“Mission: Impossible — Final Reckoning” is the eighth installment in the series. The films have grossed a combined $1.3 billion in the U.S. since 1996 — easily one of the most successful Hollywood franchises of all time.

But unlike other stratospherically-successful franchises like “Star Wars” or the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the “Mission: Impossible” movies are almost entirely defined by one actor: Tom Cruise. Yet somehow, “Mission: Impossible” is hardly the defining achievement of Tom Cruise’s film career, which is currently in its fifth decade.

Cruise is practically the definition of the American movie star. Amanda Kehrberg, pop culture expert, joined The Show to talk about Cruise’s legacy and the emerging question of whether we’ll ever see anyone else like him.

Full conversation

SAM DINGMAN: So let’s start by talking about this idea of Cruise as a movie star. What do you think defines Cruise as a movie star? 

AMANDA KEHRBERG: Cruise has this just completely ineffable charisma. He’s known for this intensity, this insane drive that he just never takes a break, never relaxes. Every film that he’s in, he is constantly trying to push the boundaries of what he did before. So you just know that when you see a Tom Cruise movie, you are going to be the recipient of that, that just gift of his intensity, of his energy.

You know, this one film critic says Tom Cruise will break his leg to entertain you. Tom Cruise literally did break his ankle in “Mission: Impossible — Fallout,” and because he got up and just kept walking, that shot is in the film. So he will he just, he has a physicality to him that is astonishing. That goes back to, you know, things that so many of the, the original movie stars in the Hollywood system were known for, that you just can’t get away with anymore.

I mean, no one would let a contemporary Buster Keaton do those kinds of stunts. Nobody would let Donald O’Connor do, make them laugh again and spend three days in a hospital bed afterward.

But partially because Tom Cruise has been a producer for many decades now, he kind of can get away with some of that stuff, and he understands that his whole body goes into that star performance.

DINGMAN: Yes, yes. And critically, I think that scene in that Mission Impossible movie where you see him on screen harm himself in the midst of doing a stunt. That’s not even one of the most significant stunts that he does. That’s not him. You know, free climbing, free climbing a mountain or like a skyscraper, holding on to the side of a helicopter as it takes off. 

KEHRBERG: Oh. It’s wild. Yeah. And he understood, really from the beginning that why he wanted to do those stunts was that it allowed the camera to be in places that it wouldn’t otherwise, if it was just a stunt double. And, and so that allows him to really take his performance into those spaces and make a more intimate connection than with the audience.

But like that physicality goes into how he is a star offset as well. Like, he’s known as this incredibly generous person with fans that he’ll spend hours just working the rope lines. That’s such a different thing than when we talk about the intimacy that stars provide today of like, oh, they might retweet you like that or you whatever.

KEHRBERG: It’s like Tom cruise will do a handshake. Tom Cruise will sit next to you and eat fistfuls of popcorn if you catch a Cruise moment. It has an intense presence to it.

Amber Victoria Singer/KJZZ

DINGMAN: Speaking of this idea of intimacy and commitment, I think we should also not forget that one of the things that really defines Cruise is that as well known as he is for these big action movies, he has also worked with auteur directors, playing incredibly emotionally intense sort of Oscar caliber characters. 

KEHRBERG: Absolutely. Yeah. He, he’s been nominated for Oscars four times. Um, and he started out, you know, he, he kind of hits it big in 1986 with “Top Gun.” And he’s this young, just super, super desirable movie star and and decides instead of just, you know, doing action, action, action or franchise movies, big blockbusters all the time to seek out, um, working with actors like Paul Newman, like Gene Hackman, Robert Duvall, Dustin Hoffman, directors like Coppola, Scorsese.

I mean, just wanted to learn as much as he could. I think that is part of being a movie star, is having this kind of, um, transcendent reverence for the industry. And we see that so much with Cruise just he loves movies. And that is also partly of what I think he’s able to convey to the audience of just, there is something about a movie in theaters and making it that big and having a, you know, a sense of the legacy of it across the century plus of, of Hollywood that, yeah, that he embodies.

DINGMAN: I had this thought, you know, this idea of Tom Cruise being willing to break his leg to entertain you. I, the scene I always think about with Tom Cruise, that will always make me have a lot of respect for him is “Magnolia.” Um, towards the end of that movie, when he has been resistant to go visit his dying father for years and years and years, and then he gets next to the bed and he says, “I’m not going to cry for you. I’m not going to give you that.” And then he just starts wailing and saying, “don’t go away, don’t go away. I’m not going to cry.” And of course he is crying. It is heartbreaking. 

KEHRBERG: You know, Tom Cruise will break his heart to entertain you.

DINGMAN: Well, there you go. Yes, yes, yes. 

But I wonder if you feel like that commitment has something to do with the fact that, you know, I think the other thing that’s core to Cruise’s stardom is that he had a pretty significant fall from grace. 

KEHRBERG: Yes.

DINGMAN: Back in, like, 2005. Was it? ‘

KEHRBERG: He did. Yeah. It was ‘05, ‘06. Yeah. It’s really interesting because, you know, he was known kind of coming on the scenes as a, as a young star for these very Reagan, you know, uh, excess yuppie confident roles. But he always brought a clear sense of his own mortality, of his fallibility to those roles. And so, like, that was built into, I guess, what his on screen star persona was even before he had to draw on that in, in his public persona.

Because, yeah, by 2005. What’s funny is, you know, in the trajectory of “Video Killed the Radio Star.” Uh, streaming almost killed the movie star when it comes to Cruise. Uh, and then AI, of course, is not killing the movie star, but we’ll bring them back to life without their consent.

But Cruise was, you know, one of the first viral moments of very early YouTube was him jumping on Oprah’s couch. And that hit in this, this kind of burgeoning digital culture moment as super cringey. And that combined with, you know, everything else, the fallout from his breakup with Nicole Kidman and those two had defined a kind of classic Hollywood power couple was just this, this recentering of meaning, I think, in the film industry, in the star, uh, machine that that didn’t work well with Cruise.

Cruise kind of got out more on, on shows talking about his own beliefs, talking about, you know, his experience with Scientology and his personal life. And people didn’t like it. And, and so I think he really had to figure out how to adapt to what audiences wanted, now, how the industry was changing. Um, you know, what Marvel had done and this kind of, again, um, shift in what kinds of movies we go to see and who we go to see them for.

I think that’s maybe core to like what when we say movie star and what Tom Cruise is as a movie star. When you go to see a Tom Cruise movie, you go to see a Tom Cruise movie. You don’t go to see a Marvel movie or a “Jurassic Park” movie or a James Bond movie. Like, it depends on where you put that emphasis. Is it the intellectual property? Is it the character, or is it this just other worldly human that, you know, will provide you this, this specific experience?

DINGMAN: Ultimately we, we just love to watch the guy. 

KEHRBERG: We love it. We love it. And I get it.