The Naked Gun Is Back With a New Detective in Charge

It’s been three decades since the sounds of slapstick sleuthing and grisly banana peels echoed throughout movie theaters, but the comedy classic is finally coming back. The Naked Gun, one of the all-time great spoof comedies, is officially back on its way to theaters. After several false starts, long waits, and sudden stops, Paramount and producer Peter Chernin have cast Liam Neeson as the next crime-cracking comedy star in the upcoming 2025 release set for August 1 of that year. Titled simply The Naked Gun, the film will be a “legacy sequel” that introduces Frank Drebin’s son as the new “main character.”

The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! was a hit in 1988, putting bumbling slapstick detective Frank Drebin (Leslie Nielsen) on par with Bogart’s Sam Spade and other dark and twisty detectives. Drebin was a portly, awkward cop who tried to stop the assassination of Queen Elizabeth II during her state visit to the U.S. The film’s gags were just stupid enough to get away with it, and audiences responded. The Naked Gun had two sequels in quick succession, both produced and directed by David Zucker, the son of American satire legends David Zucker and Jerry Zucker (Airplane!, Naked Gun). The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear, in 1991, saw Drebin stopping a nuclear terrorist from kidnapping the country’s top nuclear scientist. Then, in 1994, Naked Gun 33½: The Final Insult, Drebin gets out of retirement when the lead singer of the KBLs is killed and uncovers a plot to bomb the Academy Awards.

And then it all came to a grinding halt. 1994’s Naked Gun was the third film in six years, and the series sputtered out after that. In 2013, Paramount first tried reviving the character with a reboot that starred The Office’s Ed Helms as “Frank Drebin, no relation.” The reboot would later move to 20th Century Fox, but that iteration fell through. (The project is what would become Fox’s final film, released before Disney completed its acquisition of the studio.) Zucker had already passed on the original concept; at one point, producer Dan Goldberg, of The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear, wanted the original three to get back together to make a fourth Drebin film. But Zucker told him, “No chance.”

The original Naked Gun producer, Zucker, was a vital part of the trilogy, helping the film stay zany and put in a heavy dose of subversive gags. He tried to distance himself from the rebooted Drebin; when Helms’ Drebin was rebooted, Zucker would have nothing to do with it. “I don’t feel attached to it at all,” Zucker told Den of Geek in 2013. “I think there will be pressure to make it, and it will be inferior.” At the time, Zucker distanced himself completely from the franchise. “I didn’t even look at it,” he added. “I never read the script. I knew that they were in business talks with Fox… I still feel it’s better not to do it. I know we’ll never do it, but I still hope that no one will.”

In 2017, Zucker briefly reconnected with Drebin to help rewrite a draft of the movie where Frank Drebin’s son is a secret agent. A similar thing happened in 2021, when Seth MacFarlane was brought on to reboot the franchise, this time without Zucker at the helm.

That’s when Liam Neeson came to the rescue. Neeson is cast as Frank Drebin Jr., the police lieutenant son of Frank Drebin Sr. Drebin Jr. is a known “Son of a Police Squad,” as the Police Squad was the predecessor team to Drebin’s team of Police Squad.

A New Crew of Idiots

Paul Walter Hauser will also star in the upcoming film as Captain Ed Hocken, Jr., the son of Drebin Sr.’s partner Captain Ed Hocken. Paul Walter Hauser will also star in the upcoming Fantastic Four: First Steps as the Mole Man. Pamela Anderson also stars as the femme fatale Beth, who Drebin Jr. will have to crack to keep the Police Squad going after her brother is murdered. The ensemble also includes Kevin Durand, Danny Huston, Liza Koshy, Cody Rhodes, CCH Pounder, Busta Rhymes, and Eddy Yu.

The first trailer was released in April. As one might expect from a legacy sequel, the trailer was met with some backlash. Most of the jokes have aged surprisingly well, but that might not be the case for Neeson’s particular brand of action heroism from the Taken movies. Zucker himself told TMZ he regrets watching the trailer, commenting, “I can’t unsee it.” But don’t worry, folks. We all feel you, Zucker. As evidenced by the trailer, Neeson is more than down to dip back into the screwball genre and poke fun at some of the more iconic stunts he’s known for. At one point in the trailer, Drebin Jr. recites a somber note from the hit Taken trilogy, reciting “Once you kill a man for revenge, there’s no going back” before ripping the arms off of one of his attackers and using them as clubs. “A voice in your head saying over and over ‘That was awesome,’” he quips later on.

The first trailer even features an emotional beat that is both a tribute to the series and pokes gentle fun at it. Frank and Ed Jr. are tearing up in front of a set of plaques dedicated to their fathers’ contributions to the Police Squad.

As you can imagine, Drebin Jr.’s first case is just a façade for the grand scheme. The gist of the set-up is that Beth’s brother is murdered, and she enlists Drebin Jr. to help her solve the case before her brother is declared just another statistic or the Police Squad gets shut down. At one point, Drebin Jr. is correcting a suspect on his criminal past; one man claims he served 20 years for “man’s laughter.” “Manslaughter,” Drebin Jr. corrects him. “Must have been quite the joke.”

The jokes are all very much funnier. That is, if you are into bad puns, sending up cheesy action tropes, and laughs so loud they sound like canned laughter in public. Frank Drebin Jr. has the full uniform of trench coats, hidden weapons, and pithy one-liners delivered with an unearned deadpan confidence. And, of course, all the ways to fall and break your neck. As Drebin Jr. is taught by Anderson’s Beth Anderson on how to keep a detective’s badge hidden from criminals, he has to borrow a bathroom in a coffee shop. “We don’t allow that in the bathrooms,” the barista protests. “Excuse me, it’s for police business,” Drebin Jr. says and pushes the counter girl away with the barrel of his shotgun.

Dun dun DUNNNNN.

The Neeson-era Naked Gun will likely never take over the mantle as the defining crime-comedy of the last three decades. The original films are still classics, and these new gags will only ever pale in comparison to the easy, ground-breaking original set of films. But if the trailer is any indication, this looks like it’s a whole lot of silliness and nostalgia that is tailor-made for our post-COVID summer season.