With his next film, Tom Cruise continues to exploit one of Hollywood’s most profitable legacies: his own
‘Days of Thunder’ was not a blockbuster in 1990, nor did it please critics much. And still, it’s going to be next let Tom Cruise roll. Before ‘Top Gun 3’ or any other project on his agenda. It is not another whim of the star, it is a new episode in the recovery of a legacy that the actor knows is currently valued very highly in Hollywood: his own. Days of Thunder 2. After months actively and passively confirming that the film is underway, Paramount now has a director for the sequel: it will be Jonathan Levinestill negotiating the terms of his contract. Cruise returns to be Cole Trickle, the NASCAR driver he played 36 years ago, and produces alongside Jerry Bruckheimer, the film’s original producer. The studio is already treating the film as Cruise’s next production, ahead of ‘Top Gun 3’, which Paramount has already announced is in development, and ahead of ‘Broadsword’, the project he is preparing with Christopher McQuarrie. A relative failure. ‘Days of Thunder’ was born in its day as an attempt to repeat the formula of ‘Top Gun’: same director, Tony Scott, same producers, Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer, same protagonist, four years after the premiere of that one. And although, as we say, he reunited Cruise with the director of his previous success, it did not work so overwhelmingly: ‘Top Gun’ grossed $357 million worldwide. with a budget of just 15; ‘Days of Thunder’ stood at 157 million compared to a disbursement of 60. Legacy is what matters. But Cruise treats both films the same: as his property, to be reactivated when he decides. When Paramount proposed turning ‘Days of Thunder’ into a series for Paramount+ years ago, it was the actor himself who rejected the idea. I didn’t want a second-rate spin-off. He wanted to repeat with this film the same move that worked with ‘Top Gun: Maverick’, about which we already explained how he turned nostalgia into Hollywood’s most profitable mechanism, compared to the forced recycling of other studios. Comedy on wheels. Levine’s choice is also unusual. Until now he has directed comedies like ‘Memories of a Teenage Zombie’ or modest dramas like ’50/50′, never an action blockbuster on this scale, and Paramount comes to him for an indirect reason. Apparently, test screenings of ‘Mr. Irrelevant: The John Tuggle Story’, a sports drama with David Corenswet that opens next Christmas, have been exceptionally good. That result, and not a previous history with cars or chases, is what has boosted the studio’s confidence in Levine. The definitive boost. The final push came, almost accidentally, from another motorized debut. In June 2025, while promoting ‘F1’, the film with Brad Pitt that Bruckheimer also produced, the producer confirmed that conversations with Cruise were active: “there are always new technologies, new ways of doing things and showing them.” weeks later it was more direct: confirmed that Cruise wants to film the sequel and that the two were still shaping the script. The actor himself confirmed it that same month. 36 years later. Of course, ‘Days of Thunder’ has severe problems recovering its original cast team, and it cannot be solved emotionally, as happened with the absence of Val Kilmer in ‘Maverick’. Thirty-six years later, Tony Scott and Robert Duvall have passed away (the absence, of course, will be regrettable). And Nicole Kidman, whom Cruise met during that filming and with whom he was married for eleven years, has not worked with her ex-husband since the divorce, and her return should be considered impossible. But first. Before Cruise gets back into a race car, ‘Digger’ will hit theaters on October 2: a black comedy by Alejandro González Iñárritu that marks Cruise’s return to Warner Bros., a decade after ‘Edge of Tomorrow’. There Cruise is not an action hero, but the most powerful man in the world, facing a catastrophe that he himself caused. The other side of the strategy: in this way Cruise reactivates his catalog with Bruckheimer, but also tries a different register with Iñárritu. Cruise has something for everyone. In Xataka | Being a close friend of Tom Cruise has a special bonus: exclusive viewing of a six-hour film masterclass
