Every Tom Cruise Movie Since 2016, Ranked

Published Oct 5, 2026, 8:09 PM EDT

Lucas Kloberdanz-Dyck is a writer for Collider. He grew up creating lists, stories, and worlds, which led to his love of anime and video games. He attended Sheridan College where he earned an Honours Bachelor of Game Design. Lucas and his group won 1st place for technical innovation at LevelUp Toronto 2023, and he was also an intern for the Oakville Film Festival of Arts. 

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This generation has been full of some of the greatest movie stars of all time, and one of the brightest and most popular is Tom Cruise. From action masterpieces such as Mission: Impossible to engaging dramas like Eyes Wide Shut, he has an illustrious career that only gets better with age, as does he. Not everyone is a fan of his, but no one can deny his dedication to film and the lengths he goes to ensure the best quality for his projects, not to mention that he is a pretty nice guy.

While his catalog of films spans decades, some say he has hit a new point in his career, which is why this list will rank all eight of his movies since 2016. The past ten years have been a mixed bag for Cruise, but positive overall. Based on aspects such as acting, directing, originality, his performance, fan opinion, critical acclaim, and overall quality, these movies of his are but a slice of his acting prowess, yet they are full of genre-defining masterpieces and some misses.

8 'The Mummy' (2017)

Image via Universal Pictures

Some fans may think it is impossible for Cruise to have a bad film, and while he is a star, he has more than a few disasters, including the failed reboot of The Mummy. Nick Morton (Cruise) is a soldier who comes from fortune, and when he accidentally awakens a resting queen in an Egyptian tomb, she brings her ancient curse to the modern world, forcing Morton to become the vessel for the god of death.

Movie reboots don't always turn out well, and The Mummy is a prime example, taking whatever the original did well and ignoring it. This movie doesn't have an identity, switching between a horror flick, an action-adventure, and a superhero-style blockbuster. Unfortunately, it doesn't get any of those aspects right, leaving a jumbled mess that tries and fails at everything. Cruise doesn't help the film either, not being able to embody his selfish anti-hero role and instead falling into his usual action star routine that simply doesn't fit well with The Mummy.

7 'Jack Reacher: Never Go Back' (2016)

Image via Paramount Pictures

The Mummy might have been Cruise's worst film of all time, but he has plenty of other misses, including the sequel, Jack Reacher: Never Go Back. Cruise plays the titular action hero who goes back to his old base in order to meet his former commander, only to find that she has been arrested for espionage. After breaking her out, he plans to unearth the government conspiracy while dealing with a teenage girl.

The first Jack Reacher film was decent, but it didn't come out in the past ten years. Instead, Jack Reacher: Never Go Back was released during that time. The worst thing a movie can be is forgettable, and that is exactly what this film is. From the villain to the conspiracy to the action and even Cruise's performance, everything in Jack Reacher: Never Go Back fell flat and ended up being one of the actor's most unremarkable projects.

6 'Digger' (2026)

Image via Warner Bros.

After the Mission: Impossible franchise ended, most fans weren't sure what Cruise would do next, but the last thought that crossed their minds was a satirical comedy by Alejandro González Iñárritu. Digger is his latest venture, and while it is a change of pace, it is exactly this switch-up fans were wanting. Digger Rockwell is an oil baron whose latest venture could cause the demise of millions of citizens. He has taken it upon himself to be humanity's savior and stop the disaster and become a legend while doing it.

The lead-up to Digger has been one of the most interesting couple of months, with viewers curious what it would turn out like. Unfortunately, it seems to be an unexpected flop. It does place a little higher on this list because some critics absolutely adore it, and Cruise's performance is career-defining. However, this was not the outcome he or fans wanted. Some critics love Digger, but the polarizing nature of the film makes it one of the worst simply because he has so many masterpieces. Cruise delivers a marvelous, albeit bizarre performance that caricatures some of the biggest and most fragile egos.

5 'Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning' (2025)

Image via Paramount Pictures

Cruise starred in three Mission: Impossible movies in the last ten years, and unfortunately, the worst is also the last. Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning is the culmination of the franchise, leading to its supposed finale. With the AI system inching towards taking over the world, the team faces their toughest challenge yet as they face familiar and new foes, while a ticking clock will determine if they save the world or if the mission really is impossible.

While it is the worst modern Mission: Impossible movie, it is still a fantastic film with remarkable action. It respected the classic movies while embodying the future that the series became, using both to create a daring finale that will be well remembered. Final Reckoning faced an impossible task of ending a legendary franchise, but it succeeded with a grand send-off and one of Cruise's best on-screen stunts.

Collider Exclusive · Action Franchise Quiz What Action Series Would You Thrive In? Wick · Fast · Mission · Die Hard

Four franchises. Four completely different ideas of what a hero is: the assassin with a code, the family that never leaves anyone behind, the man who does his own stunts, and the guy who simply refuses to die. Only one of them runs on your particular brand of trouble. Eight questions will tell you which one you would survive.

🐕Wick

🏁Fast

🧨Mission

🎄Die Hard

FIND YOUR FRANCHISE →

01

How does a room know you've walked into it? Every action hero arrives differently. Some of them arrive before they arrive.

ASomeone recognises me, and the temperature in the room drops without a single word being said. BLoudly and warmly. I arrive with my people, and we're already laughing about something. CI'm the one who told everybody where to stand. I walked this room twice before anyone else arrived. DBy accident. I wasn't supposed to be here, and now I'm the only one who can do anything about it.

NEXT QUESTION →

02

It turns physical. What does your fighting actually look like? Choreography is character. Yours says something about you.

AEconomical and devastating. Trained technique, no wasted motion, finished before most people notice it started. BLoud, heavy and weirdly joyful. I'm not elegant, I hit like a truck, and I always have backup. CTo plan, until the plan breaks. Then I improvise at full sprint and refuse to stop moving. DBadly, honestly, and with a lot of swearing. I take more damage than I deal and I still don't go down.

NEXT QUESTION →

03

Who is standing beside you when it starts? Some franchises are built on a team. Others are built on one person walking in alone.

ANobody. I have contacts, favours and people who owe me, but when it begins I work alone. BEveryone. My people are the entire point, and I'd trade the whole mission for any one of them. CA small hand-picked team I trust completely, and I'd still take the worst part of the job myself. DA voice on the other end of a radio and a building full of people who don't know I exist.

NEXT QUESTION →

04

It has gone badly wrong. What keeps you upright? Act two exists to find out what you're actually made of.

AFocus, commitment and sheer will. Grief is fuel if you point it in the right direction. BThe people counting on me. I don't appear to have a limit when it's family on the line. CRefusing to accept the odds. Somebody has to do the impossible part, and it's going to be me. DSpite, mostly. And a growing sense that these people picked the wrong building.

NEXT QUESTION →

05

There's a vehicle. What are you driving, and how? No action franchise has ever survived without a car chase. This one is yours.

AA black muscle car I am unreasonably attached to, and I will dismantle an entire empire over it. BSomething impossibly modified, at impossible speed, off an impossible ramp. Physics is a suggestion. CA motorbike at full throttle through a city I memorised last night. And then off a cliff. DA borrowed car, badly, while somebody in the passenger seat politely asks me to slow down.

NEXT QUESTION →

06

How do you feel about the people giving the orders? There is always an institution. There is rarely a good one.

AThere are rules and I respect them absolutely, right up until somebody breaks one against me. BI don't take orders. I take care of people, and everything else tends to sort itself out. CI serve the mission, not the memo. If my people are in danger, the orders come second. DThey're in a van outside telling me what I'm doing wrong while I'm the one bleeding on broken glass.

NEXT QUESTION →

07

Underneath all of it, what are you actually doing this for? The stunts are the reason people come. This is the reason they stay.

ASomething was taken from me that can't be replaced, and I've been settling that account ever since. BBelonging. I built a family out of people who had nowhere else, and I'll defend it with everything. CThe conviction that if I stop, people die. I don't know how to hand that to anyone else. DI just wanted to get through the holidays with my family. Everything after that was self-defence.

NEXT QUESTION →

08

When the credits roll, what do people say about you? Every franchise is really an argument about what makes someone worth watching.

AThat I was a myth people warned each other about in whispers, and that they were right to. BThat I never left anyone behind, the door was always open, and there was always a place at the table. CThat I did the impossible part myself, every single time, and never asked anyone to risk it for me. DThat I was just a guy in the wrong place at the wrong time, who turned out to be very hard to kill.

REVEAL MY FRANCHISE →

Casting Has Been Completed Your Franchise Is…

Four action series. One of them is built around exactly the way you handle pressure, people, and a room that has just gone very quiet. Here is where you would survive the trilogy, and probably headline it.

John Wick

You are precision with a grudge. You don't posture, you don't escalate, and you don't warn anybody twice. That is exactly why the people who know you are so careful never to be the reason you start.

• The Wick films run on discipline: an underworld with actual etiquette, a hero who honours every rule of it, and a world that unravels the instant someone breaks one against him.
• You share that quality. You are extraordinarily reasonable right up to the line, and then completely immovable past it.
• Focus, commitment and sheer will. You'd be the one carrying grief through three sequels and turning it into technique rather than noise.
• People wouldn't call you dangerous. They'd say your name quietly and let that do the work.

Fast & Furious

You understand the thing the whole franchise is secretly about: the cars are spectacular, but the crew is the point. You collect people, you keep them, and you'd drive through a building for any one of them.

• This series went from street racing to orbit without ever changing its actual subject, because loyalty scales and plot doesn't have to.
• You have the same instinct. You build a family out of whoever turns up, and then you defend it past the point of reason.
• You'd thrive here because the franchise rewards exactly your strengths: warmth, nerve, an absolute refusal to leave anyone behind, and a relaxed relationship with physics.
• The mission can wait. The barbecue cannot.

Mission: Impossible

You over-prepare and then take the dangerous part yourself anyway. It looks like control, but it's really responsibility. You have never worked out how to ask somebody else to carry the risk.

• This is the franchise of the plan that collapses on schedule: the team, the mask, the rooftop, and the one person sprinting flat out because sprinting is all that's left.
• You share that refusal to accept an outcome. Told the odds, you treat them as an administrative error.
• You'd thrive here because these films reward competence and loyalty in equal measure. The mission matters, but nobody on the team gets left on the wrong side of a door.
• Some people delegate the cliff. You have never once been that person.

Die Hard

You are not the most trained person in the building, the best equipped, or the one anybody would have picked. You are simply the one still standing at the end, which turns out to be the only qualification that matters.

• Die Hard invented the modern action hero by making him mortal: outgunned, out-planned, bleeding, and extremely funny about it.
• You share that stubbornness. Adversity doesn't make you noble, it makes you sarcastic, and then it makes you unstoppable.
• You'd thrive here because these films reward improvisation and nerve over preparation, and you've never had the luxury of preparing anyway.
• You didn't want any of this. You just declined to be the person who let it happen.

↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ

4 'American Made' (2017)

Image via Universal Pictures

Most fans know Cruise for his daring action blockbusters, but he can really turn it loose in drama productions as well, as seen in American Made. Based loosely on the life of Barry Seal, a pilot who finds himself in the middle of a drug war. From working for the CIA to delivering drug packages from Colombia to the United States, and smuggling weapons for the Contras, he does whatever he can to stay alive.

Cruise abandons his usual style in favor of something completely unhinged, chaotic, and wildly entertaining. American Made is a fast-paced bundle of exhilaration that combines the gritty truth of the story with the hilarious absurdity of the system. Not to mention, Cruise does an excellent job portraying this sleazy character, enhancing the comedy and drama. His action movies are fantastic, but it is refreshing to see Cruise play a different type of character and see him flex his acting muscles.

3 'Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One' (2023)

Image via Paramount Pictures

AI is a growing technology, but as with every technological advancement, it also presents a slew of unknown dangers that movies love to touch on, including Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One. When a Russian submarine crashes, the world's most advanced and dangerous AI is now in the hands of whoever has the two keys. This stirs a race to collect the two keys, invoking the titular team and those who would wish to use it for evil, like an old villain and the AI itself.

AI is becoming a tired topic in movies nowadays, but Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One spices it up with some of the best action in modern cinema. It blasts out with a riveting sequence and doesn't stop until the movie ends, creating a magnificent pace of non-stop exhilaration that has made it one of the best movies in the Mission: Impossible franchise. The motorbike stunt is among Cruise's best, and the train sequence, while reminiscent of Uncharted, is an absolute spectacle that reminds fans why this franchise is so good.

2 'Mission: Impossible – Fallout' (2018)

Almost half of the entire Mission: Impossible franchise is on this list, and that obviously includes what is arguably the best in the series, Mission: Impossible – Fallout. After Ethan Hunt prioritizes his own team over the mission, the world is in danger when a terrorist group is now in control of a large amount of plutonium. With the help of a CIA agent, Hunt and the team set out on a globe-trotting adventure to get the plutonium back and save the world.

Cruise has a long list of magnificent movies, but his best of the past decade are easily between this and the next, with Mission: Impossible – Fallout only barely losing out, but it could really go either way. Regardless, this is one of the most definitive movies of his catalog, highlighting the best of his acting, action, and movie prowess. The practical stunts are absolutely jaw-dropping, making it an action masterclass with the famous HALO jump and the legendary bicep reload. Beyond the stunts, Fallout is an emotional payoff and a turning point for the characters and the franchise, which is some of Cruise's best work.

1 'Top Gun: Maverick' (2022)

Image via Paramount Pictures

Legacy sequels are always fun and nostalgic, but they are rarely ever good, which is why so many fans were worried about Top Gun: Maverick. Set decades after the first, Cruise's character is a test pilot, but after a failed test, his last hope of piloting may be as an instructor. He must teach these hot-headed recruits and prepare them for a death-defying mission, but his brash tactics go against the top brass and their wishes for the mission.

Top Gun: Maverick is the gold standard for legacy sequels, keeping what made the original good and adding some fan service and new elements. It is one of the most exhilarating movies ever, with the authentic stunts immersing viewers in the intense action. Cruise had an excellent performance and an even better dynamic with the cast. Top Gun: Maverick is more than just a spectacle, but also a sincere story. This high-flying sequel isn't just his best of the decade, but arguably of all time, proving he's still got it and may never lose it.

Top Gun: Maverick

9 10

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  Capt. Pete 'Maverick' Mitchell

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  Penny Benjamin