Tom Cruise's Next Legacyquel Should Be 'The Color of Money,' But He Plays 9-Ball on the Moon

I have an insatiable need to watch Tom Cruise risk his life on screen, so I request that his next film send him to the Moon.

This was originally published on Robot Butt.

Like every other person on the planet, I was left in awe by the aerial cinematography of Top Gun: Maverick. It’s an engrossing action spectacle unlike anything else we’ve ever seen before, and it demands our repeat business on the biggest screen possible.

On top of Cruise’s recent stunt heroics in the Mission: Impossible series, which continue to push the envelope further with each installment, I’ve realized that I’ve developed an addiction. I have now cultivated an insatiable desire to watch Tom Cruise defy death on screen and I require that he immerse me in the most incredible action set pieces the human mind can conjure. If this includes pushing one’s body to its absolute limits, that’s all the better. Cruise certainly seems to agree.

But these tastes of cinematic ambrosia come but every other year or so, and that will simply no longer suffice. And now that legacyquels are in play for Cruise, I’ve reviewed his filmography extensively and am now formally requesting that his next project be a continuation of The Hustler/Color of Money series, with his character Vincent Lauria playing 9-ball on the moon in this third film.

I know Cruise has to be looking towards the heavens for his next filmmaking frontier. Aside from maybe staging some thrilling hand-to-hand combat at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, Cruise has accomplished nearly everything he can on this planet. It’s time he took to space.

What better character to do this with than Lauria, the talented but cocky 9-ball stud who can never seem to get out of his own way? Though we only know him as a young man in 1986’s The Color of Money, it’s safe to say he’s still spending his days in pool halls when we once again check in on him, still hustling the local scene.

That is until, let’s say, an invading alien species demands a 9-ball tournament with the world’s best players to ultimately decide the fate of the planet.

Set on a neutral site like the Moon, Lauria must overcome his own past and internal demons to save humankind. Maybe we can bring in a hologram of Paul Newman as his former mentor Eddie Felson while we’re at it.

Most importantly, this sequel allows us as an audience to see Tom Cruise literally get blasted into space and film the climax of a movie on the Moon. I haven’t thought the technology through much yet, but I imagine the tournament would take place in some environmental bubbles that would replicate the gravity of Earth – you know, to make the tournament fair.

And being the action junkie that he is, it’s important to include a subplot or two that will require Cruise to do some of his patented sprinting on the Moon, perhaps firing some alien weapon tech during one of the many battles that will take place between the more understated – though no less tense – games of pool.

I’ll do whatever it takes to get this pitch in front of Cruise. I’ll become an Operating Thetan and ascend to OT VIII if I have to in order to get a script into his hands. Assuming I won’t be completely cut off from the rest of society at that point and will be able to actually see the movie instead of being at sea above the Freewinds Scientology ship as a full-fledged member of their space navy, it’ll all be worth it.

Then, once this movie makes a cool billion, I’ll begin to ready my pitch for Cocktail: Annihilation.