Thirty-five years after Tom Cruise strapped into a stock car and gave NASCAR its biggest Hollywood moment, the sequel is inching closer to a green flag. Paramount is reportedly targeting Jonathan Levine to direct Days of Thunder 2, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Levine joins a project that already has considerable horsepower behind the camera. Cruise has been pushing for the sequel since Top Gun: Maverick proved that legacy sequels can print money when done right. Jerry Bruckheimer, who produced the 1990 original, is back on board.
Even Jeff Gordon has given his blessing, though the original film was actually inspired by the late Tim Richmond, not Gordon — a distinction that still gets muddled three decades later.
Levine is not an obvious choice for a racing movie. His filmography leans toward comedies and dramas — Warm Bodies, Long Shot, the underrated 50/50. But Paramount appears to be betting on his upcoming sports drama, Mr. Irrelevant: The John Tuggle Story, which chronicles the last pick of the 1983 NFL draft and has reportedly tested well with audiences.
The logic seems clear enough: if you can make people care about an obscure football player from 42 years ago, maybe you can make them care about stock cars again.
The original Days of Thunder was never a great movie. It was a great Tom Cruise movie, which is a different thing entirely. Robert Duvall gave it credibility, the racing sequences held up, and the script was essentially Top Gun on asphalt — nobody pretended otherwise.
It made $157 million worldwide on a $55 million budget. Not a blockbuster by today’s standards, but it embedded itself in the culture in ways the box office alone doesn’t capture.
Duvall’s passing last year means the sequel will lack one of the original’s most vital ingredients. Whoever steps into that mentor role — assuming one exists in the new script — has enormous shoes to fill. No casting beyond Cruise has been confirmed, and the project still lacks a publicly announced screenplay or production timeline.
The timing is interesting. Motorsport movies are suddenly fashionable again after years of Hollywood treating them like box office poison. Brad Pitt’s F1, produced by Bruckheimer’s frequent collaborator Apple, opened to massive global numbers earlier this year. Two major racing franchises competing for audience attention simultaneously would have been unthinkable five years ago.
Cruise is now 63. He’s still doing his own stunts in Mission: Impossible films, so the physicality probably isn’t the concern. The real question is whether a stock car movie can generate the same nostalgic pull as a fighter jet movie.
Maverick worked because audiences weren’t just buying a ticket to see F-14s — they were buying a ticket to feel something they felt in 1986. Days of Thunder 2 needs to find that same nerve, and NASCAR’s cultural footprint has shifted considerably since Cole Trickle last turned left.
No release date has been set. No production start has been announced. But with Cruise, Bruckheimer, and now a director circling, this is no longer just a rumor floated at a press junket. The pieces are assembling. Whether they fit together is another question entirely.
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