The Naked Gun Review

The Naked Gun series receives the legacy sequel treatment with Liam Neeson taking the lead and showing off his silly side.

Frank Drebin Jr. (Neeson) is the son of a legendary police detective. When investigating a car collision, Drebin discovers the driver worked for the tech billionaire Richard Cane (Danny Huston), and a potential link to a bank robbery he foiled.

The original Naked Gun trilogy was a beloved set of films. They were breezy, silly films that had such a rapid-fire method of joke telling that something would land. This legacy sequel was made by fans of the original. Seth McFarlane produced the film, and there were plenty of references to Zucker, Abrahams, and Zucker comedies in his popular animated shows Family Guy and American Dad. In the director’s chair was Akiva Schaffer, a man known for making Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping, and his television credits include Saturday Night Live and Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

This fourth entry in the film set out its self-aware intentions early. The bank robbery involved a “P.L.O.T. Device” being stolen, and when Drebin spoke of a picture of his father, he said he wanted to be just like him but also different. That was a fitting description for the film since it blended the humour from the classic films with modern sensibilities and commentary.

There were plenty of jokes that would have fit in the original films. Neeson offered a deadpan performance worthy of Leslie Nielsen, where he said and did ridiculous things. Neeson plays into his action persona, where he showed himself to be a badass whilst mixing it with Naked Gun-style humour, like Drebin dressed up as a schoolgirl and fighting a line of henchmen. The Naked Gun was filled with gags, like a running gag where cops were given cups of coffee. More modern jokes involved the LAPD and American policing’s less-than-stellar reputation with race relations. The infrared spying scene had the biggest reaction during my screening. It was my favourite moment in the film since it appealed to my juvenile sense of humour.

The Naked Gun had a more bombastic plot than the previous films. It opened with a bank robbery that felt influenced by The Dark Knight and acted like a pre-credits scene from a James Bond or Mission: Impossible film. There were references to the Mission: Impossible movies, and the score sounded like it was composed by Hans Zimmer. It was fitting since the music was composed by Lorne Balfe, a Zimmer protégé and the composer for Mission: Impossible – Fallout and Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning. The villain’s plot was more ambitious than in the previous film, even if he ripped off Richmond Valentine from the first Kingsman movie.

The villain of the piece was a green tech billionaire who had a messiah complex and a massive ego. He was basically Elon Musk, with a little bit of Jeff Bezos. It’s great to see Hollywood developing the will to take shots at Musk instead of revering him. The Naked Gun follows Mickey 17 and Superman (2025) by having a Musk stand-in as a villain. The self-driving cars in The Naked Gun were more reliable than real-life Teslas.

It was nothing new for Naked Gun to aim for major figures. Naked Gun 2 ½ was about vested issues trying to stop the use of green energy and made fun of George H. W. Bush, whilst Naked Gun 3 1/3‘s third act took the mickey out of The Academy Awards.

The Naked Gun was a film made with love, and the humour ranged from amusing to downright hilarious. It was one of the sharpest Hollywood comedies to come out in years.