Top Gun 2 & M:I7 Reveals Show Tom Cruise’s Biggest Competition Is Himself

The promos for Top Gun: Maverick and Mission: Impossible 7 reveal the biggest issue that the Tom Cruise franchises face: the actor himself! Cruise is integral to both movies; he’s long been the star of the iconic Mission Impossible saga, and the original Top Gun helped to make Tom Cruise one of the globe’s most bankable actors. For the majority of his career, Cruise has been known for his stunt work in action movies — and arguably, he is now competing against himself in the industry.

Both Top Gun 2 and M:I7  are promoting Cruise’s stunt work in their marketing materials. Top Gun 2‘s promo at CinemaCon featured an action-packed flying sequence where Cruise’s Maverick hit a record-breaking Mach 10 speed, while Mission: Impossible 7‘s promo at the same event showed Cruise performing a stunt with a dirtbike riding off a cliff in what might become known as his most dangerous stunt yet. In both instances, the actor himself is a key aspect of the movie’s appeal — particularly, his contributions to the action set pieces.

Although Cruise wasn’t as associated with dangerous stunts when Top Gun premiered in 1986, today, it’s a core aspect of his brand. Mission Impossible 2 changed Tom Cruise’s career forever in 2000: He began to appear in far more action-heavy roles and just kept on upping the ante with each passing year since.  At this point, he’s essentially in competition with himself to go bigger at the box office and also to constantly outdo his own stunts and death-defying feats for his films. What the future holds for Tom Cruise is quite uncertain, but one can assume that he will continue to try, and succeed at, upping his game and moving up the ladder; truly, the actor is in a league of his own.

The problem Tom Cruise faces now is that he’s essentially in competition with himself, which could affect his creative decisions going forward. With the long-awaited Top Gun sequel continuing Maverick’s story, and the added uncertainty that COVID-19 brings for cinemagoers, there are extra stakes at play for Cruise’s career. Top Gun: Maverick might flop, and Cruise fans would still have a whole other action blockbuster to look forward to in Mission: Impossible 7 — but then what? Since there is no news about Tom Cruise’s film projects barring these two flicks, it’s quite a possibility that Cruise may make a return to acting in dramatic, emotionally resonant, and grounded films. This is especially likely considering how Cruise is turning 60 next year, and audiences have yet to see the actor in a role of an older man.

Tom Cruise has cultivated a history filled with action-packed superstardom, and the more he continues to raise the bar, the more he will be without competition for the top box-office spot. Many might claim that Cruise is joined at the top of the tentpole by Hollywood A-listers like Brad Pitt or Will Smith, but the reality of the matter is that the movies that Tom Cruise stars in always manage to make the attention circulate around him rather than it deviating to co-stars and directors.  Wherever he ends up, Tom Cruise remains a legendary figure in American cinema and around the world. Top Gun: Maverick and Mission Impossible 7 could cement his place in history even further — or not. It really depends on whether Tom Cruise is interested in upping his own game and is feeling dangerous.