Say what you will about him, but Tom Cruise remains one of the last movie stars who always does his own stunts. That's even more impressive when you consider the stunts that he's done… and will do. Tom Cruise spent a year training for a big stunt in Mission: Impossible 6, according to Collider — it will be the most epic of them all, but the exact nature of the stunt remains a mystery for now.
The revelation about his M:I 6 stunt came when Collider interviewed David Ellison, the CEO of Skydance Media (the production company that produces the popular action franchise). "I will say after the Burj [Khalifa], we thought it was going to be impossible to top that stunt, and then Tom did the A380 for the plane," Ellison told Collider. "What Tom is doing in this movie I believe will top anything that's come before. It is absolutely unbelievable — he's been training for a year. It is going to be, I believe, the most impressive and unbelievable thing that Tom Cruise has done in a movie, and he has been working on it since right after Rogue Nation came out. It's gonna be mind-blowing."
Holy hype, Batman! Talk about setting expectations high. Rest assured, given the absurd amount of time its taken him to master whatever skill it is, it will probably be a spectacle of physical derring-do that rivals any of the stunts Cruise performed in the other Mission: Impossible movies. Given that those movies featured the actor free-climbing, getting run over by a semi truck, scaling the outside of the tallest building in the world, hanging off the side of an airplane while it took off, and reportedly holding his breath underwater for six minutes, it makes you wonder what he'll do to one-up himself next time.
So, what could Cruise possibly be doing that took him a solid year to master? Let's make some guesses…
1. Wrestling A Bear
Leonardo DiCaprio won an Oscar for being mauled by a CGI bear. Tom Cruise could be gunning for his own Oscar by learning to wrestle a real, live bear. Take that, Leo!
2. Shooting Out Of A Cannon
Sue Sylvester shouldn't get poor Brittany agree to get shot out of a cannon for the halftime show on that one episode of Glee, but I bet Tom Cruise would have happily volunteered for the job for the movie.
3. Surfing A Tsunami
Maybe in M:I 6, Ethan Hunt will have to stop a villain who's stolen a piece of technology that can control seismic activity, and then the villain uses the technology to trigger a tsunami in an attempt to kill Ethan, but then Ethan manages to successfully surf it to safety. Probably on the back of a dolphin.
4. Walking In Space
Gravity schmavity. You thought Sandra Bullock and George Clooney floating around in green screen-space was impressive? M:I 6 could become the first feature film to shoot in actual outer space.
5. Going Over A Waterfall
It's just like bungee jumping. Except without a bungee cord. And into a pool lined with jagged rocks. NBD.
6. Jumping A Shark
Fonzie set the bar pretty high for this particular feat when he pulled it off back in a 1977 episode of Happy Days. Leave it to Tom Cruise to potentially improve upon one of the most critically-derided stunts of all time.
7. Folding A Fitted Sheet
It would literally take at least an entire year of training to learn how to do this. I swear to god. People who can fold fitted sheets are wizards.
Whatever it is, we'll get to see Tom Cruise's next death-defying stunt when Mission: Impossible 6 opens in July 2018.
