‘Top Guns: The Next Generation’ Shows the Successes and Struggles of Aspiring Fighter Pilots

Andrew Seepe always dreamed of sitting behind the controls of an F-18 Super Hornet.

When he was a boy and his mother -- a medical officer in the Navy at the time -- was stationed at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point in North Carolina, his family attended air shows. The Blue Angels fascinated Seepe.

Later on, Seepe was mesmerized by an article about what it was like for a fighter pilot to take off and land on an aircraft carrier.

“It was just so vivid and emotional and exciting,” Seepe told Military.com. “That kind of bug blossomed more into a burning passion to pursue at that point.”

Dreams often have a way of crashing broadside into reality. Seepe’s ambitions never died.

Series Chronicles Student Pilots in Advanced Phase Training

Seepe is one of the aspiring Navy and Marine Corps aviators featured in “Top Guns: The Next Generation.” The six-part docuseries is scheduled to be broadcast every Tuesday from Sept. 16 to Oct. 21 at 9 p.m. Eastern time on National Geographic. “Top Guns: The Next Generation” will stream the following day on Disney+ and Hulu.

The series features a core group of eight student pilots as they navigate their way through the challenges of advanced phase training, including dogfighting, bombing tests and, yes, practicing landings on an aircraft carrier.

Naval Air Station Meridian in Mississippi served as their main training base, with some filming also being done at Naval Air Facility El Centro in California. Seepe, a lieutenant, was interviewed to potentially be in “Top Guns: The Next Generation” while based at Training Air Wing One at Meridian, and his backstory interested the showrunners enough for him to be accepted.

Seepe, who graduated from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida with a degree in uncrewed aircraft systems, sought a waiver from the Navy for three years because of a severe allergy to bee stings. The back-and-forth tested Seepe’s resolve, but he ultimately achieved his goal. The Navy granted the waiver in January 2020, Seepe said.

“It was a time of some soul-searching and some questioning about whether or not I was ever going to be able to do what I wanted to do,” he recalled to Military.com.

“[My classmates were] like, ‘Dude, you’re such a character. We’re not surprised that National Geographic picked you, especially with your background, all the difficulty to get here.’ I just felt like it was a good opportunity to share a good story that maybe would inspire others.”

‘The Beauty of Being Able to Fly’

Filming began in April 2024 and lasted for six months. Not wanting the camera crews to distract him from the actual training, Seepe said he ignored them as best he could. With the flood of information being thrown at the student pilots, focusing on tasks was essential.

Seepe considered dropping bombs as the funnest part of training and called dogfighting the most challenging.

“There’s a bit of Hollywood in there, but I think they’ve done a good job of capturing the struggles, the emotions and the beauty of being able to fly,” Seepe said.

“Top Guns: The Next Generation” isn’t just full of beautiful aerial scenes, which were shot by the same production company that worked on “Top Gun: Maverick.” It intends to show a fuller picture of what aspiring fighter pilots endure.

“One of the good things that’s shown throughout the show is, we’re not perfect,” Seepe said. “We make a lot of mistakes, and one of the things we take away from our mistakes is our learning. The atmosphere that is set throughout the strike community is, ‘You learn from your mistakes, and you need to be a sponge and continue to learn, continue to improve, continue to be better.’

“I feel like, from the outside, the strike, the jet guys are [viewed as] perfectionists, cocky, that kind of thing.”

‘Oh, My, That’s What Dad Did’

Now based at Naval Air Station Oceana in Virginia, Seepe doesn’t have time to be cocky. Because he doesn’t know where he will be on the flight schedule, he is unsure whether he will watch the premiere episode of “Top Guns: The Next Generation” when it first airs.

At some point, he intends to sit down with his wife and see what made the final cut. Whatever shots “Top Guns: The Next Generation” used, Seepe will see it as another example of how far he has come.

“This is something that, in 20 years, my kids can watch and go, ‘Oh, my, that’s what Dad did. That’s really cool,’” Seepe said. “As opposed to when your dad told you stories about what he did, it’s one thing, but to go back and watch a documentary with all this footage, like, ‘You really did all this really cool stuff.’”

One really cool thing that Seepe has yet to do is to fly a F-18 Super Hornet. It’s a dream unfulfilled, but when he achieves it, his past suggests no one should be surprised.

Related: 2 Elite Marine Corps Pilots Reveal What It's Like to Fly a F-35B Fighter Jet

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