TOP GUN: MAVERICK:

America’s Need For Speed…With A Confidence Problem

What does Top Gun:Maverick tell us about ourselves, as people and as a country, and what are the lessons we can take from it?

Like many other people I saw Top Gun: Maverick this opening weekend after a two year wait, the movie's release having been delayed due to Covid.  What usually happens with a movie whose theatrical release date is pushed back again and again, is waning interest and rising ridicule as it is assumed the movie must be terrible.  Top Gun: Maverick defied that convention, its delayed release only serving to build the anticipation and the movie delivered.  In fact, the movie exceeds expectations. 

The movie delivered in every way that both Hollywood and audiences hopes for: It’s a good story,  it got people back into movie theaters after a long trending decline in theater attendance, and it’s a big hit!  Perhaps, most significantly it proved the enduring power of good movies with compelling characters and an entertaining story at its heart. 

And of course it proved the enduring appeal of Tom Cruise who just might be the last great movie star.  Go see the movie right away.  In the theater with a bucket of popcorn — you will be glad you did.  However, this is not a review of Top Gun: Maverick. What I want to talk about is what Top Gun: Maverick and its moment in time says about our culture and our country in the 36 years since the original was released.  My entire life I've taken inspiration from stories. I find deeper meaning in the movies, books, theater, and television that I've loved.  So, what is the real story of Top Gun:Maverick, what does it tell us about ourselves, as people and as a country, and what are the lessons we can take from it?

SPOILER ALERT!!!  SPOILERS AHEAD

The new movie picks up with Pete “Maverick” Mitchell still played by the apparently ageless Tom Cruise.  Now a Captain instead of a Lieutenant, though his Naval career has not been particularly distinguished (except as a pilot).  For Maverick, the only seat his butt is shining is in the cockpit of a jet airplane.

His latest posting finds him flying an experimental supersonic jet out in the middle of the desert and still managing to tick off his superior commanders (the latest portrayed in this opening scene by a surly, Ed Harris, who is always terrific)  Maverick remains as agile on the ground as he is in a jet as he yet again dodges what seems like certain fate and the end of his flying career when word comes down from from his old friend Iceman…ahem, make that Admiral Iceman that Maverick has a new posting: As a Top Gun Instructor.

One thing not in doubt, despite the fact that he's 30+ years older, and his career in the Navy has plateaued, is that Maverick does not have a confidence problem.

With the trademark Tom Cruise grin Maverick rides off into the sunset on a Kawasaki motorcycle back to Fighter Town, San Diego, returning to the place where we last left him.  One thing not in doubt, despite the fact that he's 30+ years older, and his career in the Navy has plateaued, is that Maverick does not have a confidence problem.

Which is good because his assignment involves training former Top Gun winners for a dangerous bombing run behind enemy lines in nameless ‘hostile country” (so as not to offend any potential global film audiences and thus undercut the profitability of the movie; certainly that’s one difference from the original.  Bye bye Taiwan bomber jacket patch).  The rub comes when Mavericks discovers that one of the Top Gun pilots he is to train is “Rooster,” the son of “Goose,” played by Anthony Edwards in the original  Maverick’s dead best friend and wingman. Rooster is played by Miles Teller in the sequel.

Not surprisingly, “Rooster” and “Maverick” have a strained (estranged) relationship as surrogate “father” and “son.”  Maverick is the only fighter fighter whose real-world combat experience includes the types of maneuvers and encounters that this dangerous mission calls, and it will be up to him to pick the team, which might mean picking “Rooster” for an extremely dangerous mission where he could be killed, or not picking him, thus further setting back Rooster’s career, and deepening the rift between them, maybe permanently.

We learn also that Rooster’s career was waylaid for a number of years by Maverick who had denied him a posting adding to the reasons why Rooster doesn’t like Maverick.  The question though is why Maverick did that?  Not surprisingly we learn this has some connection to Maverick’s unresolved feelings over Goose's death. He doesn't want to see the same thing happened to his son.  Plus, there’s an additional complication in the form of a deathbed promise Maverick made to Goose’s widow, played by Meg Ryan in the first movie, (deceased by the time this sequel picks up its storyline), a burden which Maverick heroically bares alone so that Rooster won’t blame his mom too.  But melodrama aside, what is at issue insofar as the mission is concerned is what can only be described as “Rooster’s confidence problem.”

It appears as though the movie is criticizing the qualities that make Mav so good.  Is that what’s happening?  Is Top Gun: Maverick telling us that confidence is a bad quality?

Interestingly, Hangman exhibits all the arrogant confidence and cockiness that Tom Cruise did in the original, (you can practically see Hangman wondering “who the best is?”  just like Maverick did.)  However, it seems as though in this movie that quality in a pilot is looked down upon.  Most of his teammates seem to think Hangman’s an asshole.  Whereas Tom Skerrit who was the head of Top Gun in the first movie, “liked that in his pilots,” the head of the school this time around, played by my pal, Jon Hamm, very clearly does not.  If it were up to him Maverick would already be grounded. 

It appears as though the movie is criticizing the qualities that make Mav so good.  Is that what’s happening?  Is Top Gun: Maverick telling us that confidence is a bad quality?

Compare that to the original movie.  Back then, Maverick, like Hangman now, radiated confidence. So much so that he and Goose had a running bet over whether they could take women to bed in a single night.  In other words, his confidence was not merely in a plane, it was in every aspect of his life.  Maverick, nor any of the pilots in the original movie for that matter, lacked confidence. They practically oozed it.

Which is worth noting because this question of confidence that is at the heart of Top Gun: Maverick is to mind really a question about America.  It’s a reflection of where we are as a country right now:

Like Rooster, We have a confidence problem.

Consider Rooster: A millennial, unsure of himself in relation to his own past, his present abilities, or his future prospects.  Which is why he lacks the confidence to take the shot. Unlike the confidence problem that Maverick (briefly) suffered from which was directly linked to his flying and the death of his best friend, Rooster’s problem is not attributed to a single-factor, but is rather endemic to who he is.  It’s part of his character.  With Rooster we realize this lack of confidence problem is not limited to flying. We see it when Rooster plays pool against Hangman, and loses his cool after Hangman calls him out.  Not once but twice in the movie.  And not in the very alpha way Cruise did in the original who even in his outburst was still super sure of himself (“I’ll fire when I’m goddamn good and ready!” he tells Merlin.)  Rooster on the other hand is very beta.  It seems he lacks not only the confidence of pilots like Mav or Ice from the older generation had, but even the mission-required skill of  being being able to take the shot and hit the target at the precise right moment in time.

I’m reminded of a scene in the original movie where Maverick’s competition, “Slider” (Rick Rossovitch), leans in and tell Maverick that a move Mav made in a dogfight is the "gutsiest move he ever saw,” a sentiment we learn is shared by Mav’s instructor “Charlie” so much so she breaks her own rules and falls for one of her students.  In other words, what was prized among fighter pilots in the 80s at the height of the Cold War when we knew our enemy and the real stakes were clear to us all was confidence, bordering on arrogance, backed up by ice-cold skills, and the ability to trust one's gut.  These were the qualities in a man — in a hero — that saved the day.

Conversely, the qualities in a pilot praised today is a patient, considered, not arrogant, by the book flying — even if it doesn’t accomplish the mission.  Rather than cut him or the other pilots who can’t make the grade, (except for Hangman) Commander Jon Hamm scraps Mav’s mission plan in favor of one that won’t get the job done, or even lead to the pilot’s survival, for one that is easier and doable — even if it fails to achieve the mission’s main objective.  Better it seem to lower standards to meet the diminished confidence levels of pilots like “Rooster” who are very thoughtful pilots, but who ultimately fail when and where it counts the most.  This is what I think of as the Everyone Gets A Trophy-mentality which is now the norm in little league sports across America — we don’t keep score and we don’t declare winners.  Because it makes others feel bad.  The problem is where that mentality leads.  To lower confidence, less developed skills that have been tested in the real world, and ultimately to failure;  failure to accomplish the mission or to accomplish our goals.  But hey, as long as the pilots feel good about themselves.  Apparently, this is okay in Jon Hamm’s Navy.  If they crash and burn that’s not their fault after all, it’s the world’s.  (He must be following the General Mark Millie method of combat preparedness.)

While the goal in this sequel is supposedly victory, the qualities in fighter pilots prized by the Navy are ones that lead to confidence problems.  Rooster is quite literally unable to take the shot in the moment; he’s impotent.  “He’s all brain and not enough cock and balls,” to quote the grandfather in Todd Phillip’s “Road Trip.”  Coupled with the faceless enemy in this movie, I took this to mean that the biggest threat we face these days, comes from within; it’s our own shortcomings.  As a country, as people, we have become like “Rooster.”  Despite all of our technological advancements and technical abilities piloting ourselves through a world where things move at the speed of an F-18, the fact of the matter is we have a confidence problem.

Which brings me to what I love about Top Gun:Maverick, and why I cheered wildly in the final climactic scenes.  Because Tom Cruise’s “Maverick” is a direct repudiation of this mentality.

Lack of confidence ain’t Maverick.  He does not think like this.  He believes in trusting yourself.  He believes in facing what is hard and doing what is needed to get the job done.  The movie through the actions of Tom Cruise’s Maverick, a relic of the Cold War, reminds of who we are as A People, the mindset we used to have, one far different from the weak (woke?) mentality we’ve exhibited lately as a country.

Thirty-six years ago as a country we were “Maverick.” A cocky bunch of flyboys with a winning grin unafraid to break the rules to win even if that meant coming out of a 4G negative dive with some bad ass MiGs so we could go to guns on them.

As Maverick’s heroism showed us in the original and does again in this kick ass sequel, what makes us who we are is we don’t lower our standards to make the mission easier.  We don’t cut and run from the fight.  We’re not afraid to face the danger to win the day.

When Maverick displays a lack of confidence in the first movie following Goose’s death, his instructor Tom Skerrit doesn’t pat his back and give him a time out.  He "keeps sending him up.”  To face his fears.  And overcome them.  Which is what Maverick does for the fighter pilots under his command this time.  He lets them be professional, and do the thing that they are there to do, they are trained to do — take the shot and win the fight.  And of course he leads by example.  Something sorely lacking in so many of our so-called “leaders” and cultural icons today.

This is why Top Gun: Maverick not only captures the best of the original movie but the character grow.  Back then the flying on screen was all done by real pilots with actors on stages in front of rear projection screens playing pretend.  Now Cruise can do this stuff for real.  And make no mistake, this movie’s flying scenes are nothing short of breathtaking, (and more than make up for whatever confidence problem the movie itself may have in terms of its nebulous antagonistic enemy threat). Like the actor playing him, Tom Cruise is also older and with the life experience that only time can bring.  Along the way his confidence in his own skills has clearly grown.  This time around there is a new aspect to how Maverick flies: responsibility.  He’s on the edge but not reckless.  He clearly is more thoughtful and concerned — for Rooster and for all the pilots, all of whom he wants to see safely return home.  Because they are the future.

This new dynamic to Maverick also shows up in his relationship with an ex-girlfriend named "Penny" played by Jennifer Connolly (which when you figure out the connection to the original movie is actually quite a kick).  He can still charm with the best of them but after Penny’s daughter sees Maverick climbing out of her mom’s bedroom window she tells him is not to break her mom’s heart this time.   That’s the “hard deck for this hop” and this time around Maverick isn’t going to be the one to break it.   It’s romance with the responsibility.

For both the older generation of movie fans who grew up on the original, and the next generation of movie-goers who come to the story through Top Gun: Maverick is a movie made to remind us of our potential.  Like all good heroic stories.  They  show us that we can still be great — maybe even better than we were — if we can just trust our gut, take the shot, and not miss when it counts most.  To do that will take confidence.  Top Gun: Maverick is a reminder that we still have the skills with lots to be confident about.

Supreme self-confidence has always been at the heart of our culture and how we see ourselves as Americans.  We live with the belief that what we stand for is right, that our values are true, and we will do whatever it takes, overcome whatever obstacle, face down whatever threat, external or internal, in order to win the day.  If we want to succeed as individuals, and as a country, we need to remember to celebrate the qualities in our heroes — and in ourselves — that enable us to reach those wild blue yonder heights.  That’s our true need for speed.