Well worth masking up for. Managed a matinee in the IMAX and some social distancing too.
Can’t imagine seeing this on a wide screen after IMAX. It is immersive. The plot stretches it a bit, some ranks seem to manage to get transferred all over the world at a drop of a hat to keep the story going and some operational points are simply eliminated. You know - the usual movie “some events have been condensed” type disclaimer.
There are some lovely nods at the original, some nods at a few other Tom Cruise movies too. Anyone get the one at “An Officer and a Gentleman”? And the Dambusters and Star Wars get their nods too. But at the end of the day - while knowledge of the first movie adds to the experience - this movie stands on its own. And with a lot more hardware in the air and at least three “acts” featuring different hardware - you get a lot more flying for your money. It’s better than the first.
Sure there is some CGI in there. The F14 is real on the ground, but in the air - well… But a chunk of this flying is real. And it’s just worth it for that.
Of course the good guys win - but so what?
For the folks who think it “would never be like that”. Here are two YouTube videos showing this is trained for all the time by a whole raft of the NATO inventory.
First video - from the cockpit
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dyzAAcpsdEQ
Second video from the plane spotters’ viewpoint (watch out for a flight of 4 x C130’s flying the profile)