WhileTop Gun 3can’t repeatTop Gun: Maverick’s first and most effective sequel trick, this isn’t necessarily bad news for the movie as a whole. It is tough to see whatTop Gun 3’s storywill be.Top Gun: Maverickmight have taken 36 long years to produce, but the sequel had an inherently compelling premise. Viewers were desperate to see what became of Tom Cruise’s reckless test pilot Maverick afterTop Gun’s triumphant ending and, the longer the wait between the movie and its sequel, the more fans wanted to know the rest of Maverick’s story.
By theending ofTop Gun: Maverick, no one could claim that Maverick’s story was unfinished. Viewers found out what happened to the antihero, how Goose’s untimely death had gone on to shape his life, how Iceman helped him move on before he himself died, and how Maverick redeemed himself by saving Goose’s son on a dramatic mission. Maverick ended up happy with his old flame Penny Benjamin when the credits rolled, leaving viewers to wonder howTop Gun 3’s storywould justify his return. Already, the sequel can’t reuse the first trick thatTop Gun: Maverickrelied on.
Top Gun: Maverick Directly Recreated Top Gun’s Opening Credit Sequence
Top Gun’s Sequel Began With A Nod To The Iconic Original
Top Gun: MaverickrecreatedTop Gun’s opening credit sequencein an audacious move that proved the sequel wasn’t trying to distance itself from its predecessor. From Luke Skywalker throwing away his lightsaber toScream 2022’s Sidney initially turning down a return to Woodsboro, many legacy sequels pointedly refuse to recreate iconic scenes from their predecessors. In contrast,Top Gun: Mavericksignaled that it would be a direct continuation of the 1986 cult classic in the clearest way possible by offering viewers a shot-for-shot replica of the movie’s iconic opening credits, complete with the same theme music.
Recreating the opening credits tacitly told viewers that this was the same story in a different decade.
WhileRidley Scott turned downTop Gun 2since he didn’t want to follow up his late brother Tony’s original movie, director Joseph Kosinski made the daring decision to openly accept that the sequel existed inTop Gu’s large shadow. Recreating the opening credits tacitly told viewers that this was the same story in a different decade, not a subversion or a deconstruction of the original.Top Gun: Maverickproceeded to repeatedly hammer this point home with its cheesy beach football montage and the finale’s hilariously unlikely inclusion of Maverick’s old reliable plane from the ‘80s.
Top Gun 3 Can’t Reuse This Famous Sequence
Revisiting The Same Credits Sequence 3 Times Feels Lazy
While it worked forTop Gun: Maverick,Top Gun 3can’t use the same opening credits sequence for a third time. Directly recreating the scene once is a touching homage, but doing so twice is simply lazy and unoriginal. Not only that, but there almost certainly won’t be a 36-year wait betweenTop Gun: MaverickandTop Gun 3. Thus, viewers are unlikely to be as nostalgic and forgiving. The franchise now needs to prove it has new ideas, not new iterations of the same hits. The sequel needs a new opening for the same reasonTop Gun 3can’t bring back Iceman.
Top Gun: Maverick’s many nods to the original movie worked only because of the staggering length of time that the series spent off cinema screens.
Although a newTop Gunmovie could find some excuse to revive Kilmer’s character with a flashback or a recorded message, this wouldn’t have the same impact as a new character and an original storyline.Top Gun: Maverick’s many nods to the original movie worked only because of the staggering length of time that the series spent off cinema screens. Without decades of hype, viewers would understandably be disappointed by a sequel that rehashes the same opening sequence as both its predecessors. This issue points to the biggest problem withTop Gun 3.
Top Gun: Maverick’s Credits Underline Top Gun 3’s Biggest Problem
Top Gun: Maverick’s Maverick Comeback Was Enough To Sell The Sequel
Top Gun 3will need to substantially expand the world of the seriesor the movie risks feel like a retread of Maverick’s story and a pointless cash-in as a result. WhileGlen Powell’sTop Gun 3roleshould allow the series to center another major blockbuster star without introducing more new characters, the sequel will need to do more than remakeTop Gun’s story with Miles Teller’s Rooster as Maverick and Hangman playing the role of Iceman.Top Gun 3needs to feel fresh and new, a pressure thatTop Gun: Maverickdidn’t face.
Top Gun: Maverickcould effectively retell Maverick’s story because the series had been inactive for so long, because Cruise’s character arc felt unfinished, and because fan nostalgia had been building for decades.Top Gun 3has none of these advantages, so the sequel must do something new. This will start withTop Gun 3’s opening sequence which, unlikeTop Gun: Maverick, can’t reassure viewers that more of the same is on the way.
While promotingTwistersin mid 2024, star Glen Powell saidTop Gun 3’s production had a prospective production start date, according toVariety.
