As someone whose entire career in journalism has been in entertainment, and specifically geek entertainment, I have an interesting relationship to the idea of catering to fans. I am a fan of just about all the stuff we cover here at Nerdist and I’m certainly not immune to films and TV shows pandering directly too me. I welled up the first time I saw Rogue One when Princess Leia said “hope,” and I shouted with glee when Cap summoned Mjolnir in Avengers: Endgame. But just as often, if not more, I roll my eyes at the increasingly esoteric media we imbibe. This is why what Mission: Impossible franchise director Christopher McQuarrie said is both incendiary and refreshing.
“Fan service, and fandom, is poison.”
The quote from McQuarrie isn’t new. It comes from a 2023 episode of The Filmmakers Podcast. (We saw it thanks to THR.) With the eighth and final (presumably) entry in the Mission: Impossible series on the horizon this week, it’s worth noting how remarkably devoid of Easter eggs and fandom winks it has been. It’s a series, sure, but at least as of Dead Reckoning, each entry has built on the last without relying on cutesy insider knowledge.
McQuarrie’s full quote on the subject is as follows:
“Fan service, and fandom, is poison. It’s deadly. It’s great when applied like a very, very strong spice, and judiciously. If you happen to have seen the other movies, great. I don’t count on it. Because what happens [when you add callbacks] — the danger of that — is I’m asking you to leave this narrative, and remember another narrative, and then come back.
“Two things are certain to happen: One, if you know the [previous] movies, you’ve left the narrative and I have to spend precious energy bringing you back [while] I’m trying to immerse you in a story so that you’re not aware the story is happening. Or you haven’t seen that other movie and you’re suddenly aware that everybody around you [in the theater] knows something you don’t. In either case, you’ve disrupted the narrative and broken the chain.”
This feels incredibly pointed at, let’s face it, the MCU and Disney-era Star Wars. And I don’t even think that’s wrong of McQuarrie to call it out. As I said above, I loved those moments the first time I see these films. But they do distract. They do force us all to go “I understand that reference” and others to say “I don’t understand that reference.” We do get pulled out of the narrative for the purposes of, effectively, Member Berries.
Now, I will say, having seen The Final Reckoning, it does contain quite a bit of what young McQuarrie would call fan service. Mostly, I think, in order to make the movie a summation of the entire 30-year franchise. But it does enough explaining to make them tie-ins rather than esoterica. Your mileage, of course, may vary.
Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning hits theaters May 23.
Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. He hosts the weekly pop culture deep-dive podcast Laser Focus. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Letterboxd.
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