A new image from upcoming action movie sequel Mission: Impossible 7 features the return of a character not seen since way, way back in 1996: Eugene Kittridge. Set to be played once again by Mission: Impossible star Henry Czerny, the character’s return is sure to be a real blast from the past for both audiences and Tom Cruise’s unstoppable secret agent Ethan Hunt.
… https://t.co/4xJ4yaAfFFpic.twitter.com/tvrS3hASw3
— Christopher McQuarrie (@chrismcquarrie) August 13, 2021
While Kittridge’s role in Mission: Impossible 7 remains a mystery, director Christopher McQuarrie has previously teased that both this sequel and Mission: Impossible 8 will be the final parts of Ethan Hunt’s story, taking the hero back to the beginning, and providing a much more emotional journey for the seemingly indestructible action hero.
The last time audiences saw Eugene Kittridge, the sleazy former director of the Impossible Mission Force was sat rather comfortably in the role of antagonist, hunting Cruise’s IMF agent across the globe, believing him to be a mole. Of course, Hunt does what he does best, running around non-stop, blowing up anything he can and stealing all manner of secret documents in order to clear his name, with Kittridge ultimately proven wrong and reinstating Hunt in the IMF. Having been a thorn in the side of the much younger, less experienced Ethan Hunt, it should prove interesting to see how the relationship between the pair has changed after all these years, especially as the agent has now stopped some impending apocalypse so many times over.
“I’ve been thinking about Kittridge going all the way back to Rogue Nation,” Christopher McQuarrie said of the character’s comeback last year. “I’m much more interested in finding something great for that character to do. Early in this process I had an inkling that there could be a place for Kittridge – the tone of the movie, the shape of the movie lent itself to that. I realised, ‘Kittridge has got to be in this scene.’ I had written it not knowing who was in it, and then suddenly Kittridge came into it and the scene was transformed, it was really fun. I got to call Henry Czerny and say, ‘You’re in! Will you be in it?’ He was great about it.”
Aside from Hunt’s past rearing its head in the form of Eugene Kittridge, Mission: Impossible 7 will have ties to more of Hunt’s past, with Vanessa Kirby also set to reprise her Mission: Impossible – Fallout role as Alanna Mitsopolis, a black-market arms dealer known as the White Widow and daughter of “Max”, a character who also appeared in the very first Mission: Impossible.
Starring Tom Cruise, Ving Rhames, Henry Czerny, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Vanessa Kirby, Angela Bassett and Frederick Schmidt, all of whom reprise their roles from the previous movies, along with Hayley Atwell, Pom Klementieff, Shea Whigham, Esai Morales, Rob Delaney, Charles Parnell, Indira Varma, Mark Gatiss, and Cary Elwes, Mission: Impossible 7 is scheduled to be released in the United States on May 27, 2022, by Paramount Pictures, followed by a streaming release on Paramount+ on July 2022. The sequel, Mission: Impossible 8, is scheduled to be released on July 7, 2023. This comes to is courtesy ofChristopher McQuarrie’s Twitter account.