Top Gun: Maverick

Pete “Maverick” Mitchell is still flying. While others of his generation have long since taken on desk jobs, ranks, and responsibilities, he pushes aircraft to their limits, keeping himself in a world he commands. Top Gun: Maverick therefore doesn’t begin by asking whether its hero is still fast enough. What’s more interesting is why, after all these years, he still doesn’t want to land.

Tom Cruise portrays Maverick as a man who doesn’t seem stuck in the past at all. He’s physically present, technically brilliant, and just as naturally at home in the cockpit as he used to be. That’s precisely what makes his situation complicated. Maverick has no obvious reason to stop. As long as he’s flying, his life works.

Then he’s assigned a mission where that alone is no longer enough. For an extremely demanding mission, Maverick is tasked with training a group of younger pilots—including Natasha “Phoenix” Trace (Monica Barbaro), Jake “Hangman” Seresin (Glen Powell), and Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw (Miles Teller). Suddenly, it’s no longer about what Maverick himself can do in the cockpit. He has to make sure others can do it.

Maverick responds in the only way he truly knows how: he shows them what’s possible. If anyone doubts a maneuver, he gets in the plane. If a limit is considered unbreakable, he tries to push it. For him, authority doesn’t come from rank or long speeches, but from skill. That’s impressive—and at the same time, it’s the problem. Maverick can demonstrate how he flies. Whether his instincts can be transferred to others is an entirely different question.

For Rooster, this task becomes more than just a training program. He is the son of Maverick’s late friend and radar officer, Goose. Between them lies a past that Rooster has only partially experienced himself, yet one that still influences every decision Maverick makes. Miles Teller doesn’t need to turn this into an overt generational conflict. His detachment is enough. Maverick is supposed to prepare a young pilot for danger and realizes, of all things, just how much easier taking risks is as long as you’re only putting your own life on the line.

The film constantly returns to images and situations that were already part of Top Gun back in 1986: motorcycles, flight jackets, sunglasses, bars, the beach, military rituals. Confident young pilots are still provoking one another. Top Gun: Maverick doesn’t pretend it needs to hide this past. But the repetition takes on a different perspective. Maverick is no longer automatically the young man at the center of such scenes. Sometimes he stands on the sidelines.

This prevents nostalgia from becoming merely a collection of familiar stimuli. The past is pleasant for Maverick as long as it consists of memories. It becomes more difficult where it has left behind obligations. The film can therefore celebrate its famous predecessor while simultaneously showing that its hero cannot remain the same forever.

As soon as the pilots are in the air, this conflict becomes very real. There’s no time for deep thoughts about age, responsibility, or legacy. Heads turn, breathing becomes audible, bodies are pressed into their seats. Speed here is not an abstract effect. It visibly changes how people move and react.

The mission, too, remains delightfully simple to understand. A difficult route, tight time frames, little room for error. That’s all the film needs. Training is therefore not a mandatory formality that must be worked through before the actual action begins. Every attempt reveals where the limits lie. One turn too far. One maneuver too slow. One decision too late. Theory very quickly becomes a physical challenge.

It is precisely here that Top Gun: Maverick benefits from its straightforwardness. Joseph Kosinski doesn’t overload the story with additional conflicts just to give a future sequel more significance. The mission is clear, the rules are clear, the risks are clear. Maverick himself is more complex.

Because his life so far has trained him to question precisely those rules he is now supposed to teach others. The young Maverick could afford to ignore orders and trust his own instincts. The older Maverick has to think about what happens when other people follow his example. A trait that once made him so appealing suddenly becomes a responsibility.

Even outside the cockpit, it’s clear how unaccustomed Maverick is to not defining himself by his abilities. Penny Benjamin (Jennifer Connelly) is one of the few people for whom his reputation means little. Around her, he is neither a test pilot nor an instructor nor a legend. The film doesn’t need to build a second major plotline out of this. It’s enough to occasionally place Maverick in situations he can’t resolve with a perfect maneuver.

This is what sets Top Gun: Maverick apart from many sequels that mainly bring back their aging heroes so they can do the same things all over again. Of course, Maverick is allowed to do exactly that. The film wants to see him fly. It wants speed, jets, and the familiar silhouette of the motorcycle next to the runway. But all these repetitions come with a small catch: at some point, someone else has to take over.

For decades, Maverick’s instinct was the solution. Now he’s supposed to teach people to develop their own. Flying was easier.