When breaking records for Tom Cruise with the highest domestic opening ever for the actor. Featuring an all-star cast that helped to further the story of Maverick and Iceman, the film appealed to a new generation of audiences. The franchise features Pete "Maverick" Mitchell (Cruise) as he navigated an elite fighter pilot school, in various roles, set up by the U.S. Navy.
As Maverick is introduced in Top Gun 2, he becomes a teacher for the same school he was once a student of. Leading a new class of fighter pilots, Maverick takes on the ultimate task of butting heads with the son of his late friend Goose, played by Miles Teller. Through many sequences of the film, Maverick and team are seen piloting planes with phenomenal stunt moves, which has led many to claim that Maverick is better than the original Top Gun. Despite the high flying maneuvers, however, the type of planes used to further the plot doesn't always match up with what the real Navy would use.
The inspiring visuals in Joseph Kosinski's Top Gun 2 left viewers with an overall appreciation for the hard work the actors had to go through in order to make the stunts seem realistic. Since Cruise was a producer on the film, he insisted that the bulk of the cast had to attend months of flight training before production began (via jet fighter planes were used in Maverick instead.
As with many stunts in films, the actors of Top Gun: Maverick did not pilot the planes featured in the movie, especially the F-35 typically used by the Navy. This was due to the fact that production on the film would have probably been difficult since Tom Cruise also didn't fly the planes himself. With camera work and proper safety regulations surrounding the film's production, there wouldn't have been a way for Cruise to fly the F-35 jet, even if he knew how. Since two-seater planes had to be used to satisfy production requirements and logistics, Top Gun: Maverick featured several other planes during impressive stunts to further the storyline.
It isn't explained in Top Gun: Maverick why Maverick wasn't flying a F-35 jet, even though the jet is mentioned several times. He is instead seen flying a fictional hypersonic jet nicknamed "Darkstar," pushing it to Mach 10 in a marvelous sequence that stunned audiences who saw it on opening weekend. While it would have been cool to see Maverick piloting the F-35, realistic expectations had to be set for the actors, meaning that stunt personnel were used.
