‘Love Lies Bleeding’ Star Katy O’Brian Joins ‘Mission: Impossible 8’

File this one under Good for Her: Katy O’Brian, the breakout star of the A24 thriller Love Lies Bleeding, has joined the cast of Mission: Impossible 8.

Deadline reports that O’Brian has joined the ensemble cast of the eighth Mission: Impossible film, previously titled Dead Reckoning – Part Two. I’ll say it now: if she does not get to crush Tom Cruise like a can of PBR with a single bare hand, Christopher McQuarrie should retire. I need a full-on fight between Katy O’Brian and Tom Cruise—not a fight between Katy O’Brian and another female character, or Katy O’Brian and Dead Reckoning baddie Esai Morales. O’Brian vs. Cruise is the only acceptable match-up, unless Henry Cavill miraculously returns, in which case watching O’Brian pummel a mustachioed Cavill is also acceptable.

Cruise is of course reprising his role as protagonist Ethan Hunt in the upcoming sequel, which also features returning co-stars Ving Rhames, Henry Czerny, Simon Pegg, Vanessa Kirby, Esai Morales, Hayley Atwell, Shea Whigham, and Pom Klementieff. O’Brian joins fellow M:I newcomers Holt McCallany, Nick Offerman, Janet McTeer, and Hannah Waddingham for the franchise’s eighth installment, which hits theaters on May 23, 2025.

O’Brian most recently starred opposite Kristen Stewart in Love Lies Bleeding, the sophomore feature from Saint Maud director Rose Glass. She’s also appeared in The Mandalorian, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, and The Walking Dead, but it’s her turn as bodybuilder Jackie in the A24 thriller that’s put O’Brian on the map.

(featured image: A24)