The Naked Gun

Legacy sequels usually suck. Luckily for fans of the Police Squad franchise, this one doesn’t.

Bringing back a series that hasn’t been heard from in over 30 years, this new iteration of The Naked Gun follows the son of Leslie Nielsen’s Frank Drebin character, Lieutenant Frank Drebin Jr. (Liam Neeson), as he tries to get to the bottom of a fatal car accident involving an Edentech employee and one of their new self-driving vehicles. Met by the victim’s distressed wife, Beth Davenport (Pamela Anderson), who implores Frank to help her solve her husband’s mysterious death, it isn’t long before the head of Edentech, Richard Cane (Danny Huston), gets involved — a man who may or may not be responsible for the recent theft of the “Primordial Law of Toughness Device,” or more the hilariously named, P.L.O.T. Device. As Frank and Beth continue their investigation, their situation becomes more dangerous and comedic by the second, with each new clue and joke bringing them closer to solving the case. Cue the dumb humor and sight gags!

I have to admit, even though I’ve seen the original Naked Gun trilogy, I’ve never watched the original Police Squad show the films are based on, nor did I have much of an attachment to the movies in the way some kids of the ‘80s did. That said, The Naked Gun reboot does everything it needs to pay homage, honor, and respectfully remix what came before, while still showing how smart stupid movies can be when they really lean into their schtick.

Held together by a joke-a-minute pacing, sight gags in every corner of the frame, bite-sized action set pieces that actually entertain, actors who are completely down for the stupidity they signed on for, and a general sense of humor that swings wildly from slapstick to parody to raunchy to anything and everything in between, this new version of The Naked Gun succeeds in updating not only the franchise it takes it’s name from, but brings a relatively sophisticated yet purposely dumb sort of humor back to the big screen in ways that I haven’t seen since the ‘90s.

Though I liked pretty much everything in this one to some degree (the coffee cup gags, snowman scene, and the constant wordplay bits stood out the most to me), I have to admit that The Naked Gun’s perfectly serviceable but still super simple story was almost too straightforward for me to fully enjoy — a bummer if only because the general framework of the plot is relatively interesting overall, especially when it comes to the idea of self-driving cars and how they could be repurposed as weapons.

Throw in the fact that for an 85-minute movie, there are a few points where the film drags, and this Naked Gun relaunch does enough right that I have no problem looking past some of its flaws. Of course, if this type of comedy doesn’t do it for you, there’s no chance you’ll like what you’re seeing, but to each his own when it comes to that. But at the consistent clip the filmmakers roll out the script’s over-the-top humor, odds are that you’ll like something even if it isn’t everything. I laughed out loud more than I usually do, so by default, this one was doing something right for me.

There isn’t too much meat on these funny bones, but it almost doesn’t matter when the filmmakers are so consistent with their specific brand of comedy from the start of its less than an hour and a half runtime to the very end of its in-credit and post-credit scenes. And while it’s inevitable that some jokes fall flat just because there are so many, my only real gripe with this one is that I wanted more of it! The Naked Gun succeeds in revitalizing a stagnant property from decades past, but also finds a way to show that comedy isn’t dead, it just needs to get stupider.