Nothing Can Stop Tom Cruise Except for a Malfunction to a $30 Million Submarine

According to the latest reports coming out of the UK, where the film has been filming for what feels like at least an eternity, the release date of the eighth movie in the series has been pushed back. The delay is serious and indefinite for the time being, and it's also due to a malfunction to the $30 million submarine much of the story focuses on.

That sub would be the Sevastopol stealth sub featured in the previous film, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One. Part Two, which was initially set to open in theaters this summer, will be the final ever installment in the series, so it makes sense for everyone involved – particularly Cruise – to want it to go out with a bang.

Sources on the set say the plan to do that was to focus more on the super-smart, AI-operated Russian sub, which has been built in real life. The film will revisit the Sevastopol ten years after the events in Dead Reckoning Part One.

The malfunction that now halted production isn't with the submarine itself but the gimbal that lowers the entire 120-foot (36.5-meter) high structure. Apparently, production added fittings and stairwells to the empty shell of the submarine before they realized the gimbal couldn't hold that much weight.

"They’re not happy as it puts production behind, which costs a lot of money per day," an unnamed tipster tells one British tabloid. The report notes that most of Part One and presumably Part Two as well shot at Surrey's Longcross Studios, with the implication that this is where the submarine shell is also located.

There's a lot to be said about the credibility of these unnamed sources that go to the tabloids with salacious stories, but then there's also this: sometimes, they're right on the money.

Back in the summer of 2020, when the seventh movie was still in production, a report claimed a dirtbike that Cruise was practicing on for a stunt that eventually turned out to be the world-famous mountain top BASE jumping on a bike stunt, exploded and set fire to the entire set. Not only did the incident translate into a few weeks' worth of delays, but it also added at least another $2.5 million to an already ballooning budget.

As of this writing, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Two (whew, that's a mouthful!) has a tentative May 2025 release date. That tipster swears that the wait might prove even longer than that, hinting that whatever malfunction on the submarine might require a longer period to fix.