Hollywood A-listers Ed Harris and Jon Hamm have joined Top Gun 2, officially titled Top Gun: Maverick, in mystery roles.
Ed Harris began his acting career in 1976 and since then, he has amassed four Oscar nominations on top of 47 other nominations and 28 wins – including two Golden Globes for Best Supporting Actor. In 2017, he appeared in Darren Aronofsky’s divisive psychological horror, Mother as well as HBO’s hit science-fiction series Westworld, in which he plays the mysterious and enigmatic Man in Black.
Jon Hamm began his acting career in 1997 and has gone on to win two Golden Globes for his performance as advertising executive Don Draper in AMC’s hit drama Mad Men. He also has a further 16 wins, including a Primetime Emmy and a Critic’s Choice Award, and another 81 nominations.
Alone, the casting of Ed Harris or Jon Hamm would be a big boost for any movie or television series, but together they add a whole new level of excitement for the long-gestured sequel to Tony Scott’s 1986 classic that follows Pete “Maverick” Mitchell (Tom Cruise) – a hotshot fighter pilot whose reckless attitude and cocky demeanour put him at odds with the other pilots at the Miramar Naval Air Station, where he vies with Tom “Iceman” Kasansky (Val Kilmer) for the coveted "Top Gun" award.
Receiving mixed reviews on its initial release, Top Gun has since gone on to become a cult-classic of action cinema, amassing an enormous following and receiving regular screenings all over the world.
The plot of Top Gun: Maverick is being kept tightly under wraps at the moment, but we do know that Tom Cruise is returning as Maverick for the highly anticipated sequel and, if the recent Mission: Impossible sequels are anything to go by; we can expect some truly death-defying stunts from the Hollywood megastar. It is rumoured that Maverick is a flight instructor this time around, training up a new generation of fighter pilots, including the son of Maverick’s best friend and co-pilot, Nick “Goose” Bradshaw, who died in the 1986 original.
Top Gun: Maverick also sees the return of Val Kilmer, in his first major role since his two-year battle with throat cancer. After years of rumoured health problems, he finally came clean about his battle with throat cancer during a December 2017 interview with the The Hollywood Reporter where he revealed that it had “taken its toll” on him and his family and that he had undergone a procedure on his trachea which made his voice raspy and left him short of breath. There is no word yet on how this will factor in to Top Gun: Maverick or how big of a role Val Kilmer will play, but it will be a welcome return for the actor and we are glad he’s making a recovery.
Top Gun: Maverick will by flying in to UK cinemas on July 12th, 2019.
