May 27
A sequel 36 years in the making, Top Gun: Maverick pulls off a 4G inverted dive and then some, building on the legacy of the original classic and enriching it with a ton of emotional weight. It’s truly astonishing just how director Joseph Kosinski and crew managed to film these breathtaking flight sequences. No CGI, no plastic looking special effects, just real planes and aviation stunts. It genuinely makes you feel like you’re in that F-18 with Maverick and the Top Gun students doing all these speed ups and inversions. Cruise gives such a dramatic, dynamic, and emotionally rich performance as Maverick, making the viewer feel all of the baggage he has carried since the first film. Miles Teller as Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw (Goose’s son) gives the standout performance here, providing a complex student/instructor relationship with Maverick that only enhances the impact of the events of the original. I can’t really say much about Val Kilmer’s (Iceman) role in the film, but I will say that the man brings another layer of gravitas both to his and Maverick’s arc. Unlike the Star Wars sequel trilogy, this is a legacy sequel that earns its nostalgic moments due to the immense care and respect the creative team has for the iconic returning characters and all important new ones. Instead of retconning fan beloved plot lines and sacrificing it for woke virtue signaling, Top Gun: Maverick doubles down on the drama that carries over from the first film and gives the audience a high flying adrenaline rush into the danger zone that we so desperately need this summer with quite possibly the most thrilling and realistic dogfights in cinematic history. The rare late sequel that surpasses the classic original, goodness gracious, great balls of CINEMA!
GRADE: A
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