The hardware
Every aircraft that flies — or sits on the deck — in Top Gun: Maverick, and the part it plays. Tap through to its full profile.
◎ F
F/A-18 Super Hornet
The team's jets — the actors rode in the back seats of real F/A-18F Super Hornets
◎ F-14
F-14 Tomcat
The old Tomcat Maverick and Rooster steal to fly home
◎ SU-57
Su-57 Felon
The enemy 'fifth-generation fighter' — never named, but unmistakably this design
◎ P-51
P-51 Mustang
Tom Cruise's own P-51D — he flies it himself in the film
◎ F-35
F-35 Lightning II
On the carrier deck in the opening
What you might not know
- 01
Directed by Joseph Kosinski, it was finished in 2019 but held back two years by the pandemic. When it finally opened in May 2022 it took about $1.49 billion — Tom Cruise's biggest film.
- 02
No green screen for the flying: the actors rode in the back seats of Navy F/A-18F Super Hornets flown by Navy pilots, with six cameras inside each cockpit — and had to act, and run the cameras, under g.
- 03
Before that, Cruise put the cast through his own flight course — from a Cessna to Extra 300 aerobatics to the L-39 jet trainer — so they could take the g-forces without passing out.
- 04
The P-51D Mustang is Tom Cruise's own aircraft, and that is him flying it.
- 05
Darkstar, the hypersonic jet in the opening, is fictional — but its full-size mock-up was designed with help from Lockheed Martin's Skunk Works, the people behind the SR-71.
- 06
No flyable F-14s are left outside Iran, so the Tomcat scenes used a static jet plus computer effects. Val Kilmer came back as Iceman. The film won the Oscar for Best Sound and was nominated for Best Picture.
Around the film
The premiere, the people and the bikes — free photographs, because the film itself belongs to the studio.
