Top Gun: Maverick Release Delayed Until December

Top Gun: Maverick has been delayed until December.

The upcoming sequel to the 1986 classic movie Top Gun was originally set to be released on June 26, but amid the ongoing COVDID-19 pandemic, it has now become the latest film to have its release date pushed back by several months. (The sequel was slated to open here on June 25.)

Tom Cruise — who starred in the first movie as Pete "Maverick" Mitchell, and reprises his role in the sequel - confirmed the news on Twitter on Thursday (Apr 2) as he told fans they would have to wait "a little longer" to see the finished project, despite already waiting 34 years for a sequel.

He wrote: "I know many of you have waited 34 years. Unfortunately, it will be a little longer. Top Gun: Maverick will fly this December. Stay safe, everyone. (sic)"

Cruise, an experienced pilot himself, insisted his co-stars all had flight training so they could do the jet sequences themselves.

Producer Jerry Bruckheimer said: "What's different about this movie is that [in Top Gun] we put the actors in the F-14s and we couldn't use one frame of it, except some stuff on Tom, because they all threw up.

"It's hysterical to see their eyes roll back in their heads. So everything was done on a gimbal. But in this movie, Tom wanted to make sure the actors could actually be in the F-18s."

Cruise added: "I said to the studio, 'You don't know how hard this movie's going to be. No-one's ever done this before.' There's never been an aerial sequence shot this way. I don't know if there ever will be again, to be honest."

The actor - who is renowned for doing his own stunt work - agreed to sign up for the sequel on the condition he could tackle the tricky scenes himself, rather than rely on CGI and green screen technology.

Explaining how the movie came about, he said: "We just started talking and I realised that there were things that we could accomplish cinematically. I started getting excited about this big challenge of, 'How do we do it?' So I said to Jerry, 'I'll do it if ...' meaning, I'm not going to do the CGI stuff." — BANG