Top Gun 2 filming started TODAY: Is Val Kilmer back as Iceman? LOOK at him now

Back in 1986 two young actors in a hurry for fame and fortune both felt the need for speed.

Both Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer looked like they were on the fast track to major international stardom.

By the end of the 1990s only one was still a huge star.

Cruise has just confirmed the first day on set for Top Gun 2, which will hit cinemas next summer, but where is his on screen nemesis?

Cruise said: “Stylistically it’s going to be same. Aviators are back. The need for speed.

“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.”

But what about Iceman?

Kilmer has made no secret of his hopes for a comeback in the movie, posting a series of rather blatant bids for attentions. He’s even wearing an Iceman t-shirt…

Back in November 2016, Kilmer notoriously announced that he was involved in Top Gun 2 and then, humiliatingly, was forced to withdraw his statement. He wrote: “I just got offered Top Gun2 – not often you get to say “yes” without reading the script…”

Shortly after he issued a lengthy retraction, adding: “I jumped the top gun.”

Cruise and Jerry Bruckheimer have reunited for the sequel, butthere is still no news about another other returning cast memmebers like Kilmer, Kelly McGillis or Anthony Edwards.

Im May last year Kilmer posted two suggestive images.the first read: “Friends said it’s official – TOP GUN 2 was announced today. I’m ready Tom – still got my top gun plaque! Still got the moves! Still got it!”

Almost two weeks later, he posted his own artwork, a painted image (again) of himself as Ice Man. He wrote: “New art of ICE MAN.”

Hours later he was even less subtle with a new post of himself back in the same T-shirt with the comment: “Still got it… Just saying.”

Cruise, it seems, also feels the need to keep his thoughts to himself. Just saying…

Top Gun 2: Maverick hits UK cinemas on July 12, 2019.