Tom Cruise’s upcoming film Top Gun: Maverick’s script saga

When trouble strikes from out of the blue and derails best-laid plans, it spells ‘Mission Impossible’. This is what Hollywood actor Tom Cruise must have felt when the script of his much-awaited sequel Top Gun: Maverick went missing. The incident incidentally happened in August when Cruise was in Birmingham for the shooting of the seventh installment of his popular action series Mission Impossible.

The rare script copy of Top Gun: Maverick was in his bodyguard’s BMW X7 along with the actor’s other luggage. West Midlands Police, to whom the theft was reported, subsequently recovered both the car and the script, a report in The Sun says. Video footage showed the car being dumped in Smethwick, at 9.13 am, behind a row of takeaways.

The many setbacks

The much talked about the lost and found case of the Top Gun: Maverick script is in the long list of a setback that this much-awaited sequel to the 1986 action flick has faced since its launch. Pandemic was prime among the reasons that have delayed its release. Top Gun was a film that the generation of the 80s grew up watching. All this is thanks to some past-faced and soulful music that Harold Faltermeyer and Giorgio Moroder composed for the air-combat action flick that Tony Scott directed.

The sequel will see Tom Cruise reprise his role as Pete Mitchell along with Val Kilmer who will return as Tom Kasansky. It was the rivalry of these two hotshot pilots at Miramar Naval Air Station that set the tone for the film that grossed $357.1 million. Makers of the sequel, post this theft scare has since changed tack with the security of the script. Independent security has been assigned to the only copies outside the studio vaults when they are being transported, according to a statement the film-making team released.

The initial plan was to release the sequel in 2019. This has now been moved up to May 27, 2022, to avoid a clash with Tom Cruise’s other awaited action flick Mission Impossible 7, the release of which is now set for September 30, 2022. Top Gun Maverick also features Miles Teller, Jennifer Connelly, Glen Powell, Ed Harris, and Lewis Pullman.