TOP GUN: MAVERICK REVIEW
Tom Cruise delivers an exceptional sequel that surpasses the original movie
This might surprise some of you, but I didn’t see Top Gun until just last year when Paramount re-released it into Dolby Theaters in advance of this movie, which was supposed to also come out last year… or maybe the year before that, at some point. Even though the movie presumably finished filming before COVID, it’s just been sitting on the shelf to be moved around the release schedule to find the perfect release moment for it.
I have heard so much love and adoration towards the original movie from various friends over the decades, and I never really understood the fandom for the movie. To be honest, I really wasn’t a fan of Top Gun when I first saw it last year – the whole thing seemed rather dated and while Cruise looks like he’s 15 years old at times, it seems very much like a movie of the times.
Top Gun: Maverick has almost the same opening as the 1986 movie — including a nod to late producer Don Simpson — but we then skip forward 38 years and are reintroduced to Tom Cruise’s Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, now a test pilot putting next-level fighter jets through their paces. When he takes a jet on an unauthorized test flight, basically to prove something, he’s deployed back to Top Gun where he’s ordered to train a team of 12 of the program’s top graduates to participate in an incredibly dangerous and seemingly impossible mission.
It doesn’t take one very long to immediately realize how much Cruise has grown as an actor since the original Top Gun. Cruise had the youth and charm and swagger back in the ‘80s, but the older Maverick isn’t nearly as cocky as he was when he was younger – he has 12 trainees to bring that to the mix, particularly Glen Powell’s “Hangman.” In that sense, Cruise himself has grown older and wiser, which probably helps him deliver just a far more convincing performance.
Cruise also has a not-so-secret weapon in Christopher McQuarrie, who is credited for writing on the screenplay, having been involved in some capacity on most of Cruise’s movies over the past decade. Joseph Kosinski also steps up his game from his stint directing Cruise’s Oblivion, making a movie that is faithful to the look and feel of the original movie with DP Claudio Miranda doing a particularly great job giving Maverick a similarly slick look.
The most important relationship driving the movie is Maverick’s tenuous one with his former wingman’s son, Rooster, as played by Miles Teller, who still holds his father’s friend responsible for his death. This is the crux of the film’s story arc, and Teller more than delivers when going toe-to-toe with Cruise. The second most important is Maverick’s romance with the bar owner and single mother Penny, as played by Jennifer Connelly, which is the one that leans heavily on the throwbacks to the original movie.
Just as important is Maverick’s relationship with his former nemesis Iceman, as played by Val Kilmer. Some might wonder how it might be handled considering Kilmer barely has a voice due to his bout with throat cancer, but the scene between the two actors is incredibly emotional and possibly one of the film’s finest moments.
But Maverick is still very much an action movie, and the air fights are absolutely fantastic, especially in the way they build the tension up to the actual mission, which just really delivers. Whatever changes were made, whether it’s the benefit of visual effects or actually doing more practically, these are some of the best air fights we’ve seen in any recent movie. (The movie very deliberately avoids stating what country is being attacked, but “generic random country” certainly seems to have a decent-sized weapons budget.)
All that action and those emotions are enhanced by another fantastic score by Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe that frequently falls back on many of the original themes by Harold Faltmeyer. (Oh, but I hate that new Lady Gaga song more than that equally awful Berlin song. It’s the worst part of the movie when that kicks in at the end.)
I would definitely recommend seeing Maverick in IMAX, Dolby or another premium format if that’s available. It’ll be worth the extra price (a nice benefit of using AMC A-List or other similar subscription program) to fully experience the exceptional sound and camerawork.
It’s rare when a sequel not only fully exceeds expectations but, at least to me, is just so much better than its predecessor, and that’s the case with Maverick. While it remains faithful to the guard rails set in place by Top Gun and revisiting or resolving some of those stories, it also works as an extremely satisfying action-drama in its own right.
Rating: 9/10
Maverick hits movie theaters nationwide on Friday, May 27.