If you feel the need — the need for nostalgic callbacks galore — worry not. “Top Gun: Maverick” has you covered.
Tom Cruise is back in the cockpit as U.S. Navy airman Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, 36 years after he flew to superstardom in the 1986 hit “Top Gun.” He’s now an experimental test pilot hiding from the ghosts of his past while continuing to push limits, fly fighter jets and defy authority.
But Maverick’s not alone blasting his way back from the past. Along with a crop of new flying aces, he’s brought loads of fan service and flashbacks to the original film with him.
Directed by Joseph Kosinski and written by Ehren Kruger, Eric Warren Singer and Christopher McQuarrie, “Maverick” is chock full of that lovin’ feeling for its predecessor. Though the sequel stands alone, and in certain respects — action scenes, absence of creepy behavior toward women in bars — is clearly superior to the original, “Maverick” often feels like an homage to the original. Here are some callbacks you might have missed.
—The movie’s opening sequence may seem familiar. Watching the first minutes of “Top Gun: Maverick,” you would be excused for thinking you wandered into a time warp. There are the title cards explaining the origin of the Navy’s Fighter Weapons School, aka Top Gun. There’s the crew readying the planes for takeoff. There’s composer Harold Faltermeyer’s synths lulling us into nostalgia zone. And that font.
Kosinski says he wanted to let people know that this is a “Top Gun” movie and — hell yes! — he loves the original just as much as you do. (Maybe more, given all the footage from the 1986 version he incorporates into his sequel.)
—We’re still in the “Danger Zone.” To that end, the Kenny Loggins hit is back in pretty much the same position in the sequel as it was in the original (in that copycat opening sequence), though not repeated as often as it was in the 1986 film.
—Maverick still zooms around San Diego on a Kawasaki motorcycle. And because he’s Maverick, he doesn’t wear a helmet. Neither does his old lady. Really, this is a more a Tom Cruise thing: He loves riding motorcycles in movies and loathes helmets, probably because if he wore one, we wouldn’t be able to properly appreciate his Ray-Ban Aviator sunglasses and flashy smile. Who cares if it’s the law? He’s Maverick/Tom Cruise! As he told Iceman (Val Kilmer) in the original, “I ... am ... dangerous.”
—And he’s still irritating admirals. In the first movie, we learned that he’d misbehaved with an admiral’s daughter (more on that later). In the second one, he raises the hackles of another, this time played by Ed Harris, by disobeying orders. We don’t know about you, but when it comes to elder movie authority figures we would not want to annoy, Ed Harris is right at the top of the list.
—Jennifer Connelly’s Penny Benjamin was in the original. Sort of. Connelly did not appear in “Top Gun.” But her character in the sequel, a single mom who runs a bar, takes Maverick sailing and gives him all the feels, was only referenced in the 1986 film. The first mention comes early in the original when Maverick is chewed out for his latest hijinks and we‘re told he has “a history of high-speed passes over five air control towers and one admiral’s daughter!” (Wink-wink, nudge-nudge.)
Maverick cannot quite remember her name, so wingman Goose (Anthony Edwards) whispers it to him. Later, Goose’s wife (Meg Ryan) reveals that Goose “told me all about the time you went ballistic with Penny Benjamin.”
Another constant in the two movies: Maverick in no way deserves this woman.
—This time, the romance feels different. In what might be called an anti-callback, Maverick’s relationship with Penny is seemingly designed to draw a contrast with his relationships with women in the original. Back then, we witnessed the full-on ‘80s sexy-time treatment, replete with music video lights and camera angles, as two hot young people went at it. Here, the bedroom scene is postcoital, with Mav and Penny talking about life. You’ll have to be the judge of whether this says more about Maverick’s evolution or the culture’s.
—The Top Gun Bar is back! The original filming location of the pilots’ dive-bar hangout, Kansas City BBQ, is still in business in downtown San Diego, but it receives a canonical update in the new film with much roomier square footage and Penny behind the bar. This one is called the Hard Deck.
—And you know Maverick still has issues with hard decks. One of Mav’s first run-ins with authority in the original comes from him violating the “hard deck” (the minimum altitude allowed) in a training exercise. Though he has presumably matured in other ways over 36 or so years, he has not addressed these issues in the second. And it’s pretty entertaining that he hasn’t, actually.
—The buzz is back. One of the supposedly endearing examples of Maverick’s incorrigible Tom-foolery was his delight in buzzing control towers. That’s also back in the sequel, along with an aerial training accident to raise the stakes of Maverick’s risky business.
—Don’t leave your wingman. The number one rule in the original movie is also the number one rule in the sequel — a lesson that comes back around again decades later with a big emotional payoff.
—The Iceman cometh again. Kilmer is back as Maverick’s onetime-rival-turned-wingman, in a touching appearance that will leave many misty-eyed. Having worked up the ranks to admiral, Tom “Iceman” Kazansky is now Mav’s only friend in high places in the Navy — and, ironically, the only person to whose advice he might listen. He’s also the only member of the original supporting cast to appear in the sequel. Well, him and an F-14.
By the way, the famed moment of Ice and Mav sealing their friendship also has a clear callback in the sequel, but to get specific about it would be giving away too much.
—Goose ain’t gone. Maverick’s BFF, who died while flying with Mav in the first one, casts a long shadow over the sequel. Whether in copious photos from the original or in the principal conflict between Maverick and Rooster, Goose’s son (played by Miles Teller), the ghost of Goose haunts the house. One could argue his spirit all but possesses Rooster, who practically cosplays his dad, complete with light brown highlights, Hawaiian shirt, aviator shades and that signature ‘stache.
—“Talk to me, Goose.” The first line of the original film, which takes on greater meaning late in that story, returns several times in the sequel. We first hear it during the exciting test-flight sequence that is the new film’s inciting action, then it shows up in strategic places later — perhaps most effectively in slightly altered form.
—Great balls of fire, Goose is all over this thing. Remember that moment in “Top Gun” when Goose did his best Jerry Lee Lewis at the stand-up piano in a restaurant, singing “Great Balls of Fire” with Maverick as the future Rooster sat atop the instrument? How could you forget — your ears are probably still bleeding. Well, that moment is back, bigger than ever, in the sequel. And while its group shout-along can barely be called singing, it does provide a nice acting moment for Mr. Cruise.
—Bad bar behavior gets its comeuppance in class. In the original, a brash young pilot gets a little too personal (well, stalkerish and disrespectful) with someone in a bar, only to discover the next morning in front of the class, to their embarrassment, that that person is their Top Gun instructor? This time around, some brash young pilots also find themselves blushing over their previous night’s behavior in class, although the connotations are not quite as problematic.
—When it comes to beach sports, they still don’t give a shirt. Shirtless beach pseudo-football is the new shirtless beach volleyball! And One Republic’s perfect-for-a-lite-beer-commercial tune “I Ain’t Worried” really, really wants to be the new Kenny Loggins’ “Playing with the Boys” — it even has its own L.A. billboards.
—Lady Gaga will take your breath away. With a sweeping, epic power ballad fueled by enough feminine ferocity to offset “Top Gun: Maverick’s” machismo-heavy energy, Gaga delivers a thundering new earworm with her end-credits theme song. Her lyrics are more about emotional vulnerability and human connection (“So cry tonight / But don’t you let go of my hand”) than the sensual longing of Berlin’s chart-topping Oscar winner “Take My Breath Away,” written by Italian synth legend Giorgio Moroder. But in a bomber jacket and aviators, Gaga makes her own nods to the past, paying homage to Berlin’s Terri Nunn walking through a fighter jet boneyard with her own music video that’s already racked up over 17 million views ... before anyone has even seen the movie.
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