The Best Pilot



The eyes of Tom Cruise can move mountains.
Photo courtesy of imdb.com



Aside from improving international relations by flying inverted, Tom Cruise is the best pilot for his singing ability, taking a song that was quite happy in its near extinction and launching it into every drunk man’s vocabulary.

He sang so well, in fact, that he was able to make sweet love to Kelly McGillis before she became a lesbian, likely because no other man would ever please her the same way Tom Cruise did (incidentally, this gives a whole new meaning to Cruise singing, "there's no tenderness like before in your fingertips"). 

Yet being a maverick (a maverick named “Maverick,” believe it or not) doesn’t stop there. 

No, this man has to take a line and deliver it so very well, that it will be molded and reused for decades to come. Who would have ever thought, “talk to me Goose” could have evolved into “I’ll never let go…”

The closure one gets from watching Maverick launch his closest friend’s dog tags into the deep could only be matched by the tossing of an inestimably valued diamond (admittedly, the old lady from Titanic still sucks in comparison).

Our Maverick sees a shot and he takes it. In the cockpit, our Maverick flies by the seat of his partner’s flight suit, referring to himself as dangerous, and more than once, a “Ghost Rider.”

“Ghost Rider” may be in reference to his ever-absent father who just so happened to fly with Viper, the top instructor of Top Gun.  Flying is something with which our Maverick was inherently born. One could never do better than to adhere to his wisdom in the air, as well as in life: “you don’t have time to think…if you think, you’re dead.” 

Tom Cruise flew into our hearts, and flew into the catacombs of celluloid. This is why he will always indisputably be…the best pilot. Ever.

– Father Mapother