Tom Cruise Announces 'Top Gun 2' Title, Confirms The Bold Move To Have Jets

Last week, we were surprised to learn that Top Gun 2 was no longer just a flight of fancy that Tom Cruise would occasionally comment on. The actor has been making the publicity rounds for The Mummy (opening next week), and with the big news regarding the Top Gun sequel surfacing last week, he's being inundated with questions about what fans can expect from the long-awaited follow-up to the original 1986 film. Thankfully, he provided some helpful details, including the sequel's title.

Find out the Top Gun 2 title after the jump, along with what fans can expect from the new movie below.

The information comes from Tom Cruise's interview with Access Hollywood:

First of all, Tom Cruise says that the real title for Top Gun 2 is Top Gun: Maverick, named after the actor's call sign in the sky from the original movie. It's kind of a clumsy title, which would be better off just being called Maverick, but since there's a classic TV show and a film adaptation of it with the same title, it's probably easier for brand recognition to keep Top Gun along with it.

Outside of the title, Tom Cruise couldn't really divulge any specific details, not even the names of any other cast members returning for the sequel (though we know Val Kilmer is surely interested). But he did give a general idea of how they're approaching the movie:

"We're gonna have the same tone that we had from the first one. Stylistically it's gonna be the same. We're gonna have the same score from Harold Faltermeyer, I can tell you that. Aviators are back. The need for speed, we're gonna have big, fast machines. It's going to be a competition film like the first one, and it's going to be in the same vein and the same tone as the first one, but a progression for Maverick."

The fact that the sequel is going to have the same tone as the first movie is interesting, because Top Gun is the kind of movie that movie studios don't really make anymore. It was just as much of a romance as it was an action movie. The relationship between the characters played by Tom Cruise and Kelly McGillis was such an integral part of the movie that you can't hear Berlin's song "Take My Breath Away" without picturing the two stars making out. Will there be another romance in the sequel? It remains to be seen.

But Tom Cruise completely blew our minds when he offered up this detail about Top Gun 2. He said:

"There's going to be aircraft carriers. There's gonna be jets."

When asked whether or not there would be drones in this movie, Cruise merely reiterated that there would be jets. Does that mean the concept of bringing drones into the fold as the next evolution in military flying technology is out the window? If it's a competition film still, I'd be willing to wager that there's some kind of competition between the old guard of fighter pilots and the new guard of young drone pilots who have never really seen any action outside of their computer screens.

Frankly, I'm surprised that this movie actually seems to be getting off the ground. It's not a done deal yet, but with TRON Legacy director Joseph Kosinski already the frontrunner to get behind the camera for it, this is the closest the movie has ever felt to becoming a reality. Stay tuned to see how this one develops.