disappointment again.
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