Tom Cruise is flying back into action for a new Top Gun sequel after the massive box office success of the previous entry.
ing back into action for a new Top Gun sequel after the massive box office success of the previous entry.
The 61-year-old superstar will be back as Captain Pete 'Maverick' Mitchell, and Paramount, which will be producing again, is hoping to reunite him with his recent costars Miles Teller and Glen Powell.
The news that Cruise is back in business with Paramount — where he has released many of his recent films — comes just days after he signed up for a deal with Warner Bros. to produce and develop new films for that studio, including movies he'll star in.
According to Puck News, Maverick co-writer Ehren Kruger is writing a script for the third entry in the series.
Tom Cruise is working on a sequel to 2022's massively successful Top Gun: Maverick with Paramount, according to Puck News; seen in July in NYC
Top Gun 3 — which follows Maverick's incredible $1.5 billion grosses — is set even as Cruise recently inked a deal to produce and develop films for Warner Bros.; still from Top Gun: Maverick
Sources told The Hollywood Reporter that director Joseph Kosinski is also expected to return after proving himself with the critical and commercial smash success.
Cruise's last deal with Paramount ended in 2006, despite his continued work with the studio, and the new deal with Warner Bros. is nonexclusive, which will allow him to still work with other studios.
However, he's expected to be getting his own office on the Warners lot.
Cruise and his costars helped lead the long-awaited sequel Top Gun: Maverick to nearly $1.5 billion in grosses, and the action film's months-long stint in theaters help revive the theatrical business amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
Although news of the high-flying sequel struck some as an attempt to blunt the positive publicity Warner Bros. was getting for scoring a Cruise connection, THR reports that it has been quietly in development since the late fall.
Paramount didn't comment on the development.
Despite the hopes of Hollywood — and theater owners — that Cruise could once again revive their bottom lines with another successful Top Gun film, they'll have to wait quite some time before it even goes into production.
The actor first has to finish the eighth installment in the Mission: Impossible series, a direct continuation to last year's Dead Reckoning — Part 1, which underperformed compared to expectations.
The film may have also been hurt by only having a brief time on premium screens before the Barbenheimer juggernaut — the dual release of Barbie and Oppenheimer in the same week — pushed it out.
Paramount hopes to reunite Cruise with costars Miles Teller and Glen Powell. Maverick co-writer Ehren Kruger is writing the screenplay, and director Joseph Kosinski is expected to return; still from Top Gun: Maverick
But fans might have to wait quite a while, as Tom is still working on Mission: Impossible 8, which is expected to be released in May 2025; seen in July in Atlanta
The next M:I film is currently set to be released in May 2025, and development on Top Gun 3 could take considerable time, based on the time frame for Maverick.
Cruise's return to working with Warner Bros. comes almost a decade after his last film for the studio, 2014's cult film Edge Of Tomorrow.
His other movies at the studio include 2012's Rock of Ages, 2003's The Last Samurai, 1999's Eyes Wide Shut, 1994's Interview With The Vampire and his breakthrough roles in 1983's Risky Business and The Outsiders.
He also starred in 1999's Magnolia, which was distributed through the Warner Bros.–owned New Line Cinema.