Need for speed: A fly ranking of the top ten ‘Top Gun’ moments
Do you feel the need? The need for speed!? Well, you did on May 13, otherwise known as Top Gun Day. As you might be able to guess, the day necessitated fans of the film quote all their final lines, wear aviator sunglasses, indulge in some topless volleyball with the boys, and generally pretend to be the cockiest pricks to have ever been made fighter pilots. To get you all buzzed up for the task, here’s our ranking of the ten best Top Gun moments.
10. Getting dangerous from the get-go
Duuude! Danger zone! If you’re not hyped for life (or for aircrafts) after these opening credits, you’re probably dead inside.
9. “The need for speed”
If you and your bestie don’t have a rhyming catchphrase you can pull out and high five over at any given moment, are you even buddies? We’d argue not.
8. “Watch the birdie”
Proving that narcissistic jerks taking pictures of each other at inopportune times happened long before Instagram made it a big deal, Maverick (Tom Cruise) flips the bird while Goose takes a Polaroid. In the middle of the damn air like the showboating bastards they truly are.
7. The Maverick & Charlie love scene
Charlie (Kelly McGillis) gives Maverick a bad review even though she sees what an utter “genius” he is in that cockpit. After chasing after him on his bike, she then gives him a sterling review in the bedroom that he most definitely introduces to her as his “personal cock-pit”. (Probably a deleted scene.)
6. The scene where Goose dies
Thus beginning a series of performances where we’re forced to watch various characters played by Anthony Edwards die in devastating ways. (Fuck you forever, ER!)
5, The “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling” singalong scene
The only woman within 500 miles of anywhere is serenaded by 200 dudes who happen to know every single word of the Righteous Brothers’ love ballad. Okey doke! Sure.
4. The locker room showdown
Sweaty Iceman (Val Kilmer) gives sweaty Maverick a piece of his mind and tells him he’s too dangerous to be up in the air. Maverick responds with one of Cruises cheesiest delivered lines of his career: “That’s right . . . Ice . . . Man . . . I am dangerous!”
3. Playing with the boys
Just a totally hetero bro hangout involving a casual muscle rippling game of topless volleyball while Kenny Loggins’s “Playing With the Boys” bangs out in the background.
2. Goose & Maverick abandon their ladies to sing “Great Balls of Fire” to each other
No comment.
1. The final bromance
Iceman & Maverick are just two dudes from different sides of the airfield. One plays by the rules! One’s a loose cannon! It’ll never work! Except by the end they’re totally slapping flesh (get your mind out of the gutter –we’re talking high fives and brohugs) and making bold declarations about how they’re now one another’s wingman. Adorable.
