Paramount has moved back the release of the eighth “Mission: Impossible” film from June 2024 to May 23, 2025, with insiders at the studio citing production delays due to the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike.
The eighth “Mission” film, which is produced by Skydance, will take the Memorial Day slot previously held by an untitled “Spongebob SquarePants” film, which will now head to December 19, 2025 as a family competitor to 20th Century’s third “Avatar” film.
The June 28, 2024 release slot previously held by “Mission” will now be taken by “A Quiet Place: Day One,” which was previously slated for a March 2024 release. Paramount also moved the John Krasinski family film “If” up a week to May 17, 2024, placing it ahead of a Memorial Day weekend slate that includes Warner Bros.’ “Furiosa” and 20th Century’s “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.”
In its slate change announcement, Paramount notably referred to the film simply as “Mission: Impossible” rather than its previous full title of “Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning, Part Two,” signaling a potential name change for the upcoming installment, which is a direct follow-up to the plot of “Dead Reckoning, Part One,” which hit theaters this past July.
Filming on “Mission: Impossible 8” was already underway this summer when it went on pause to allow the film’s cast, led by Tom Cruise, to promote “Dead Reckoning: Part One,” which grossed $567.5 million at the global box office against immense competition from Warner Bros.’ “Barbie” and Universal’s “Oppenheimer.”
On the same day that the film was released in the U.S. on July 14, SAG-AFTRA began its first TV/film strike since 1980, calling for strong rules on compensation and consent for AI-generated replicas of actors and stronger residuals for streaming, among other demands. The strike has lasted 102 days and counting, with the guild and studios meeting on Tuesday for another round of contract negotiations after talks previously broke off on Oct. 11.
Until a deal is reached, film and TV production will largely remain at a standstill, something that is a particular problem for “Mission: Impossible” given the amount of time and logistics needed to resume shooting on a film filled with complex action set pieces shot on location in various global locales.
With so much uncertainty over exactly when a strike-ending deal may be reached, insiders at Paramount said that the studio determined that it would be unable at this point to complete the film in time for a release in June.
Taking its place next summer will be “A Quiet Place: Day One,” a spin-off prequel of the hit horror films directed by John Krasinski. Michael Sarnoski is writer-director of the film, which will star Lupita Nyong’o and tells a story set on the first day that deadly alien creatures with powerful hearing abilities attacked humanity.
“Mission: Impossible 8” now settles into a Memorial Day 2025 space that has yet to be occupied by other films, as Disney only has a placeholder slot set on that holiday weekend.
As the first blockbuster to stake a spot there, “MI8” will get three weeks of play on Imax screens, something that “Dead Reckoning, Part One” did not have as it only got one week of Imax screens before the premium format shifted worldwide to “Oppenheimer,” which made over $179 million from Imax screens alone.
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