‘Top Gun 3’ officially in works — and Tom Cruise is returning
A sequel to the hit action film “Top Gun: Maverick” is officially in the works, and Tom Cruise is set to once again return as Pete Mitchell.
Paramount, the studio behind the original 1986 “Top Gun” film and its 2022 follow-up, announced the highly anticipated news during its CinemaCon 2026 panel on Thursday, according to Variety.
The studio reportedly confirmed that a script is in the process of being written and that Jerry Bruckheimer will also return to produce the upcoming threequel.
“Maverick” marked Cruise’s first return to the role of Pete “Maverick” Mitchell since the original 36 years earlier.
While the sequel saw Cruise’s character train a new generation of TOPGUN pilots – like Miles Teller’s Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw, Glen Powell’s Jake “Hangman” Seresin and Lewis Pullman’s Robert “Bob” Floyd – it also saw the return of the late Val Kilmer as Tom “Iceman” Kazansky.
The 63-year-old “Mission: Impossible” star, meanwhile, teased the future of the “Top Gun” franchise in May 2025 while discussing what he had planned next in his action-packed movie career.
“Yeah, we’re thinking and talking about many different stories and what could we do and what’s possible,” he told Australia’s “Today” show at the time.
Cruise added, “It took me 35 years to figure out ‘Top Gun: Maverick,’ so all of these things we’re working on, we’re discussing ‘Days of Thunder’ and ‘Top Gun: Maverick.’”
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