It was just a couple months ago that the release date of Star Wars: The Force Awakens forced Mission: Impossible 5 to move from its December perch to July, but now it seems that the Tom Cruise-led franchise is getting a bit of revenge. How so? By getting the jump on using the word 'Rogue' in a title and forcing Disney to postpone promotion of the first ever Star Wars spinoff movie, Rogue One.
Earlier today, Mission: Impossible 5 announced that it will officially be called Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation, but while many fans may have seen this as a reaction to this month's Star Wars title news, The Hollywood Reporter says that Paramount Pictures actually called dibs on the word 'Rogue' months ago. According to their sources, the studio actually cleared the name with the Motion Picture Association of America back in January - and Disney never did the same for Star Wars: Rogue One. If they had chosen to, Paramount could have fought to stop Disney or Lucasfilm from using the title, but they chose another option instead.
Sources say that Paramount Pictures and Disney have worked out a deal that will see the latter company "refrain from referring to Rogue One this summer in any promotional materials aimed at the general consumer." This obviously covers all sorts of areas, but there is one exception to the deal. The sci-fi franchise will be hosting its annual Star Wars Celebration this year from April 16-19, and apparently this is a time when Disney has been permitted to openly promote and discuss their Gareth Edwards-directed/Felicity Jones-starring production.
It's not exactly super hard to see why both Paramount Pictures and Disney/Lucasfilm would want to make a deal in this situation. On Paramount's side of things, there is really no reason to antagonize one of the biggest, most powerful franchises in the industry. On the Disney/LucasFilm side, the truth of the matter is that their movie won't be coming out until December of next year, and they probably won't be doing much promotion for it this year anyway (just think about how little was given away from Star Wars: The Force Awakens last summer). It's a situation where both parties really ultimately benefit from not turning it into a bigger deal.
Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation, which is being directed by Christopher McQuarrie and stars Tom Cruise, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Ving Rhames, and Alec Baldwin, will be in theaters on July 31st of this year. Star Wars: Rogue One, which still has a plot that remains a complete mystery to us all, is scheduled to be released on December 16, 2016. Given their very desperate schedules, chances are that when each individual movie is coming out, the other blockbuster will be far from the general audiences' collective minds.
