Every Mission: Impossible film brings in a new antagonist — Fallout remains the standard with Henry Cavill's mustache-sporting, arm-reloading August Walker/John Lark. Dead Reckoning Part One pits Tom Cruise against a foe from his past played by Esai Morales. Here's what you need to know about the villain.

Warning: Spoilers ahead for Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One

It's revealed relatively early on in Dead Reckoning Part One that Ethan (Cruise) has history with a man named Gabriel (Morales). In a flashback, we see one of Ethan's love interests die at the hands of Gabriel — making their rivalry all the more personal.

This is further complicated by the fact that whether or not Ethan likes it, Gabriel is vital to the mission given his knowledge of Dead Reckoning Part One's MacGuffin. He's been blessed (or cursed if you're anyone else) with knowledge so valuable that Luther (Ving Rhames) has to reinforce with Ethan that this can't be an emotional showdown and that they need Gabriel alive.

That's tested when Ethan and Gabriel fight atop the moving train at the end of the film. Ethan eventually gains the upper hand, but while on top of his adversary, he gains control of the knife and holds it up to his throat. That's when Jasper Briggs (Shea Whigham) and Degas (Greg Tarzan Davis), who has been tailing Ethan the entire film, arrive just in time and cause the two to break it up. That allows Gabriel to make his planned escape and fall onto an awaiting truck below the train tracks.

But as he drives away, he realizes he no longer has the prized keys that he's been battling for during the entirety of Dead Reckoning Part One. Ethan outsmarted him, but this suggests that the keys are only the beginning before they face off in the next Mission: Impossible movie.

Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One is in theaters now.