Like it or not, Liam Neeson’s Naked Gun remake is officially coming in 2025
Directed by Akiva Schaffer, the Liam Neeson Naked Gun remake is now scheduled for July 2025
Aux News Liam Neeson
We need to ask ourselves, as a nation/world/people who are going to have to collectively live through this shit: Do we want Liam Neeson remaking The Naked Gun? (Not that our desires necessarily matter in this case: ABC News reports this weekend that Neeson’s remake of the long-running cop comedy franchise has now been officially set for a July 2025 by Paramount Pictures, with The Lonely Island’s Akiva Schaffer directing.)
There are arguments on both sides of the equation—the most obvious “pro” one being the ways Neeson’s career mimics that of his similarly initialed predecessor in the role of Police Squad! detective Frank Drebin, Leslie Nielsen. Both men spent years primarily being viewed as dramatic actors, with Nielsen playing the heavy for decades before Airplane! team Zucker, Abrahams, and Zucker noticed how well his pitch-perfect deadpan worked for comedy. Neeson’s career has similarly traveled far afield over the last 50 years, but almost all of those roles have benefited from his ability to withhold or deliver reactions in exactly the quantities required—a gift for comedy, as he’s demonstrated more than once. And Schaffer is a known comedy talent himself at this point, between directing Popstar, multiple episodes of I Think You Should Leave, and even that Chip ‘n Dale movie people genuinely liked from a few years back—so there’s no reason to worry he’d be the problem here.
The bigger question, to our mind, is whether Naked Gun itself is still a fit for the modern comedy world. Not in a dopey “They don’t let you make jokes like that!” anymore sense—the series was always more interested in rapid-fire silliness than anything especially profane or offensive—but in a wider sense of how studio comedies get made these days. There’s a reason, for instance, that ZAZ themselves eventually devolved into the Scary Movie franchise; there’s something about the Naked Gun “throw everything at the wall, every second, and see what sticks” approach that’s fallen a bit out of step with current-day comedy. (See, for instance, the lukewarm reception to TBS’s Angie Tribeca, a show that tried to be a modern Police Squad! to a nearly actionable extent, and then just sort of vanished, despite a genuinely hilarious performance from Rashida Jones.)
Again, though, Paramount is making this thing, no matter what we say: Schaffer will be working from a script he wrote with Dan Gregor and Doug Mand, who also wrote Chip ‘n Dale.
44 Comments
I mean, I think this is a bad idea irregardless, but at least this won’t be starring Ed Helms as initially announced.
I would love to see a return to the Police Squad! version of Drebin rather than the Naked Gun version. The show was drier and delivered much straighter, like Airplane!. I enjoyed the Naked Gun films a lot, don’t get me wrong, it’s just that they went kind of broad with the comedy in a way that felt like a step down.Drebin was part of a weird, farcical universe in the show, but everybody knew he was a dolt in the films, which is a different vibe. The show was canceled after four episodes and the three films were all very successful financially so I guess it’s probably a fait accompli that they’ll go with the latter. I’ll still watch and I bet it’ll be a lot of fun.
I guess for a movie to work, you kind of need the character to be an underdog in a way. But yeah, it doesn’t work as well. The show is “What if this were a serious cop show but full of wacky stuff?” while the movies are “What if this was a wacky cop movie that tried to take itself only slightly seriously?”
There’s something on the side of your mouth Mr. Furious.
We need to ask ourselves, as a nation/world/people who are going to have to collectively live through this shit: Do we want Liam Neeson remaking The Naked Gun?
Even as a pop culture website you can choose to ignore it.
You know, like you’re ignoring this season of Drag Race, which last I checked is still one of the most popular TV shows in the world.
If you can ignore that, then you can certainly ignore a new Naked Gun movie and live through some other shit of your choosing. Easy.
Can we stop with the ‘why don’t you do your job, pop culture website!’ complaints already? That ship sailed a long, long time ago. You’re just hurting yourself at this point.
But it’s our job as commenters to complain!
And dammit, we’re good at it!
Perhaps you’re replying to the wrong post.
I didn’t complain. I gave an option to ignore “this shit” (their words), which they evidently don’t have a problem with doing for other shows.
They don’t ignore anything, they ignore pretty much everything.
Look, I don’t disagree with that in general.
But in this specific case they’re the ones saying they’re going to have to “live through this shit”, i.e. they can’t ignore it. I’m just responding to that, which is a reasonable thing to do in a comment section for fun.
DID YOU HEAR THAT SOME TROPHY WIFE WHO’S COMPOSED MOSTLY OF BOTOX AND SILICONE MAY HAVE DONE COKE WITH SOMEONE ELSE?!?! STOP THE PRESSES!!!
Is that like being mostly dead?
The writers dont engage with the articles they write unless it’s gotten backlash on Twitter. We are all, collectively, hissing into the wind. How often do greyed commentators get vetted and added to the discussion? Never? As for the movie? I’m excited for a new take on the Police Squad formula. I hope it stays just as raunchy as ever. Scary Movie did not “devolve” from the ZAZ formula. Two very bad, but successful parody writers, Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, who had a positive working relationship with Leslie Nielson on their badly written film, Spy Hard, is why the Scary Movie franchise “devolved”.
Maybe they like it. Don’t kink-shame.
sorry, but we don’t need more coverage of reality tv here.
I adored Angie Tribeca, it was glorious. Damn I miss that show.
It was great.An entire plotline (I think about the captain– or lieutenant maybe, I forget; Jere Burns’ character– being ill in some fashion?) played out in the episode descriptions that never for a single second appeared in the actual show.
I loved the first seasons, but that last one was… not really working for me.
I dig Neesson and Shafer and I miss naked gun style so much I’m actually becoming nostalgic for Scary Movie God help me, so I’m down for this
i agree, im all in for a silly rapid fire joke movie. if its not being done these days, i submit that it should be. you need to take time for the ideas for jokes to build up, and i think the scary movie franchise was coming too often, but we had our palate cleansed, lets bring the silly again.
That “I wonder what President Ford would’ve done?” joke in Scary Movie 3 is one of the all-time greats.
I’m applying here because I have the most appropriate screen name for this article.
Neeson’s had a stranger career than simpler being a dramatic actor like Nielson was, having been a strong character actor/lead for decades and only becoming an action star with Taken in 2008. He’s been doing that for 16 years now, so if he successfully pivots to comedy, this will be a third act that really shows his versatility as a performer.
Frank Drebin: “I have a particular set of skills… in fact, here he comes now… I’d like you to meet Trevor Setofskills.”
No…
Can’t help but feel that while Neeson does have dry comedic chops to pull it off, someone like Jon Hamm would’ve knocked it out of the park.
Knocked it out of the park and then dragged it around by its genitals.
I think Jon Hamm lacks the subtlety to pull of Drebin, but now that you mention it, in 15 years he may very well resemble Leslie Nielsen.
Speaking of Mad Men actors, John Slattery also would work.
If they absolutely have to remake Naked Gun, Liam Neeson is a great choice. His performance in Life is Short is great.
And Derry Girls.
Shirley, you can’t be serious.
I dunno, she looks serious.
Who’s playing Nordberg? And Enrico Pallazzo?
I feel like this only got greenlit because Liam Neeson and Leslie Nielsen’s names are similar.
This is what happens when you call someone Shirley.
“ABC News reports this weekend that Neeson’s remake of the long-running cop comedy franchise has now been officially set for a July 2025 by Paramount Pictures, with The Lonely Island’s Akiva Schaffer directing.)”The first Naked Gun movie came out in 1988. The third and final movie came out in 1994.
And it’s been running long ever since.
For anyone doubting whether Liam Neeson can pull off deadpan comedy, you clearly have’t seen this:
Good news is they won’t have to recast Nordberg since O.J. Simpson is still around.
Why is this written in such an angry tone? I loved these films as a kid and I actually think Liam Neeson is something of an inspired casting choice.
Nice beaver.