Tom Cruise will play Ethan Hunt for the last time in the upcoming Mission: Impossible finale

Tom Cruise will play Ethan Hunt for the last time in the upcoming two-part finale for the Mission: Impossible franchise.

It’s definitely the end of an era.

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Tom Cruise established himself as one of Hollywood’s most profitable actors with the Mission: Impossible franchise.

The film series started in 1996 with the first movie and it has since grossed $3.57 billion at the box office.

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Mission: Impossible fans will be happy to learn that all the main characters from the series will be there.

Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg will both reprise their roles as Luther Stickell and Benji Dunn respectively, as will Rebecca Ferguson, who appeared in Rogue Nation and Fallout.

The upcoming sequel is titled Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One and it will be released in 2023.

Part Two is scheduled to hit the screens one year later, in the summer of 2024.

Earlier this year, Paramount Pictures confirmed that both films will be a send-off to Ethan Hunt.

Which helps to explain the enormous budget for the movies.

The first film, which is currently in post production, reportedly cost $290 million to make.

Rumor has it the second one will be even more expensive.

It also begs the question: is this the end of the franchise, or just the end of the road for Ethan Hunt?

About the Mission: Impossible franchise

The first movie was directed by Brian De Palma and released in 1996.

It was loosely based on the TV series of the same name that aired in the US through the 1960s and 1970s.

The plot follows Ethan Hunt, an American spy who works for the IMF, a fictional secret agency.

The acronym IMF actually stands for Impossible Missions Force.