Impossible 7 Phrase May Hold The Key To Dead Reckoning Part Two

«Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One» ends with Eugene Kittridge (Henry Czerny) delivering a foreboding monologue that concludes, «The world doesn’t know it, but they’re counting on you. Good luck, Ethan.» On its face, it appears to be a pensive capper for a thrillingly exhausting movie. However, it seems to also be setting up what may be a defining idea in «Dead Reckoning Part Two» — the limits of fate and fortune

Fate is a concept that has already cropped up in previous «Mission: Impossible» films under Christopher McQuarrie’s pen. In «Rogue Nation,» for example, Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is described as «the living manifestation of destiny» by CIA director Alan Hunley (Alec Baldwin). The implication is that Ethan is so determined, skilled, and thorough that there is no problem he can’t solve by thinking several steps ahead. If a person becomes Ethan’s mission, his superior strategic mind gives them no real choice but to accept what fate he has in store for them — in a grand sense, they lose free will.

Thus, Ethan’s ultimate enemy could only ever be an actual manifestation of destiny — an A.I. so skilled in predetermination that not even he can consistently outsmart it. The Entity’s status as such a rival comes in the form of the first allusion to good luck in «Dead Reckoning,» one that most fans probably didn’t notice. Operation: Podkova — the mission title designated to the submarine in Sevastopol housing the Entity, which is verbalized in the film’s first line of dialogue — translates from Slovak to «Operation: Horseshoe.» Horseshoes are a common symbol for — you guessed it — good luck.