This is the kind of cockpit footage you can get in real training and the theatre of war shown in many documentaries. Top Gun Maverick like Mission Impossible is strictly a money making venture; it has little entertainment or informational value and bears little resemblance to actual military activities.

Fact: non-military personnel are NOT permitted to fly military assets. Tom Cruise was NOT sitting in the cockpit flying these aircraft as it appears in the movie! He sat in the back mugging the camera. You're better off watching the TV series Seal Team which at least includes some actual Seal members and a well informed and accurately written script.

So, it's a Tom Cruise vehicle, people, little more. Set aside your TC idol worship and this is at best a movie about an unreal military operation with zero chances of success, until of course, the hero of the day comes out of retirement (unbelievably) and sucks up camera time. Kelly McGillis avoided this stinker, but Jennifer Connelly took the big money. Even the cameo from Val Kilner is dubbed as he is unable to speak. Did you wonder why Cruise, sitting thoughtfully speaking to the camera introduces the movie? Why is he out of character? This never happens at the beginning of a movie, right? He knew this was not a great movie and wanted, disengenuously, to thank you for donating to his production company and ingratiates himself to win you over. Did you think he really gives a s*** about your loyalty to sit through his movie? There are fine films out there that sometimes go wanting, that tell great stories and can be truly entertaining without insulting history, science, facts, or you, and it is a shame that their production companies cannot afford multi-million dollar advertising campaigns to promote quality film-making... and that truly is a shame. You as a viewer have to seek out hidden gems (and there are plenty) and support them. And every time you pay to see mega dollars being spent on TC closeups and totally unrealistic action scenes, you contribute to the making of further productions of this kind of chest-beating, Ra Ra, bomb-the-bad-guy-in-some-rogue-state mentality.

Don't spend your post COVID money on this nonsense. And remember the ratings for this movie come from two main sources: young minds who are yet unable to see how transparent this movie is, and two, millions of dollars spent on promotion saturating TV, and print media extolling the virtues of the next fantastic TC movie (read: hundreds of millions spent, must be good, need to recoup investment).

Update: I continue to see advertising and reviews (from paid experts) saying this picture is Cruise piloting a jet. HE DID NOT! Whatever camera trick they used, he's sitting in back of the pilot. Civilians are never permitted in the pilot seat of a military aircraft. You are being lied to to squeeze yet more revenue from this phony movie. In addition to him not piloting the aircraft (which he never comes clean on) he's a lousy actor. How many academy awards or awards of any kind does he have for acting? None. He just makes a ton of money promoting himself and his production company - he laughs all the way to the bank. Sorta like casino operators watching hordes of addicted gamblers throwing their money away in their establishments. Additionally the premise it absurd. Many REAL pilots have gone on record stating the stunts shown in the movie are impossible to carry out; they are just testosterone on steroids with no physical reality for the pilot (who would black out) and the aircraft (which would likely self-destruct); just eye candy. Expensive movies have massive advertising budgets to bring in an audience that will believe anything they're shown. Don't give in to Tom Cruise superhero worship. Like Trump who has gotten rich grifting the American public by saying the election was stolen, Cruise has a powerful economic machine behind him that inflates reality and plasters the airwaves with advertising to recoop the millions spent on the movie. Cruise wants to conquer the cinematic world with help from money grabbing Hollywood execs. Keep this in mind when scrutinizing the next Cruise "blockbuster".