The Mission Impossible franchise is the crown jewel of Tom Cruise 's illustrious career. The franchise has been running for more than 2 and a half decades and shows no sign of losing steam any time soon with two future sequels for 2023 and 2024 already in the works, titled Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part One and Part Two.
It is a common tradition nowadays that when a long-running franchise is coming to an end the final installment of the franchise is split over 2 movies like this. It is this fact along with several reports and rumors that has convinced fans recently that Tom Cruise's run as Ethan Hunt will be coming to an end with these two upcoming films.
However, the director of the 2 upcoming movies, Christopher McQuarrie has warned fans against believing everything that they might hear on the internet or on the news. His exact comments on the matter are as follows:
"Let me tell you, I’ve been working with Tom Cruise for 15 years and I cannot tell you the number of times I’ve been standing next to the man, witnessed an event and then read about it in the trades the next day and none of what they describe is actually true... When you read articles in the trades, just put the imaginary word in front of the headline: ‘The Agenda Is…’ When you read ‘anonymous sources’ or ‘sources close to the production say,’ that’s somebody putting it out there for a specific reason. That’s someone wanting others to think that for a specific reason, and you can never know for sure what those reasons are. You learn to ignore it and laugh at it. In today’s world, you wait 17 minutes and another news cycle will sweep it away."
While McQuarrie makes a valid point it is worth noting that he didn't say anything in regards to the actual question of whether the upcoming movies will see the end of the franchise. Obviously, he isn't allowed to reveal anything at the moment but his language does suggest that perhaps the decision is still very much up in the air.