Thopa gunner: maverick, bitch

Thopa gunner: maverick, bitch

 

Bear with me a moment, I swear this tangent is going somewhere. So, there’s this Simpsons gag about military recruitment. Where the recruiter explains they use subliminal, liminal and super liminal messaging. When asked to explain what super liminal messaging involves, he leans out a window and screams at a passer by telling them to sign up. Ha. Ha.

 

If I was to try and slot top gun maverick into one of those categories, it’s got to be super liminal.  If only because everyone already is well aware the original was also a recruitment tool for the navy. 36 years down the line, the cat has had kittens and those kittens have had kittens, and the proverbial bag was recycled into a coke bottle that was then used as a gravity bong before being discarded into landfill. Yet Top gun refuses to move on, so much so the film’s theme (join the navy) was about how little anyone in top gun had actually moved on… from the navy, which they joined…

 

I appreciate the mental gymnastics a screenwriter today would have to go through to write anything as corny and un-ironic as a top gun film. Though in that regard I feel they fall a bit short in places. The film has more cheese than the US food stamp program in 1986. While I'm down for an 80’s cheese fest, my lactose intolerant friends will attest there is such a thing as too much cheese. So let’s examine the post pizza depression of Maverick.

 

Much as the film tries to convince that there are actual narrative stakes at play you can feel the kid gloves of the soft writing underneath. I’m not saying someone has to die a sudden dramatic death, but the film telegraphs itself as too much of a feel-good flick to really do that. The only death in the film, join the navy, is forewarned and the most respectful adoring funeral one could hope for.

 

The messaging across the film is not only can you return to the past, but it’s as vibrant and good as you remember it. Nothing exists there to fundamentally challenge you, your sweet heart is still waiting, and you can comfortably be a big fish in a small pond, sticking it to your old man (Jon Hamm) by joining up, shipping out and flying boats at mack too. Needless of me to point out, that isn’t how the 80’s was: I know I was there. Like a lot of media, it’s riding nostalgia for a time that never was, which isn’t what the nostalgia of my childhood used to be, it used to be good, you’know, it was a purer kinder nostalgia, people nowadays use it as an escape but.

 

 A good portion of the film is characters lining up to metaphorically jerk Thomas Cruisé off with flattery and praise. Which I’m chalking up to the military recruiters knowing that no one under the age of thirty five was ever led to believe that they were good enough. If anyone can be used to symbolize a black hole of praise seeking insecurity, it would be the now 61 year old Tobias Cruz.

 

Paradoxically, the sheer volume of affirmation that Tommy Crush, maverick, is in fact the best fighter pilot of all time forever and ever left me with lasting imposter syndrome. I am now resigned to never being a top of the line fighter ace. The worst part of that is I've never even flown and have a totally unrelated fear of heights. Though that might speak to the boat having sailed on my own sense of self-worth.

 

Speaking of, Tumnus Crash does have a boat sailing scene. Where it is revealed that he doesn’t know how to sail, so that his new old girlfriend can girl-mansplain the basics to him. Doesn’t learning to sail boats sound like a great idea for a date? A good way to learn those skills would be to join the US navy.

 

It has occurred to me that pointing out the film as propaganda isn’t particularly clever. Critics like to think of themselves as clever people, because they’re people and everyone does that. The sheer obviousness of it goes some way to neutralizing the criticism of it being propaganda. Hence making it more effective propaganda: this is a super liminal thing I was talking about; awareness of advertisement doesn’t neutralize the effectiveness when it’s not trying to be subtle. If anything the knowledge goes some way to encouraging the same complacent mindset that made the original so effective.

 

If we’re on the subject of criticism, and this being a review; I think we are, blowing your nostalgia song on the opening sequence is crumby as hell. I’m fairly sure, based on nothing other than my own notional sense of entitlement; that if danger zone started blasting during the maverick dog fight sequence, it would be incredibly cringe, over the top, and quintessentially 80’s nostalgia perfection.

 

The other easy angle with Cruise is his cult affiliation, which I'm sure I could be scathing about, but I'm not putting in the research (reading wikipedia) to get enough material for a paragraph on the subject. I can stomach reading about the US navy, but thinking about that other aquatic organization gives me the ick.

 

I’m fairly sure Maverick won’t have the same lasting impression as the original, but I also know it’s not trying to. A sequel in the narrative sense moves the story on; keeping some underlying themes and concepts, whilst developing them. Ultimately they aim to supplant the original, successful or not. Tenga Topa gun maverick isn’t interested in moving forwards, it and a lot of modern sequels to 80’s classics have got more in common with a prequel if anything, ticking off a set of references and nods to the status quo. This is how modern ‘generative AI’ works; a scatter shot approximation of what it was fed. If the machines were trained on our cultural, no wonder they’re not creative.

 

Tron legacy was more forward looking. Yikes.