Is there a post-credits scene in Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One?

For all practical purposes, the only film franchise to speak of through the '80s and '90s was James Bond. Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt introduced a very different kind of spy to the screens. A far cry from the sophisticated martini-sipping Bond, Hunt was a daredevil American with a complete disregard for rules. From the time Tom Cruise began working in the movies, no less than five actors have played James Bond but only one has played Ethan Hunt.

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Even though Mission Impossible turned into a successful franchise, no single thread connected the plots of the first six films. The only common factor between these films was the protagonist Ethan and his two friends Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg) and Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames).

Rebecca Fergusson’s Ilsa Faust was introduced to the Mission: Impossible universe in 2015 with Rogue Nation. She remains the only female character to star in three MI movies, IMF’s diversity hire, if you please. In Mission: Impossible 7, Faust is joined by the mononymous Grace played by Hayley Atwell leading to speculation of Fergusson’s exit from the franchise, a question that is answered about halfway into the film when she dies at the hands of Gabriel, the handyman of an AI being simply called the Entity.
The Entity is the real villain of Mission: Impossible 7.

While MI7 isn’t the first movie by any stretch to showcase AI taking over the world, it remains unique in its depiction of the technology. Whether it’s Terminator or Age of Ultron, filmmakers have always relied on a physical manifestation of the technology: a time-travelling robot, a supervillain being that decides to take on a metal body, you get the picture. The Entity, however, doesn’t take on a physical form. It always remains unseen but ever present and managing to wreak havoc. Esai Morales’ Gabriel is merely a pawn in the hands of the Entity but the sentient being that has decided to take over the running of the world remains invisible.

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Perhaps the only other time we have seen a depiction of such an AI being was in the TV show Person of Interest whose surveillance AI looms large over five seasons and over 100 episodes. While POI’s AI was built with a noble purpose of saving lives, the Entity was designed to breach a state-of-the-art Russian submarine before it becomes sentient and goes rogue.

For the audience, this threat seems more real than any others that preceded it in the older AI annihilation movies. At some level we all knew that if we were to die in an apocalypse, it wouldn’t be at the hand of a metal bot but rather an invisible algorithm that would drive us off the cliff. With developments in AI being splashed on the news every day, this belief has only been reaffirmed. And by simply depicting the Entity as an invisible but all-powerful being, Mission: Impossible 7 makes the doomsday scenario more real than ever.

Even though Mission: Impossible takes its cue from Avengers by splitting the finale into two films, it doesn’t feature a post-credits scene. What it does drop, however, is a subtle audio cue. Wait for the credits to roll and you will likely hear a few faint beeps suggesting that Entity has been watching you, the audience, the entire time. This is perhaps the closest you’ll get to a post-credits scene in Mission: Impossible. But it’s also a nifty hat-tip to the world in which we live where we are always being watched and always being heard.

Also read: Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One review: Tom Cruise take practical filmmaking to dizzying new heights