Commander Chris O’Connor, U.S. Navy
The best parts are the multiship dogfight scenes! The worst part: Even as a kid, the F-5 as the MiG-28 annoyed me, as well as the repeated stock shots of the same missile launches. I was, and still am, a proud aviation and weapons nerd.
Captain Donald E. Kennedy, U.S. Navy
The worst aspect was the non-aviation patches on Tom Cruise’s flight jacket—Seabees, DLG-32 William H. Standley, etc. No aviator would be caught dead wearing them on their jackets. The best was the soundtrack (including “You’ve Lost that Lovin’ Feeling”).
Captain Rob Niewoehner, U.S. Navy (Retired)
The best part is the opening scene’s flight deck footage and realism—it provoked a physical reaction. The worst moment: “I’m in a flat spin out to sea.” I flew more than a hundred flat spins during the Super Hornet’s development. They go nowhere but down.
Admiral James Stavridis, U.S. Navy (Retired)
The best and worst were personified in one scene—the immortal beach volleyball match between the Top Gun junior officers. It captured the real camaraderie and spirit of naval aviation. But it was also a goofy piece of 1980s eye candy that seems so silly in retrospect.
Chief Petty Officer John M. Duffy, U.S. Navy (Retired)
The best aspect was the realistic air combat maneuvering in the last air battle. The worst aspect was trying to pass off F-5 Tigers as enemy MiGs.
Commander Greg Atchison, U.S. Navy (Retired)
The best: An entertaining and fun movie about naval aviation. The worst: “Maverick’s gotta ball,” “Maverick’s in a flat spin headed out to sea” (while over the desert east of San Diego?), and the notion that Top Gun is just the top 1 percent. What are the other 99 percent? Hacks?
Captain William O. Harrison, U.S. Navy (Retired)
I was peripherally involved in the filming. The most impressive thing was the melding of scenes from Naval Air Stations Fallon and Miramar and Naval Training Center San Diego to make it look like one seamless set. The worst aspect was the plot.
Thomas R. Hart
Like its 1934 predecessor, Here Comes the Navy starring James Cagney, 1986’s Top Gun was a highly entertaining movie that substituted aircraft carriers for the battleship Arizona and F-14 Tomcats for the dirigible Macon—with totally unrealistic depictions of the Navy and Navy life.
Marc J. Cohen, U.S. Navy Veteran
The best part was great public relations for the Navy. The worst part was the Seabees patch on Maverick’s jacket. Maverick was not in the Seabees, nor the Civil Engineer Corps. Therefore, the character had no right to wear a patch he never earned.
Jeff Lichtig
Best: To be the best, one must experience failure and learn from their mistakes. The jet wash scene in which Goose dies is a great example. Worst: The competition between Maverick and Iceman was not the ideal way for two highly talented naval aviators to engage with each other.
Captain Robert C. Rubel, U.S. Navy (Retired)
I found the original Top Gun movie excruciating. The worst aspect was the personalization of feedback, or as Top Gun would say, putting the “who” into it. Second worst was the toleration of flat-hatting. Third was the depiction of training occurring at low level.
Captain Bill Galvani, U.S. Navy (Retired)
The worst was Maverick and Iceman graduating from Top Gun, getting emergency orders, and showing up in the Indian Ocean two minutes later looking bright-eyed and not too tired to fly high-speed, demanding air combat maneuvers against a real enemy.
Theodore Kuhlmeier, U.S. Marine Corps Veteran
The best was, of course, the flying scenes. No wonder after the movie’s release, naval aviation recorded a recruiting spike. For me, as a Naval Academy graduate, the worst is the plot line that has Goose telling Maverick he could not get into the Academy because his father supposedly violated a “no-fly line” to save his shipmates. Nonsense! The Navy would have rallied around the son.
Marc DeLamater
The best: Actress Kelly McGillis playing an aerospace analyst and actor Tom Cruise's aviator sunglasses. The worst: Up-close nonverbal communication performed during inverted flight and nonfunctional air-conditioning systems on board aircraft carriers with everyone suffering from near-terminal cinematic flop-sweat.
Actors Val Kilmer and Tom Cruise on the set of Top Gun. Alamy.
Sebastian Bruns, Professor, U.S. Naval Academy
One cannot easily forget Top Gun’s soundtrack. Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away,” Harold Faltermeyer’s chilling instrumental, Cheap Trick’s “Mighty Wing,” and certainly Kenny Loggins’ “Danger Zone” remain pop culture classics 35 years later and will forever be connected to Hollywood’s imagination of sea power.
Stuart Jackson
Easily the worst is the initial briefing to trainees for the first day of flight exercises when they are told to "remember the hard deck for today is 10,000 feet." Then the next flying sequences show trainees and instructors racing at altitudes clearly less than 5,000 feet, such that hills around them are visible through their canopies.
Kit Lavell, U.S. Navy Veteran
The best scene in the original Top Gun movie—and the most realistic scene in the entire move—is the O Club scene!
Robert Swaney, U.S. Navy Veteran
I was deployed on the USS LaSalle (AGF-3) when Top Gun came out. The Navy arranged for special screenings at the support base in Bahrain. I remember feeling pumped up, excited, and very proud to be in the Navy after seeing it. It was a great morale booster.
Captain Jim Bryant, U.S. Navy (Retired)
It damaged the officer nuclear-propulsion pipeline because many candidates switched to aviation!
Don Brown
The opening 3 minutes and 51 seconds of Top Gun, flight quarters at dawn, is the supreme cinematic depiction of the drama, hazard, and excitement inherent in the flight deck ballet. I will leave the worst aspects of the film to someone else.