I’m going to lose a lot of readers on this post, but I have to let you know up front that I’m a fan of Top Gun. I can’t support everything it stands for, but I enjoyed the film and with as much family history as I have in naval aviation, it struck many personal notes for me. Last weekend I watched Val Kilmer’s documentary finally and when he got to the Top Gun bit, I started itching for a rewatch. In Val, Kilmer said that he’s always liked Tom Cruise and considered him a friend. We also know he has a cameo in the sequel Top Gun: Maverick and if Cruise had any real beef with him, Kilmer wouldn’t be allowed anywhere near his film. So, I started getting excited for the sequel. Especially because my folks are in Coronado and I know all the huge plans that area has discussed for the premiere, like showing it on the deck of the USS Midway. Alas, I’ll have to pack those feelings up – again – because Maverick’s opening is being pushed back once more. Instead of revving up the jet engines over Thanksgiving, Maverick’s been delayed to Memorial Day 2022 due to Covid concerns. That’ll make it almost three years after the first trailer was released.
After a successful launch of clips and footage at CinemaCon, Paramount is pushing its big Tom Cruise tentpoles, Top Gun: Maverick to May 27, Memorial Day weekend 2022, and Mission: Impossible 7 to Sept. 30, 2022.
Again, these are big potential billion dollar grossing franchises co-produced with Skydance which require the world to be in an ideal order, not crimped by a pandemic. Mission: Impossible alone through six movies has grossed over $3.57 billion. The most recent movie in 2018, Mission: Impossible – Fallout hit a franchise high of $791.7M at the worldwide B.O.
Top Gun: Maverick vacates the pre-Thanksgiving weekend of Nov. 19, and takes over Mission: Impossible 7‘s previous spot of Memorial Day weekend next year, putting the sequel to the 1986 hit back in the summer, where the original first launched and grossed $357M-plus global.
At this rate, Maverick’s release will coincide with the release of Steve Perry’s 2nd solo album. But while Thanksgiving is a good film going weekend, Memorial Day plays into the whole patriotic, ‘Merica! vibe the film attracts so it’ll work in ‘ol Maverick’s favor. As for the decision to push it, I get it. The box office is a bit of a crapshoot these days. Some films are opening big, but the second weekend numbers show steep declines. Die-hards are masking up and making the trek to a theater on the opening but everyone else is still sitting it out. Unfortunately, we can no longer count on being back to normal by Thanksgiving. We know these days Cruise films are theater films, that’s what he was telling us when he did the weird promotion for seeing Tenet in the theater. In this particular case, I don’t blame him, I have no doubt Maverick is a big screen film. Mission Impossible 7 probably is as well, but I checked out on those a long time ago. Which is probably a good thing because that film has so many issues.
Anyway, it’s too bad Maverick’s getting delayed again. But I’ve waited for the movie this long, a few more months isn’t going to hurt. I’m sad were looking at another pandemic holiday season though. In the meantime, I can always watch the original (and quote all the lines).
Photo credit Instagram/Paramount
At this point they just need to figure out how to show movies at amphitheaters. There’s no way I’m going in a movie until my kids are vaxxed (at minimum)… and honestly, since I have a parent with end stage COPD, I probably won’t after that, either. Can’t risk a breakthrough case.
Used to be this thing called the drive-in. Now they’re all, or almost all, developed into some other use. Drive-ins would be perfect during a pandemic, for those with cars, at least.
We have a drive in theater in the next town over. It’s great because they have first run movies.
You are not alone with this feeling Hecate! I was also really hoping life would be calm enough to go see Maverick too because I also love Top Gun. We went to a little bistro-tabled theatre a few years ago and watched the original. We said the lines, sang along with Danger Zone and giggled at the tongue-wrestling in the love scene. Great night!
It might be highly unpopular but I loved the film back then.
It was great fun when originally released…however, I have no more interest in TC as a leading man, especially in high intensity action films. He’s just getting long in the tooth ( at 55, so am I). Add in his continuing support for Co$, and it’s a pass for me.
My friends and I love the original and always have, one married another fan and walked up the aisle to Danger Zone (it wasn’t a theme wedding or anything, just a nod to something that Roger loves).
I can also separate young Tom from Scientology Tom which I have a major issue with today. Not sure how I feel about the reboot as a result.
I thought I was the unpopular one for not liking it?? I unfortunately like other Tom Cruise movies so I can’t pretend to be above it all either.
Tom, call your youngest daughter.
That’s all I got.
Umm no, he can stay the hell away from her. He’s in an abusive cult and they want to drag her in too if they can.
He obviously doesn’t give a sh*t about her or he would have made other choices
I don’t dislike people who like Top Gun, or any movie I despise. That would be weird. But the only reason I would watch this movie is to see Val Kilmer. Top Gun, along with Pretty Woman, are still 2 movies that just make me want to hurl.
Pretty Woman..why’s that?
Cinderella is a hooker? That does it for me. I watched it at the time, but overall, it’s a skeevy story.
Two best things about Pretty Woman are that polka dot dress she wore to the polo match, classic and I’d wear it even today and the actress who played Kit, the BFF, because she was funny and she grew up in NJ, where our families were next door neighbors.
Another one who loved the original Top Gun (OMG, to this day my friends and I will drool over that volleyball scene); it was just fun to watch and close enough in age to the characters to daydream about a group of fighter pilots serenading us in a bar. *sigh*
That being said, while no doubt Tom Cruise and all are doing their best to capture the spirit of the original, have no interest in seeing the sequel. Do agree it’s definitely a movie to see in a theater.
If there’s not a volleyball scene in this one, I’m storming out of the theater! 😆
Tom Cruise is a Forever Nope (I propose it as the exact opposite of a Forever Dong) and I will never willingly give him a penny again. Even before the extent of his CO$ evil and abuse was known, before he abandoned Suri, he had the nerve to denigrate Brooke Shields for talking about her PPD and the medication that helped her recover, and he’s been dead to me since. He’s a smirking, disingenuous, egotistical control freak, and he thinks he knows more about a woman’s body/health than she herself does.
That said, I saw the original Top Gun in the theater with my friend Debbie and her dad when we were 10 and was MORTIFIED by the sex scenes. Since then have seen it approximately 4,682 times, can quote every line, and ALWAYS preferred Iceman to Maverick. Everyone anticipating this, enjoy! I’ll sit it out. 😉
Young TC in Top Gun was HOTT.Now he is crazy as a loon. Poor Val Kilmer. I will watch when it is streamed but wont go to see it. BTW, Val was a great documentary.