The Author's Inspirations

Bruce Israel Geller

A key inspiration for Geller in creating the series was the 1964 Jules Dassin film Topkapi, innovative for its coolly existential depiction of an elaborate heist. Geller switched the story away from the criminals of Topkapi to the good guys of the IMF, but kept Dassin's style of minimal dialogue, prominent music scoring and clockwork-precision plots executed by a team of diverse specialists. Several episodes in fact show close-up shots of an agent's wristwatch to convey the suspense of working on a deadline.

One of the more controversial points of Geller's was his insistence on minimizing character development. This was done intentionally both because he felt that seeing the characters as tabulae rasae would make them more convincing in undercover work, and because he wanted to keep the focus on the caper and off the characters themselves. Geller would even veto the writers' attempts to develop the characters in the episodes. This is why, even after Geller was removed from the show, the IMF agents would only have one scene at Jim's apartment where they interacted, and they were rarely if ever seen in their "real" lives.

As a side effect of this, cast turnover was never once explained on the show. None of the main characters ever died or were disavowed in the original series, but a character could disappear between episodes without mention or acknowledgment. The 1980s revival, however, did kill off a main character on screen; Bruce Geller had died on May 27, 1978 in a plane crash in Santa Barbara, California, so he was unable to potentially veto the decision. Mimi Davis is the only character whose recruitment as an IMF agent shown on screen, although such a scene was filmed for Dana Lambert (Lesley Ann Warren) and discarded. The 1980s revival otherwise stayed true to Geller's edict, with the occasional brief exception.

The producers of Mission: Impossible were sued for plagiarism by the creators of an ABC show called 21 Beacon Street. The suit was settled out of court. Geller claimed never to have seen the earlier show; Beacon Street's story editor and pilot scripter, Laurence Heath, would later write several episodes of M:I.

Mission: Impossible is still recognized for its innovative use of music. Composer Lalo Schifrin wrote several distinctive pieces for the series. The visual cuts in the main title sequence were timed to the beats and measures of the theme tune—written in (unusual) 5/4 time—while an animated burning fuse moved across the screen. Most episodes included fairly long dialogue-free sequences showing the team members—particularly electronics expert Barney Collier—making technical preparations for the mission, usually to the accompaniment of another easily recognizable tune called "The Plot." Lalo Schifrin also wrote a theme piece for each main character and the sound track for each episode incorporated variations of these throughout. Even when an episode's score is credited to some other composer, Desilu's music supervisor Jack Hunsacker would re-edit it, adding Schifrin melodies from the library. The series had great impact on film and TV music. Before Mission: Impossible, a common compliment was along the lines of "the score worked very well but never got in the way or called attention to itself." By contrast, Mission: Impossible was praised for the prominence of its music.

At 171 episodes, the original version of Mission: Impossible held the record for having the most episodes of any English-language espionage television series for over 35 years (about 10 more episodes than its nearest rival, the UK-produced The Avengers). Its record was broken during the eighth season of 24 in 2010.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission:_Impossible