Tom Cruise shares photo to tease start of production on Top Gun 2

Tom Cruise is officially back in the cockpit.

Late Wednesday, the 55-year-old actor teased the start of production on Top Gun 2 with a photo of him back in uniform, a fighter jet in the distance, and the iconic phrase, “Feel the need.” Cruise wrote on social media, “#Day1.”

This month marks 32 years since the release of Top Gun, in which Cruise starred as Navy pilot Pete “Maverick” Mitchell. The Tony Scott-directed film played a big role in Cruise’s ascension to movie star status, and now, he’s putting the aviators on again for Top Gun: Maverick, the long-gestating sequel from Tron: Legacy filmmaker Joseph Kosinski.

“Aviators are back, the need for speed,” Cruise previously told Access Hollywood. “We’re going to have big, fast machines. It’s going to be a competition film, like the first one … but a progression for Maverick.”

Top Gun: Maverick flies into theaters on June 26, 2020.