The Naked Gun (2025)
Directed by Akiva Schaffer
No — The Naked Gun is not especially woke, scoring 20 out of 100 on our wokeness meter.
The Naked Gun (2025) is a legacy sequel and reboot that understands its only duty is the joke.
Consciousness Markers
The villain is a tech billionaire (Edentech's Richard Cane) who plots to cull the population so his fellow billionaires can survive in a bunker, and the climax occurs at 'Ponzi-scheme.com Arena.' The eat-the-rich satire is present but played entirely for laughs.
The cast is reasonably diverse for a studio comedy, with CCH Pounder as Police Chief Davis, Liza Koshy, Eddie Yu, Moses Jones and Michael Beasley in supporting roles, plus Pamela Anderson as the female co-lead. However, this is ensemble comedy casting rather than any deliberate representational statement.
Beth is a capable crime novelist who drives part of the investigation and a woman runs the Police Squad, but these are functional roles in a spoof rather than any articulated feminist argument.
The film features a diverse cast but makes no comment on race, racism, or racial identity at any point.
This is a slapstick parody whose only stated purpose is to make people laugh; it delivers jokes, not sermons.
A self-driving electric car is used as a running gag and a murder weapon, but the film has no environmental message or climate theme.
No LGBTQ+ characters, themes, or subtext appear anywhere in the film.
No body-positivity themes or messaging of any kind.
No neurodivergent characters or themes are present.
The film is a contemporary spoof with no historical subject matter to revise.
Why it received this score
The Naked Gun (2025) is a legacy sequel and reboot that understands its only duty is the joke. Liam Neeson plays Frank Drebin Jr. with gravelly solemnity. Pamela Anderson supplies capable co-lead energy. The ensemble includes CCH Pounder as the police chief and a handful of supporting players who reflect the modern studio comedy call sheet. This is not representation as argument. It is representation as casting logistics. The film has no interest in making a statement about race, gender, or sexuality. It wants to put a self-driving electric car through a plate-glass window and see what happens.
Where the film brushes against contemporary social consciousness, it does so with a shrug and a punchline. The villain is a tech billionaire who plans to cull the population from a bunker. The climactic arena is named after a Ponzi scheme. That is eat-the-rich satire, but it is played for laughs, not for a manifesto. A woman runs Police Squad and a crime novelist drives part of the investigation. The movie treats these as functional roles in a spoof. The electric car is a running gag and a murder weapon, not a climate sermon. There is no LGBTQ subtext, no body-positivity message, no neurodivergent arc, and no historical revisionism. The film is set in a permanent present tense of slapstick.
The result is a comedy with a low lecture threshold. It delivers jokes, not sermons. The humor is broad, silly, and occasionally committed to bits that should not work. A magical snowman threesome occurs. A pantsless arena finale occurs. The film's cultural awareness is incidental. It reflects a diverse casting landscape because that is the industry now. It makes billionaires the bad guys because billionaires are convenient villains. It does not ask us to examine our complicity or rethink our assumptions. It asks us to watch Liam Neeson punch a man in the gut while an owl provides air support. That is not a moral program. It is a gag. The Naked Gun knows exactly what it is, and it refuses to pretend otherwise.
{"thematic_tags":["sequel","remake"]}
Analysis generated by our Consciousness Algorithm
Part of
Synopsis
Only one man has the particular set of skills... to lead Police Squad and save the world: Lt. Frank Drebin Jr. Following in his father's footsteps, he must solve a murder case to prevent Police Squad from closure.
Questions about The Naked Gun
Is The Naked Gun woke?
No — The Naked Gun is not especially woke, scoring 20 out of 100 on our wokeness meter. That earns it a verdict of Based.
Does The Naked Gun have any woke elements?
2 of the 10 markers register at 30 or above, led by Eat the Rich (45) and Representation Casting (35). On Eat the Rich: The villain is a tech billionaire (Edentech's Richard Cane) who plots to cull the population so his fellow billionaires can survive in a bunker, and the climax occurs at 'Ponzi-scheme.com Arena.' The eat-the-rich satire is present but played entirely for laughs.
How does The Naked Gun compare to other 2025 movies?
It ranks #103 of the 217 films from 2025 we've scored; their average is 26. The wokest is STRAW (92).
How is the Woke Score calculated?
An AI-assisted process researches the film and its reception, scores it 0–100 on ten markers, then combines those into one 0–100 Woke Score. It measures a specific set of 2020s cultural themes, not film quality.