Fans of the Naked Gun franchise may need to brew some coffee and stay patient before finding out if Police Squad will soon tackle another case.
Director Akiva Schaffer‘s feature reboot The Naked Gun hit theaters last summer from Paramount Pictures and starred Liam Neeson, Pamela Anderson and Paul Walter Hauser. This marked the fourth entry in the film series that kicked off with Leslie Nielsen starring as detective Frank Drebin in directorDavid Zucker‘s original 1988 movie after the character originated on ABC’s Police Squad!
During a conversation with The Hollywood Reporter to promote Thursday’s launch for the second season of Peacock series Ted, Seth MacFarlane — who produced last year’s The Naked Gun through his Fuzzy Door banner — weighed in on the chances for a potential sequel in which Neeson would reprise his role as Frank Drebin Jr.
“I know everyone would love to, including Liam,” MacFarlane says. “We have not heard anything yet. I think it’s all up to Paramount.”
The reboot of The Naked Gun hit theaters last August and collected $102 million at the global box office. Prior to its release, the film was watched closely as a possible referendum on whether audiences would support comedy features — and spoof movies in particular — given that those types of projects have not been as prevalent in theaters as they were decades ago.
Pamela Anderson plays Beth Davenport and Liam Neeson plays Frank Drebin Jr. in The Naked Gun.
Paramount Pictures
In a conversation with THR timed to the 2025 film’s release, screenwriters Dan Gregor and Doug Mand said that they had begun making notes with ideas for a potential follow-up. “Dan and I have notebooks already that we’re already starting to just jot down ideas on,” Mand said. “Akiva is the same way, to a degree.”
Following the film’s release, producer Erica Huggins told THR that there had been talks among the project’s team about a possible sequel: “Akiva and Dan and Doug, our writers — we’re all talking about it.”
When asked earlier this year about the prospects of a sequel, Schaffer told CBR, “We are not planning another,” but noted that some ideas had previously been discussed. The director also pointed out that Skydance Media’s acquisition of Paramount Global getting finalized days after the release of The Naked Gun could potentially complicate the path for a sequel: “[The merger] was about seven days after the movie came out, and so we’re waiting to see if they would want it.”
In his review of last year’s The Naked Gun for THR, chief film critic David Rooney wrote, “There are enough laugh-out-loud moments to keep nostalgic fans of the earlier films happy and maybe make some new converts.”