Being Tom Cruise appearance on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" as "the best gag in the whole episode". Aidan Smith of "Scotland on Sunday" wrote favorably of the show, and noted, "Fearlessly, in view of how paranoid Scientologists are, the latest target was Tom Cruise. I especially liked the scene where the tiny screen giant winched himself, Mission Impossible-style, on to Nicole Kidman while she slugged from a tinnie like a good Sheila." "The Daily Mirror" described the program as "far too funny". A review in "The Daily Mirror" was positive, commenting, "If you want to see a brilliant spoof about Tom Cruise's faith
Tom Cruise and "The Last Samurai" can also be considered to be part of this formula. "Widescreenings" noted that for Tom Cruise's character Daniel Kaffee in "A Few Good Men", "[screenwriter] Aaron Sorkin interestingly takes the opposite approach of "Top Gun", where Cruise also starred as the protagonist. In "Top Gun", Cruise plays Mitchell who is a 'hot shot' military underachiever who makes mistakes because he is trying to outperform his late father. Where Maverick Mitchell needs to rein in the discipline, Daniel Kaffee needs to let it go, finally see what he can do." Sorkin and director Rob Reiner are praised