Film Review: "Top Gun: Maverick"

The original “Top Gun” holds a certain place of nostalgia in the minds of many. It’s a film that has themes and ideas that haven’t aged well which concerned me going into “Top Gun: Maverick.” I’m happy to report that after 36 years, Director Joseph Kosinski and Tom Cruise have revitalized the franchise for the world today. Our story picks up with aviator Pete “Maverick” Mitchell purposely dodging an advancement in rank, as a courageous test pilot. When he’s called back to the “Top Gun” training facility to train a new group of pilots, Mitchell is brought back into a world he thought was left behind.

My biggest problem with the original “Top Gun” is that there were no emotional stakes. The relationship between Maverick and Goose did have an emotional arch, but it was always undercut with themes of patriotism and homoeroticism. What makes “Maverick” rise above its predecessor is that it trades the themes of patriotism and homoeroticism for genuine emotion. There’s no denying the cliché story beat of a “grizzled mentor training the young, wise-cracking up and comers.” Over the film's two-hour and twelve-minute running time, both Cruise and Kosinski acknowledge this very thing. Most of these “wise-cracking recruits” are clichés, up to a certain character. Miles Teller as Goose’s son, Lt. Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw, sets the film on a different course emotionally.

Without divulging into spoilers, seeing how he views Maverick as this ‘enemy’ makes for some incredibly compelling drama. The same could be said for what calls Cruise to do as a performer, with how dramatic he has to be. One of the most common complaints about Tom Cruise as an actor is that he can never quite break through his real, larger-than-life persona. The screenplay strips the original material of the clichéd machismo and retools the focus on what it means to be an aviator. Instead of simply celebrating the military, we have a film that flirts with what it means to be a soldier. These moments don’t always work but are effective when they do.

Suffice it to say, not all of “Top Gun: Maverick” manages to surpass the original. Particularly the arch of Teller as Rooster is resolved in such a rushed way that never feels earned. The same could be said for Cruise’s Maverick, who spends large portions of the film being celebrated in a self-congratulatory way. So many characters spend time discussing how Cruise is a “Maverick” of aviators, that the constant celebration feels gross. It doesn’t last long but was the kind of detail that was incredibly hard to look past. Another annoying element of the film is how it skids around the concept of a true “enemy."

The whole reason that Maverick is brought in to train new recruits is to destroy a uranium facility of an unnamed nation. You can easily draw conclusions as to who this unnamed nation might be, but it’s easy to tell that the film is worried about offending someone. We’re living in a world much more politically charged than in 1986. What’s surprising is that especially in an industry like Hollywood, it’s very unexpected that no feet are held to the fire. Trading the clichés of 80’s cinema for nameless “bad guys” feels like a cheat to the audience. It’s a small qualm to have, but one that really left me scratching my head once the credits rolled. Thankfully the action sequences against these unnamed foes made it a lot easy to forgive.

For the screening of the film that I attended, we were privileged enough to see the film in IMAX. Seeing these ariel combat sequences, where Cruise really made the cast get in these cockpits, created a visceral experience. It’s one of the rare films in recent memory that demands being seen on the biggest screen possible. People keep referring to “Top Gun: Maverick” as the return of the summer blockbuster. Like any grandiose summer blockbuster, it isn’t without its slight structural issues. Living in a world still recovering from the pandemic, “Top Gun: Maverick” serves as a reminder of what theaters were meant for.