Movie Review: Top Gun: Maverick (2022). Theatrical release.

By now, most people know that the long-awaited sequel to the mega-hit Top Gun from 1986, Top Gun: Maverick, was just released to theaters this past weekend.  The new movie, which was ready for release in 2020, was shelved for two years until it could be seen by audiences in theaters on big screens.

Tom Cruise, the movie’s star and one of the executive producers, was insistent that this film would not be released to streaming platforms until it could be seen in theaters first, and so it wasn’t throughout the first two years of the pandemic.  But it’s finally here, and it was well worth the wait, especially for fans of the original movie (who are legion).

It’s worth noting at the outset that the plot contains a large number of elements that are absurd, and just not believable from a rational standpoint.  But of course, we can always decide to suspend disbelieve, just as we would for a blockbuster science fiction film, in which case, strap in for an incredible and entertaining ride!

The absurd parts: a legendary fighter pilot now in advanced middle age is still in the Navy, stuck by his own individualistic misbehavior at the rank of captain in the role of a test pilot, but yet somehow not forced out of the service for failure to advance.  An unnamed hostile country possesses fighter planes that are way better than the F-18s (or for that matter, F-22s or F-35s) the U.S. military actually flies.  A 3-week “emergency” is created, where an elite team of pilots needs to train for and perform an impossible and unprovoked attack on the unnamed country’s new uranium processing plant.  And so on.

Of course, the original Top Gun film had a lot of the same sort of contrived and unrealistic plot devices to set up its story, and none of us who have watched and enjoyed it over the years have ever really cared about that, because the believable characters, the portrayal of the human relationships under stress within an elite world of competitive warriors, the humor, and the incredible aerial combat scenes more than made up for any trivial lack of story plausibility.

The new movie is absolutely faithful to those aspects of the original, while continuing the story of several of those personalities and relationships as they have aged and matured through time, and at the same time showcasing even more spectacularly realistic aerial footage than the original, as a new Top Gun team of "best of the best" fighter pilots trains for and then launches the seemingly impossible attack.

Much has been made of the extent to which this is a Tom Cruise showpiece, and it certainly is.  As a producer, he brought a long career’s worth of knowledge and experience about how to create outstanding action-packed cinematic entertainment, along with his expertise as a highly trained pilot (in real life), and his strong connections to the Navy from the original film, due to its decades-long value as a major recruiting tool for naval aviation.

But as an actor, he also brings authenticity to his portrayal of an older, sadder but wiser Maverick.  He’s still the dominant fighter pilot among the “best of the best”, and he still won’t follow orders if it doesn’t suit him, but he also knows how to act his age and life experience – struggling over whether he can teach his students what they need to survive, self-aware about the impact of pilots’ deaths on their families, and loving and compassionate toward his ailing friend and former Top Gun competitor Iceman (Val Kilmer), now the admiral who’s been providing “top cover” for Maverick’s checkered naval career over the years.

As is typical of Cruise, he also insisted on doing his own stunts to the extent possible, to make them look more realistic, although apparently (and not surprisingly) he did not actually pilot the Navy’s F-18s used in the movie.  He does briefly fly his own personally-owned World War II era P-51 Mustang fighter, which in the movie is one of Maverick’s fast-moving boy's toys, along with his iconic Kawasaki motorcycle.

If you’re ready to venture back into a movie theater, and you’re able to enjoy a film that is loud, visually overwhelming, blatantly militaristic and fantastical, but also epic entertainment with an uplifting story and likeable characters, Top Gun: Maverick should be at the top of your list for the summer.  It seems to be playing almost everywhere, so finding a theater near you that’s showing it shouldn’t be a problem, and in the near future, we can expect it to show up on one of the streaming services (although it won't be as grand or overpowering on the small screen).  Highly recommended.