Tom Cruise starrer ‘Top Gun 3’ is officially in works, makers confirm

LOS ANGELES: Hollywood action star Tom Cruise is finally returning for ‘Top Gun 3’, the makers confirmed at CinemaCon.

According to Variety, Paramount announced Tom Cruise’s return to the franchise along with producer Jerry Bruckheimer. They also confirmed the film being officially in works.

A sequel to Joseph Kosinski’s 2022 blockbuster ‘Top Gun: Maverick’, the third instalment was first revealed to be in the development in 2024 with writer Ehren Kruger. ‘Maverick’ was a blockbuster hit, even during the times when the theatres struggled due to COVID-19 pandemic. It collected $1.5 billion at the global box office with a budget of $170 million.

“Top Gun 3” is officially in the works at Paramount, with Tom Cruise set to return and Jerry Bruckheimer producing, as announced at #CinemaCon. https://t.co/0sTeLBRkOB pic.twitter.com/lPTLBmqOdo

— Variety (@Variety) April 16, 2026

Cruise also returned for the second instalment, 36 years after he debuted as Lieutnant Pete ‘Maverick’ Mitchell in the 1986 original. His character went back to the famous flight school to teach a new batch of pilots for a dangerous mission. It is then that he crosses paths with Bradley Bradshaw (Miles Teller), the son of his best friend who died in the first film.

Besides Cruise and Teller, the film also featured Glen Powell, Lewis Pullman, Monica Barbaro, Danny Ramirez, Jay Ellis, Greg Tarzan Davis and Manny Jacinto.

Notably, in May 2025, Christopher McQuarrie, the director of ‘Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning’, shared updates on his upcoming collaborations with Tom Cruise, including the highly anticipated Top Gun 3.

As per Deadline, in an interview, McQuarrie revealed that the sequel to ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ is “already in the bag,” with a framework for the story already in place. “It wasn’t hard,” McQuarrie said, adding, “I thought it would be, and that’s a good place to go from is you walk into the room going, ‘Come on, what are we going to do?'”

McQuarrie emphasised that the challenge lies not in developing the story but in executing it and capturing the emotional depth that makes the films resonate. (ANI)