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Originally Posted by unsunghero
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I’ve heard the navy actually donates their planes and carriers to use for those movies
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They were doing that all the way back in the 40's and 50's. It was more common back then than it is now because hollywood movies tended to be more pro-military back then. For what should be obvious reasons the U.S. military generally won't support films it sees as anti-military.
If the admiral is a jerk and the pilots get treated like dirt it's basically accurate to life. Pilots are expensive to train and always limited in number but for some reason the armed forces continue treating them like they're disposable. It fuels their exodus to civilian jobs which generally already pay better for less injury risk. The Navy may have known this is an issue and wants to get it some publicity in a deniable manner (ie, nobody wants to put his own job on the line). The original "Top Gun" film was used in part to try to raise public awareness (and hence, get people yelling at Congress) of the faults with the F-14. The scene where the RIO dies is basically true-to-life; the plane suffers a compressor stall and engine flame-out, the pilot instinctively but incorrectly tries to fight it with the stick instead of with opposite pedal, the plane rapidly enters an unrecoverable flat spin and they're left with no option but punch out. A number of real F-14 crews were injured or killed in similar fashion, and for a number of years Congress didn't want to fund any remedies like engine replacement.
There are also a couple of brief but very neat shots of a rolling scissors towards the end of the first film. As with the above, it is not directly explained for people who don't know what they're seeing. If the new film has similar tidbits, it might be worth a watch.
Danth