“Sassafras Chicken in D. Make it extra lumpy, boys.”
Of all the things the world needs right now, I can’t imagine a reboot of the 1988 comedy classic The Naked Gun would rank high on anyone’s list. Nevertheless, here we are in 2025 talking about The Naked Gun, the fourth film in the franchise, coming some 30 years after the last entry. Akiva Schaffer seems like an inspired choice as director and co-writer, as the Lonely Island founding member has directed some funny films in this same rapid-fire vein like Hot Rod and Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping.
If there’s one authorial voice that seems most responsible for what we see on screen in 2025’s The Naked Gun, however, it’s got to be producer Seth MacFarlane. The man clearly loves the Zucker-Abrams-Zucker brand of comedy wherein the landscape is saturated with jokes, but his brand of non-sequitur comedy is much more aggressive, forcing four jokes into a space where one would suffice. Joke density in and of itself is not a guaranteed formula, though, which this film proves within its first 15 minutes.
The film’s plot follows Frank Drebin Jr. (Liam Neeson) attempting to track down a stolen piece of tech known as the P.L.O.T. Device, before tech billionaire Richard Cane (Danny Huston) can use it for his own nefarious ends. Drebin’s macho male antics have made him a dinosaur within his own department of Police Squad, with his beleaguered Captain Ed Hocken Jr. (Paul Walter Hauser) attempting to keep him out of the crosshairs of Chief Davis (CCH Pounder). Also in the mix is femme fatale Beth Davenport (Pamela Anderson), on a quest for vengeance after her brother was murdered by Cane.
Schaffer and his co-writers are bound and determined not to repeat any gags from any of the three previous Naked Gun movies, a noble intention that makes me happy I didn’t have to hear Neeson warble his way through the national anthem as Enrico Palazzo, Jr. The problem is that the jokes are, for the most part, hacky sub-Family Guy cutaway gags or running bits that forget they’re running bits.
The film often just takes things a step too far past the point of funny. There’s a bit at the very end mimicking the freeze frames at the end of every episode of Police Squad, but Schaffer and company expand it beyond the simple joke and seek to make it more complex. Unfortunately, they only succeed in making the joke unfunny. This sort of thing rears its head several times in the film where a mildly amusing bit goes on for the length of a bible, killing any hope of comedy in the scene. Whether it’s an extended bit about Drebin’s diet causing him bathroom issues or a romantic rendezvous involving Frank, Beth, and a sentient snowman, the bits just go on far longer any of them need to.
Liam Neeson’s third career act has been closer to the mold of Charles Bronson’s later career, not Leslie Nielsen’s. Like Bronson in his Cannon Films days, Neeson’s sincerity provides tons of unintentional comedy in his action films. However, Neeson is completely lost in comedy, particularly gag-heavy spoof movie type comedy played with a straight face. On the surface, he may seem like the right guy for the assignment, but he just couldn’t be more wrong for this kind of movie and this style of comedy. Imagine The Naked Gun in 1988 starring Charles Bronson and you’ve got a pretty decent grasp on the incongruousness of the two. Maybe the audience would’ve seen it coming more, but Steve Carell could have nailed this role and the movie’s poorer for insisting on casting against type.
It’s appropriate that Danny Huston, a spoof of a movie villain, is playing the villain in a spoof movie. The dude oozes “rich scumbag” out of every pore, but without the gravitas of previous franchise villains like Ricardo Montalban, Fred Ward, or (dare I say it) Robert Goulet, he makes no impact. Hauser, Pounder, and several other excellent character actors are also given little to nothing to do, turning them into stock caricatures more than characters.
Most unscathed here is Pamela Anderson, whose career renaissance is fully underway thanks to last year’s The Last Showgirl. Her jazz scatting nightclub scene made me smile, and she’s giving her all here, acquitting herself about as well as can possibly be expected. Again, there are other actors who could’ve done it more effortlessly (think Jennifer Tilly or Jennifer Coolidge), but I am pleased to see Anderson’s hot streak continue.
The number one problem with 2025’s The Naked Gun is that it just didn’t feel like a Naked Gun movie. It felt like one of those lesser spoof movies that Leslie Nielsen himself wasn’t immune from starring in like Spy Hard, Wrongfully Accused, or 2001: A Space Travesty. It is, quite frankly, inelegant as a spoof movie. There’s no noticeable spoof here of cop movies or heist movies or even Liam Neeson movies, or any of the tropes contained therein. It has the feel of a comedy, just without the laughs. It’s a damn shame, too, because you can tell they were really trying.
Header image via IMDb