Seth MacFarlane seems to have officially entered the “remaking ‘80s comedies to support a Frank Sinatra cover act side-hustle” phase of his career. The Family Guy creator is currently promoting a new album called Lush Life, in which he croons along with “lost” Sinatra arrangements. Of course, they weren’t really lost, but whatever.
MacFarlane just guested on the Kyle Meredith With… podcast and was asked about two upcoming projects he’s producing, both of which are remakes of beloved ‘80s comedies. On the subject of this summer’s The Naked Gun. MacFarlane explained that the project began with his interest in seeing Ted 2’s Liam Neeson take on the role of Frank Drebin, describing the draft that he co-wrote as a “cover band version of The Naked Gun.”
MacFarlane also chatted about the streaming TV remake of Joe Dante’s 1989 comedy The ‘Burbs, starring Keke Palmer. The original, of course, starred Tom Hanks as a paranoid suburbanite who begins to suspect that his neighbors are murderous Satanists. How could any of that possibly be relevant in 2025… Oh, wait nevermind.
“The ‘Burbs is more of a departure from the original, it fits much more with today’s landscape,” MacFarlane said of the Peacock series, revealing that it’s “more of a mystery” than the movie, which he argued is “not quite as hallowed a ground as The Naked Gun is. But it has its cult fanbase, and hopefully they’ll be happy with it.”
MacFarlane does count himself among the movie’s dedicated fans, recalling that he watched the movie on laserDisc “on repeat throughout so much of the ‘90s.” And he made a pretty bold claim about The ‘Burbs. “I still try to say, if anyone will go along with me, that that might be Tom Hanks’ finest performance. There is so much brilliance in his performance.”
He makes a good point. Hanks won an Oscar for playing Forrest Gump, but there’s not one second of that movie even comes close to equaling this scene:
“Yes, he’s fantastic in Cast Away. Philadelphia was wonderful,” MacFarlane continued, “(but) there’s many many great actors, I think, who could have done Philadelphia, as great as Tom Hanks was. There’s nobody but Tom Hanks who could have done The Money Pit or The ‘Burbs. Impossible. They’re just two of the most brilliant comedic performances ever.”
While MacFarlane is clearly a huge fan of Hanks’ performance in The ‘Burbs, he’s less enamored with the way the story wraps up. Spoiler alert for a 36-year-old Tom Hanks movie, I guess. “The original — the ending is so absurd,” the American Dad star complained. “The fact that (the neighbor) has a trunk full of skeletons in his car. Isn’t that lucky for Tom Hanks and Rick Ducommun and Bruce Dern? That this was so convenient. It turns out they were right!”
It’s unclear if he prefers the alternate ending in which Hanks’ character tragically dies.