Christopher McQuarrie 'deciding to direct' 'Mission: Impossible 5'?

It's been a little over a year since the Brad Bird-directed, IMAX-amplified, heavily-punctuated Mission: Impossible–Ghost Protocol. The movie was a box office hit, a critical sensation, and a boon to the Dubai tourism board. It also rejuvenated the Mission: Impossible franchise. Producer-star Tom Cruise has been circling another sequel, and early rumors had his Jack Reacher writer-director Christopher McQuarrie as a strong possibility to helm the five-quel. McQuarrie's best-known work was the Oscar-winning screenplay for The Usual Suspects, but he's lately become a Cruise favorite, having written Valkyrie and co-scripted the upcoming All You Need Is Kill — a movie which, we need to stress, is still titled All You Need Is Kill, thank goodness.

Earlier today on Twitter, McQuarrie was asked point-blank if he was making the next Mission: Impossible. McQuarrie said he was "deciding to accept." It was a delicate choice of words, and one which McQuarrie clarified in a later tweet: "'Deciding to accept' is not the same as 'Decided to accept.'" (The former is the present continuous tense, and the latter is the past tense. Grammar bonus!)

Paramount did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Mission: Impossible series has a history of eclectic directors. It'd be hard to find directors with more radically different styles than Brian De Palma, John Woo, J.J. Abrams, and Brad Bird. It will be interesting to see what McQuarrie "will decide" (future tense.)

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