Top Gun: Maverick, again starring Tom Cruise as Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, is set to hit theaters May 27 in a brand new movie.
In the 1986 film Top Gun, the plot focused on Mitchell’s efforts to become the best pilot in his class. The new movie stars an older Cruise, and Maverick is shifting gears to focus instead on Mitchell training a new, hottest young pilot for a dangerous mission involving the destruction of the enemy’s uranium stockpile.
The sequel will guest star Lieutenant Tom “Iceman” Kazansky himself, Val Kilmer, who has been battling throat cancer for the past few years. However, director Joseph Kosinski didn’t want the film to look back too long and said it was important to introduce some new characters from the maverick. So had to leave some characters. Kosinski confirmed to Insider that actresses Kelly McGinnis and Meg Ryan were not asked to star in the sequel.
Because of this, Mitchell’s first love, Charlotte “Charlie” Blackwood, won’t be on the Mavericks. Charlie, an astrophysicist and civilian instructor, initially disputed Mitchell’s progress, but eventually developed a romantic interest in the confident and dangerous pilot. Spoiler alert: the two end up together. But their romance apparently didn’t last 36 years into the production of the sequel, as Mitchell took a new love interest in Maverick.
Kelly McGinnis, who plays Charlie, commented on her absence from the film in 2019. “I’m getting old, I’m getting fat again, and I look good for my age. That’s not what the whole scene is about,” she said bluntly. McGinnis, 64, has barely taken the past two decades. any action, but to focus on raising children, staying awake and improving health after being diagnosed with Alpha-1-Antitrypsin disease. “For me, I prefer to have the Absolute feeling, not valuing all these other things,” she said.
Avatar of actress Kelly McGillis
Actress Kelly McGillis on stage at the Langham Hotel on January 11, 2014 in Pasadena, California. (Credit: Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images)
Mitchell’s new love is a single mother and daughter of an admiral who now owns the bar where the Top Gun pilots relax, played by 51-year-old Jennifer Connelly. Cruise and Connery even recreated the iconic motorcycle that Cruise and McGinnis originally performed in the racetrack scene in the 1986 film.
Also, Meg Ryan, who plays Carol Bradshaw, wife of Mitchell’s best friend Nick “Goose” Bradshaw, won’t be returning for the sequel. Ryan, who has not publicly commented on Maverick, appears to have retired from show business entirely, with her last film credits dating back to 2015.
