After months of speculation, it would appear that work on Top Gun 2 has finally begun, with producer Jerry Bruckheimer tweeting a picture of himself with Tom Cruise, the star of the iconic original movie, saying that they had met specifically to “discuss” the project.

The 72 year old production heavyweight seems to have at last confirmed that one of the most eagerly-anticipated sequels in movie history is actually a going concern, a full three decades after the first Top Gun came out in 1986.

Tom CruiseTom Cruise at the New York premiere of 'Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation'

In Bruckheimer’s photo, he and 53 year old Cruise are buddying up with their arms round each other’s shoulders. “Just got back from a weekend in New Orleans to see my old friend @TomCruise and discuss a little Top Gun 2,” he wrote as a caption to the tweet. As yet, there’s no director attached to the project.

Taking $356 million from a modest budget of $15 million, the original Top Gun is one of the most memorable movies of the eighties, maintaining a cult fanbase to this day. Millions of fans will be excited at the prospect of Maverick and Ice Man taking to the skies to duke it out once again.

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All parties involved have at various points expressed an interest in a sequel, which seemed to be going ahead until original director Tony Scott (the brother of Ridley) committed suicide in 2012, whereupon the project was shelved indefinitely.

But over the last year or so, rumours have surfaced that a script was being worked on, with Cruise saying last summer that he’d “like to get back into those jets” and co-star Val Kilmer seemed to confirm its existence in November when he announced via a hasty Facebook post that he’d been invited to reprise his role as Ice Man in the sequel, before adding that the movie wasn’t yet definite.

Cruise’s involvement has always been recognised as crucial, with David Ellison of film company Skydance saying recently: “There is an amazing role for Maverick in the movie… there is no Top Gun without Maverick.”

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