Top Gun: Maverick is a great film and garnered six Oscar nominations, but that may seem a little extreme for some viewers. Top Gun: Maverick was important upon its initial release, with the film being credited as the movie that saved theaters due to its immense box office success. However, Top Gun: Maverick is one of the most nominated films at the Oscars, causing quite a controversy, and debate has started about its worthiness.
As a sequel to 1986’s Top Gun, many people expected Top Gun: Maverick to be a hit. However, no one was able to predict how successful it would be. Top Gun: Maverick’s box-office returns are so huge that the film has become one of the highest-grossing movies of all time, with many viewers seeing it in theaters more than once. Top Gun: Maverick launched several actors into stardom, with Glen Powell being more famous than ever after appearing as Hangman. The biggest surprise, however, is that the Academy Awards nominated Top: Gun Maverick for six Oscars, which is rarely seen for such a crowd-pleasing blockbuster.
Top Gun: Maverick Does Deserve 6 Oscar Nods
Top Gun: Maverick was one of the biggest films of 2022, and it’s hard to argue that it doesn’t deserve its six Oscar nominations. Half of Top Gun: Maverick’s nominations are in the technical categories, with its nominations including Best Film Editing, Best Sound, and Best Visual Effects. Most of Top Gun: Maverick is real rather than using CGI, with many of the actors filming their scenes while actually in the air. The effects are blended in so seamlessly, though, that Top Gun: Maverick maintains its sense of realism while its editing and sound keep the exciting events coherent for the audience. Top Gun: Maverick is a technical miracle.
Top Gun: Maverick also aligns with the other categories it’s nominated for. It has a Best Original Song nod, which makes perfect sense considering Top Gun: Maverick’s “Hold My Hand” is performed by Lady Gaga. Top Gun: Maverick also has a Best Adapted Screenplay nomination, which it also deserves. The Top Gun sequel takes the foundational elements of the original film and crafts a new story that is even more exciting and tense than its predecessor. Top Gun: Maverick’s new and returning characters are heartfelt and wonderfully written, thanks to its Oscar-nominated screenplay.
The most controversial category that Top Gun: Maverick is nominated for is Best Picture, but it deserves that too. Best Picture doesn’t just mean the best movie. Many films have won the Oscar for Best Picture for being the most epic, influential, or popular movie of their year. Ben-Hur, Titanic, Gone with the Wind, Braveheart, and more took the award due to their scale and impact, even though they’re not considered the best film of their respective years. The first ever Best Picture winner was Wings, an epic about military pilots, meaning that Top Gun: Maverick’s nominations harken back to the beginning of the Academy Awards.
Why The Academy Loves Top Gun: Maverick
The Academy loves the story and feel-good ending of Top Gun: Maverick, with its traditional Hollywood values being a throwback to the movies of yesteryear. An underdog story about a perseverant leader who deals with war, romance, and interpersonal conflict is right up the Academy’s alley. Many Academy members grew up watching movies like Top Gun: Maverick (if not the original Top Gun itself), making the film a clear favorite among voters.
On top of that, the Academy may like Top Gun: Maverick because it could help raise viewership for the Oscars. Recently, the Academy has started including popular movies to combat criticisms that nobody has heard of the films that win awards. Now, Best Picture typically has one or two popular nominees, with Black Panther, Bohemian Rhapsody, Dune, and West Side Story being examples. Top Gun: Maverick was a huge success, and the Academy may be trying to get fans of the film to tune in for the Oscars by handing it nominations.
What Awards Top Gun: Maverick Could Actually Win
Going up against movies like Everything Everywhere All At Once, The Banshees of Inisherin, and The Fabelmans, there’s almost no chance that Top Gun: Maverick wins Best Picture. It will also struggle with the Best Visual Effects category going up against Avatar: The Way of Water, which is almost entirely built on its effects. However, Top Gun: Maverick could win any of the other four Oscars, seriously being in the running for Best Editing and Best Original Song.