Another Mission: Impossible Star Confirms Their Return for Upcoming Seventh Film

Production continues on the upcoming seventh Mission: Impossible movie and we've already learned about several returning players for the film. Naturally Tom Cruise will be back as IMF agent Ethan Hunt but other cast members including Simon Pegg, Ving Rhames, Rebecca Ferguson, Vanessa Kirby, and even Henry Czerny of the first feature film will all be back. Even behind the camera is the return of Christopher McQuarrie as director, marking the third time he's helmed a movie in the series. Yet another actor has announced they'll be back for the movie though with Angela Bassett confirming her character, CIA Director Erika Sloane, will be back.

"The real conversation is when, I think they've begun filming, or that was the plan, but you know in these trying times, the best laid plans of mice and men sometimes go awry," Bassett told ComingSoon.net in a new interview. "But I do have the pages, we'll just see when I get the ticket to fly and go do my part, but that's coming up and I'm really excited about it."

Bassett's character made her debut in 2018's Mission: Impossible – Fallout, serving as the person that lets Henry Cavill's CIA assassin August Walker loose on the world. Though she started the film as suspicious and frankly uninterested in working with the Impossible Mission Force, she finds herself on their side by the ending of the sequel.

The new movie isn't just familiar faces however, as the seventh entry has also recruited some newcomers including Hayley Atwell, Pom Klementieff, Shea Whigham, and Esai Morales as the main villain. Even then, there's apparently even more people that the filmmakers are eager to see return, and they've got a lot of potential candidates considering the length of the franchise.

Earlier this year, a report from THR claimed McQuarrie was "said to be considering" bringing back Alec Baldwin's Impossible Mission Force secretary Alan Hunley and Henry Cavill's rogue CIA agent August Walker via flashbacks after both characters were killed in 2018's Mission: Impossible — Fallout. Story details for the new movie are still unknown, but McQuarrie once said he has a "very, very, very long list" of actors he wants to bring into the fold.

Mission: Impossible 7's release date was previously delayed by four months after its stopage in production and is now slated to hit theaters on November 19, 2021. Mission: Impossible 8 is scheduled to open on November 4, 2022. It's unclear if the film will be delayed any further due to the production hold ups.