Tom Cruise is still the movie industry’s best hope for survival, apparently

12.01.2024 - 17:57 / polygon.com / Steven Spielberg / Tom Cruise / David Zaslav / Alan Ritchson / Best

The combined power of Barbie and Oppenheimer renewed the movie industry with a kind of zeitgeisty excitement for big-screen entertainment that was so palpable it was… a little scary. “Barbenheimer” felt like a once-in-a-generation moment — so how would the movie studios keep delivering? In the wake of WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes that all but halted the momentum, as studio executives waffled over details and their own existential content crisis, the answer, it seems, comes from 2022 instead of 2023: Tom Cruise.

After flirting with franchise work with Universal’s Dark Universe and doing an OK job with the Jack Reacher series (though he has now been out-beefed by Alan Ritchson’s version on Prime Video), Cruise finally found his footing in modern franchise-hungry Hollywood just before the COVID-19 pandemic cratered movies in 2020. Mission: Impossible – Fallout helped Cruise’s 20-year spy franchise hit a new high in 2018, and when his long-desired revival Top Gun: Maverick finally hit theaters, the sequel, as Steven Spielberg would later exalt, saved movies. While Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Onedid not reach the same heights in 2023, it still cemented Cruise as a bona fide movie star in a sea of superhero wannabes. And as the Marvel mojo fades, Cruise — who famously turned down the role of Iron Man back in the 1990s — has the last laugh. Right now, everyone wants a piece of him.

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On Tuesday, Warner Bros. Pictures announced it had formed a “strategic partnership” with Cruise, who would set up shop on Warner’s Los Angeles lot in order to develop original and franchise-friendly projects in which he can star. There were no movies announced as part of the pact, which in a rare move is non-exclusive and does not include any first-look stipulations. But Cruise is no stranger to WB; the star most recently worked with the studio on 2014’s Edge of Tomorrow, which has been the subject of sequel talk for years, and arguably did his best work as an actor under the banner in films like Magnolia, Eyes Wide Shut, and Interview with the Vampire. Lestat legacyquel? The Last Last Samurai? Rock of Ages: Now with More Leather? The possibilities are endless.

“We are thrilled to be working with Tom, an absolute legend in the film industry,” said Warner Bros. motion picture group co-chairs and CEOs Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy in a public joint statement. “Our vision, from day one, has been to rebuild this iconic studio to the heights of its glory days, and, in fact, when we first sat down with David Zaslav to talk about joining the Warner Bros. Discovery team, he said to us, ‘We are on a mission to bring Warner Bros. back — we have the best resources, storytelling IP, and talent in the business — and we