one of my favorite things about bradley is that while he so desperately wants to be like his father— enough so that he spends so much of his life trying to emulate him through style, music, profession, etc.— narratively he really is more like maverick. maybe not in the exact way that he flies, because we all know maverick is notoriously a daredevil while bradley is decidedly not, but even that has its own parallels with how ice and jake upon introduction immediately point out the flaws in their piloting styles (i heard that about you. you like to work alone. / that’s just you, ain’t it? waiting for just the right moment that never comes.). their methods are different, but both on the ground and up in the air, the two of them are always competing with a ghost. fathers that they can barely remember, whose legacies one way or another made it difficult for them to make it where they are in their careers— even though their fathers are such major motivators for why they chose aviation in the first place. they both have spent a lot of their lives on their own because of that and when it comes down to the final mission for each of their movies, they’re both shown being doubted as the right fit— once again by ice and jake (it’s nothing personal…but with regard to maverick…is he the best pick? / he’s not cut out for this mission. you know i’m right.). at the end of the day they manage to pull it off, but they have to overcome the obstacles that have plagued them for a majority of the movie. it’s not just the obvious scene callbacks that tether them as characters, it’s who they are at their core.