Top Gun: Maverick (2022)

This is a pretty fun sequel to the 1986 original with Tom Cruise returning as trainer of a new, younger crew of naval aviators called upon to execute a dangerous mission. The enormous cast features Miles Teller, Jennifer Connelly, Jon Hamm, Jay Ellis, Manny Jacinto, and many more.

Joseph Kosinski keeps it moving, despite the length of 2:10 and thanks to engaging aerial acrobatics, from a script by Ehren Kruger, Eric Warren Singer, and Christopher McQuarrie, with credit given to Jim Cash and Jack Epps Jr., who wrote the first Top Gun.

Lorne Balfe is credited as one of the composers on the Apple Music soundtrack, but in the movie he is not credited as such. Those honors go to Harold Faltermeyer, Lady Gaga, and Hans Zimmer. There are twelve songs, including Kenny Loggins' Danger Zone from the first movie and Hold My Hand, performed by Gaga but written in 1950.

Cruise was last blogged for American Made, Teller for Whiplash, Connelly for American Pastoral, Hamm for Bad Times at the El Royale, Singer for American Hustle, McQuarrie for Edge of Tomorrow, and Zimmer for Dune.

Kosinski is new to me, with three previous features under his belt, and Kruger wrote the live action Dumbo, though I failed to post that fact in the blog. Ellis played Lawrence in 36 episodes of Insecure and Jacinto was Jason in fifty of The Good Place. Balfe has hundreds of credits and some of them are score producer, as he does here. Faltermeyer scored the first Top Gun, two Beverly Hills Cop movies, two Fletch movies, and many more. This is Gaga's first feature composer credit. 

Rotten Tomatoes' critics and audiences are flying high, averaging 96 and 99%, respectively.

The aerial stunts would probably be better on a big screen in a darkened theatre, but, since we don't do that anymore, we watched it with our subscription to Paramount+ on January 18. It's also available to rent on the usual platforms.