Maybe the answer should be obvious to me but I don't know. There are some big-budget Hollywood flicks that become huge box-office hits and you wonder how. James Cameron's "Titanic" was a monster hit but how did it keep repeating business weekly and remain holding to that number one spot for 15 consecutive weeks in North America! Is it a good movie? Not really, I find it represents the best and worst of James Cameron - a director who crafted something that could almost have been a Michael Bay production. Some effects were not so terrific though the sinking of that famous boat is awesome in every way. The love story (the potential key to its success) never worked for me and I can't imagine sitting through it again. Still, "Top Gun: Maverick" has outperformed "Titanic" in domestic gross, by little more than 26 million (it terms of adjusted box-office earnings, "Titanic" will probably always beat it internationally combined with domestic gross). But I don't see the appeal of "Top Gun: Maverick" at all. Sure, it has great aerial footage where you really feel you are in those Boeing F/A-18's with the pilots, its got Tom Cruise in an iconic role that many love to see him play, and its got a love story though it is rudimentary at best (even with Jennifer Connelly). The nostalgia factor is very high but I did not think there was such demand for this overlong yet fitfully exciting sequel (it is better than the original). I don't think anybody was clamoring for a revisit of the jingoistic excesses of the original back in the 1980's, let alone in 2022.
Maybe the fact that politics and woke-isms don't play a part here might be responsible for its success. The villainous threat is quite possibly Russian though never revealed. Maverick just shows he's the best fighter pilot of all time and maybe that is all people want. A simple good time, a roller coaster thrill ride, without making too much of a fuss about the world we live in now. Maybe this is the "Star Wars" people want - not much to ponder or discuss after it is over and no thoughts crossing into how a woman can do what Maverick does better. In this movie, Jennifer Connelly is a woman who just runs a bar and rekindles her relationship with Maverick. Simple.
