Val Kilmer signs up for Top Gun 2 without even reading the script

When a Top Gun sequel was first announced, we all feared the worst. A cynical cash-in trading on the goodwill of the 1986 classic? It was bound to be awful.

But we're starting to think there's a chance they could be doing it right.

Val Kilmer - aka Iceman of old - has revealed via a Facebook post that he is going to be starring in Top Gun 2 - announced back in June - and he didn't even read the script. 

He also suggests that Cruise has signed up too; Skydance Productions CEO David Ellison had previously said that there was a role for Cruise - "There is an amazing role for Maverick in the movie and there is no Top Gun without Maverick" - but the actor himself had not previously confirmed his appearance.

Kilmer also revealed that original producer Jerry Bruckheimer would be involved again. Tony Scott, director of the original Top Gun film, sadly committed suicide in August 2012, so it remains to be seen who will direct. His original post convinced many (us included) that Francis Ford Coppola and Gene Hackman were involved, but Kilmer corrected this in another post.

Previous plot ideas revealed by Ellison also sounded promising.

He suggested to Collider back in June that the new film would be concerned with the rise of drones, and the obsolescence of the fighter pilot in modern warfare. "When you look at the world of dogfighting, what's interesting about it is that it's not a world that exists to the same degree when the original movie came out. This world has not been explored... it's drone technology, and fifth generation fighters are really what the United States Navy is calling the last man-made fighter that we're actually going to produce. It's really exploring the end of an era of dogfighting and fighter pilots and what that culture is today."

Will it take our breath away? We'll soon find out.

(Image: AllStar)