How About Some Transformers, Dungeons & Dragons, and Mission Impossible 7 Updates?
Early footage from 2023’s Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves and Mission: Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part 1 just screened at CinemaCon in Las Vegas and we’re here to tell you all about it.
First of all, yes, Mission: Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part 1 is the official title of what we had long been referring to as Mission: Impossible 7 (which means, we assume, Mission: Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part 2 will be the title of Mission Impossible 8). And though it won’t be out for well over a year—its release date is July 14, 2023—Paramount screened a full trailer for the film. The reason? We suspect it will be attached to next month’s release of star Tom Cruise’s other big blockbuster, Top Gun: Maverick, though Paramount had not confirmed this as of publication.
Nevertheless, the trailer was action-packed, as one would suspect, with a very unique-looking key apparently playing a major role. There were action scenes on horses, on a submarine, on top of a train as it went through a tunnel (very much like the first film), and even a shot of a train flying off the side of a cliff. We also see Cruise and Hayley Atwell in a car chase on the streets of some ornate, old city, in a very tiny yellow Fiat. All of which culminates with Cruise on a motorcycle speeding off a cliff, letting go of that motorcycle, and letting it crash as he pulls a parachute and glides toward the ground. Filmed from above. For real. (Which we know because at CinemaCon 2021, Cruise and director Christopher McQuarrie showed a bunch of footage of it.)
The star and director also appeared on screen with a pre-taped introduction for the footage (as well as Top Gun: Maverick) filmed mid-air, above a huge mountain range, as Cruise stood on top of an airplane. Literally. McQuarrie then came up in another airplane next to him to tell him they needed to get back to shooting Mission: Impossible 8. Then the three planes (two on screen, one filming) all banked hard left and flew down. With Cruise still standing on top of it.
Because Paramount chose to show Top Gun: Maverick in its entirely (which we won’t be covering because it’s more of a straight action film, but I still loved it very, very much), the rest of its presentation was a little shorter than other studios. We saw some logos for upcoming films, like John Krasinski’s mysterious If with Ryan Reynolds, as well as A Quiet Place Day One. And then a reel of footage from a few other movies which included two big genre films: Transformers: Rise of the Beasts and Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts opens June 9, 2023, and though there were only a few shots of footage shown at CinemaCon, they were super cool. There was one of Optimus Prime, who looked very much like the blend of Michael Bay and G1 designs we saw in Bumblebee. A few shots of star Anthony Ramos reacting to what we assume can only be giant robots coming at him. One of him driving and seeing about six of the same Porsche criss-crossing in front of him, and even a shot of a Transformer we think might be Arcee, who was rolling alongside a big Volkswagen van. You couldn’t really tell what was going on overall but it was obvious the film will have the scale and scope of the previous Transformers films. You can read more about the plot and Beast Wars tie-ins from earlier reporting.
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves hits theaters March 2, 2023 and unfortunately also didn’t show a lot of footage. What we did see however was large, beautiful vistas, Chris Pine and Regé-Jean Page dressed in ornate armor, and most notably, several of the film’s characters standing in some sort of arena that was moving around them. Like platforms raising and lowering from the ground. I’ll be honest. I don’t know much about D&D so whether or not that’s something from the mythology is beyond me—but took a movie that I had zero interest in and moved the dial for sure. It certainly seems like the franchise is being treated with the utmost respect.
And with that, io9’s CinemaCon 2022 coverage comes to an end. Thank you so much for reading and we’ll see you next year.
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