Edgar Wright Explains Why He Turned Down Directing MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - GHOST PROTOCOL

Edgar Wright was once offered the opportunity to direct Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, but ultimately ended up turning down the offer. During a recent interview on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Wright explained why he chose not to direct the movie, and it simply all came down to his schedule. The timing was off.

He explained: “It was literally like a timing thing. To do it, I would have to have not done the press for Scott Pilgrim.” He went on to say that he doesn’t regret passing on the gig, saying:

“Sometimes if you love a series, you almost don’t want to be the thing that could possibly f—k it up, you know what I mean? I love the Mission: Impossible series. I don’t regret passing on that because Brad Bird’s film was f—king great. And I loved it. I was there on opening day to see it and I didn’t ever sit there thinking, ‘I could’ve done that.’ I was thinking, ‘This is great.’ I’ve had that a number of times in my career, where I’ve been asked to do episodes of my favorite TV shows. Part of me, in the back of my head, is thinking, ‘This show has existed really well without me for this long, so it’s not going to die without me.’”

I loved what Brad Bird did with Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, and while I’m sure that Wright would’ve made a fun movie, I couldn’t be more happy with the one that Bird delivered. I actually would have liked to see Bird direct more of them! But, once Christopher McQuarrie and Tom Cruise hit it off, that just wasn’t going to happen.

The movie follows the Impossible Mission Force (IMF) team as they go rogue after being implicated in a devastating terrorist attack on the Kremlin. With their organization disavowed, Ethan Hunt and his team, including new members played by Jeremy Renner and Paula Patton, must prevent a global catastrophe caused by a nuclear extremist named Kurt Hendricks.

Did you enjoy Ghost Protocol? Would you have liked to see Wright direct it?