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Song of the Day #6,164: ‘Schifrin And Variations’ – Michael Giacchino

Of course every Mission: Impossible movie has a bad guy, and some have been more memorable than others.

Today, I will rank the seven films in the M:I franchise based on their VILLAINS.

#7. Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol – Kurt Hendricks

Michael Nyqvist is only two years older than Tom Cruise, but he looks like he could be his father. And that makes it thoroughly unbelievable when his nuclear strategist character has an extended fistfight with Ethan, or beats him in a footrace. Apart from the visual mismatch, Hendricks is just a boring villain with no sense of menace apart from his access to nuclear codes.

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Song of the Day #6,163: ‘Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation Main Theme’ – Joe Kraemer

My next Mission: Impossible countdown covers an element of these movies that borders on problematic: the treatment of the women characters.

The series has a bad habit of introducing a new woman (sometimes a love interest, always a brunette) only to ditch her by the next movie, either through death or by simply not referencing her again. There are some exceptions, which I’ll get to.

So let me kick off my ranking of the WOMEN of Mission: Impossible.

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Song of the Day #6,162: ‘Cutting on One’ – Lorne Balfe

The next category I’ll rank from the Mission: Impossible film series is SET PIECES.

Almost every M:I film has a major sequence (sometimes more than one) in which the team works together, using fancy tech and their own ingenuity, to pull off a seemingly, yes, impossible mission.

The scenes I’m considering don’t include car or motorcycle chases, fistfights, or standalone stunts. They have to involve a coordinated effort by multiple team members to misdirect and deceive. They are what separates the IMF from other world-saving teams.

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Song of the Day #6,161: ‘Main Theme’ – Danny Elfman

The eighth and (presumably) final installment of Tom Cruise’s excellent Mission: Impossible series comes to theaters next week, capping off a 30-year run of breathtaking action, shrewd spycraft, and rubber face masks.

Mission: Impossible – Final Reckoning will find a now 62-year-old Cruise still hanging off of airplanes and running faster than Usain Bolt. For three decades, he has defied time and the limitations of the human body to bring big-screen entertainment to the masses — he’s the lead ambassador of Movie Magic.

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Song of the Day #6,160: ‘Count Me In’ – Gary Lewis and the Playboys

The Beatles topped the Billboard Hot 100 the week of May 18, 1965, with ‘Ticket to Ride,’ their eighth #1 on the chart and second of 1965.

In second that week was Herman’s Hermits’ ‘Mrs. Brown, You’ve Got a Lovely Daughter,’ featured a couple of weeks ago when it was at #1. How many acts saw themselves kicked out, or kept out, of the top spot by The Beatles?

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