Tom Cruise-starrer ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ has become a mega-hit. After earning waves of positive buzz pre-release, the movie had the most successful opening weekend of any title in Cruise’s filmography. Since then it has gone on to become one of only two blockbusters to make over $1 billion at the box office since the pandemic struck the world. The other is Jon Watts’ ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home.’
The success does make one wonder why it took 36 years for the sequel to get made. The ‘Mission Imposible‘ star opens up about the same in his new interview.
Tom Cruise Was Waiting For The Right Story To Come Along For ‘Top Gun‘ Sequel
The actor recently explained that the delay was caused by a serious dedication to make the movie as great as possible. This was both in terms of story and never-seen-before cinematography.
Speaking with BBC Radio 1, Cruise explained that Paramount Pictures wanted a ‘Top Gun 2‘ even before the Tony Scott-directed original was released in 1986. But this wasn’t something he was ready to commit to as his career was quickly blossoming. The Golden Globe award winner opted to wait as it meant waiting for the right story to come along. According to the actor, he heard a number of “terrible” pitches over the years.
He said, “Just for years, I would think, ‘How do I do this? What is it?’… Talking about story and structure for years. People come with ideas that are terrible – just didn’t work at all in any way, shape, or form. And I was just saying, ‘This is never gonna work. I’m not interested.'”
Eventually, the action star realized that he had to either commit to ‘Top Gun: Maverick‘ or move on. He opted for the former. Unfortunately, the stress of doing it right kept him up at night. Even though the studio was giving him the green light to basically make anything he wanted, he kept obsessing.
Cruise explained, “There was enough elements in place and I thought if I’m ever going to do it, it’s going to be now. I’d lay there at night, okay. I sit down, I’d write, I’d be like, ‘If I did this…’ And I spent years actually formulating the process by which I would think about making this movie. Because they’re like, ‘Just go do it, man. You’re Tom. Good; we’re in.’ And I was like, ‘No, no, there’s a whole thing.’”
Cruise Himself Developed Ideas For The Squeal While Working On Other Projects
Tom Cruise wanted such a plot for the sequel of the movie which not only told a proper story for the titular character but also utilized modern filmmaking technology. This was to ensure that the film would look like nothing audiences had seen earlier on the big screen. The ‘Magnolia‘ actor explained that those kinds of opportunities didn’t exist in the making of the original. He was quietly developing ideas for what the sequel could be while working on films like Doug Liman’s ‘American Made’ and Christopher McQuarrie’s ‘Mission: Impossible – Fallout‘ (both of which feature spectacular aerial action).
“When I did first one I flew. I had no real warm up, and I knew that I wanted the breadth of the film was more expansive. So, how do I educate the studio, the filmmakers, the actors on what it is that I wanted do accomplish? And you can see in American Made and [Mission: Impossible -] Fallout that I’m developing the technology, I’m thinking about it.”
The making of ‘Top Gun: Maverick‘ probably took longer than Paramount Pictures wanted, but the studio has been elated by the results. To date, according to the numbers, the blockbuster has brought in $1.12 billion at the global box office, making it the biggest cinematic hit that the world has seen in 2022.
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