What to remember about the Mission: Impossible movies before Dead Reckoning

polygon.com:

There aren’t as many Mission: Impossible movies as there are Fast and Furioustitles or Marvel Cinematic Universe entries. But the M:I movies have been running on the big screen for nearly 30 years now, so even dedicated fans can be forgiven for not remembering every detail from every labyrinthine espionage plot, and for not necessarily wanting to cue up a 17-hour rewatch just to get up to speed on a movie that will itself likely need a rewatch before its direct sequel comes out next year.

Not to worry. If you want to go see Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, but aren’t sure whether you remember all of its predecessors, this handy guide will provide a catch-up free of spoilers for the new movie, though it does feature some broad spoilers from the previous six.

None! The trailers and the movie itself make Gabriel (Esai Morales) seem like a villainous figure from an earlier entry in the series who’s back to haunt Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) after a previous story. But that isn’t true — this is the first time Gabriel (and Morales) has appeared in a Mission: Impossiblemovie.

The new movie includes some flashbacks that may cause even hardcore fans of the series to think, Wait, did I miss this in my annual rewatch? Those brief scenes, featuring images of a younger Ethan Hunt, are not from a previous Mission: Impossiblemovie. They’re newly added backstory, a light retcon for a character whose background was a bit murky. They don’t rely on previous knowledge, even if they seem like they do.

It would make sense to assume that we’ve seen this woman before, back when Tom Cruise himself was younger, in the series’ early days. But the first two movies don’t mention any previous relationships for Ethan, and after that, he’s an