Cruise back on a Mission but no JJ in the Director's chair

The announcement is flying all over the place but I will credit /Film as they are the site where I first heard it, Tom Cruise is coming back to Paramount to make "Mission Impossible 4," personally I am psyched!

Paramount Pictures has signed a deal with Tom Cruise to reprise his role as Ethan Hunt in M:I-IV. The bad news is that JJ Abrams is sitting this one out.

Finke is reporting that Ethan Hunt will be the main star of the film, debunking rumors that the character would only appear to pass the torch to a new spy. However, the new sequel is being looked at as a “reboot” to the series. The plan is for Cruise to make this his next film and start shooting by summer 2010 for a tentative Memorial Day 2011 weekend release.

Here is what we know so far: Tom and JJ developted”a really cool idea” for a fourth adventure, which Abrams turned into “an insanely long outline”. Abrams employed Alias‘ scribes Josh Applebaum and Andre Nemec to write a screenplay based on the treatment, which Abrams once joked “is probably longer than the script.” Applebaum and Nemec were well into the second act of a first draft when we last checked in (mid-January 2010), and Abrams seemed very pumped on the project.

I am a huge fan of the franchise and it sounds like JJ and Cruise are really pleased with this big outline they came up with, it's a shame JJ wont be directing but it leaves the chair open for some interesting candidates.

Names like Ang Lee and David Fincher were both set to direct MI-3 at one point, and it's not impossible that this time they may actually helm, Fincher in particular has a strong relationship with Paramount.

Another possibility could be Len Wiseman who was set to direct Cruise in "Motorcade" but both eventually pulled out.