It’s been a long road trying to get a Beverly Hills Cop reboot off the ground with plenty of rumors and a failed CBS pilot that was supposed to hand the franchise off to Axel Foley’s son (Brandon T. Jackson), but now we’re finally here and star Eddie Murphy is bringing out friends old and new to help stick the landing in a new film for Netflix.
Coming in Summer 2024, 30 years after the disappointing and bloated Beverly Hills Cop III (which found Axel chasing a case into the bowels of a Disneyland type theme park to uncover a counterfeit operation) and 40 years after the original action comedy classic, Axel F treads familiar territory. Murphy’s smartassed Detroit-bred cop is going back (back) to Cali wreck some buffets and turn a few bureaucrat’s faces red. At first glance, it looks like Kevin Bacon may be playing one such bureaucrat/authority figure while Joseph Gordon Levitt is on-board as a fellow cop and sidekick, flying choppers into traffic and rocking some seriously fab hair. Paul Reiser, Judge Reinhold, John Ashton, and Bronson Pinchot are also back in supporting roles, though the extent of their on-camera involvement is unknown. Here’s the synopsis:
Detective Axel Foley (Eddie Murphy) is back on the beat in Beverly Hills. After his daughter’s life is threatened, she (Taylour Paige) and Foley team up with a new partner (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and old pals Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold) and John Taggart (John Ashton) to turn up the heat and uncover a conspiracy.
Directed by relative newcomer Mark Molloy (an award-winner for some commercial shorts for Apple who replaced Batgirl and Bad Boys For Life directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah), Axel F looks like it’ll check all the boxes you’d want from a reboot of a beloved ’80s franchise, but will it offer much more than a few explosions, quips, and nostalgia? Will it have the edge that the first film and 1987’s Beverly Hills Cop II had?
Reboots are nothing new for Murphy. He struck gold working with Amazon on the long gestating Coming To America sequel in 2021, but that was a product of a team up between him and director Craig Brewer (a more experienced filmmaker and past collaborator of Murphy’s) that was majorly helped by the star’s willingness to step back at times and let Jermaine Fowler and the rest of the ensemble get some laughs. Time will tell if that’s the play here or if it’s even needed, but the chance to see Murphy step back into what is likely considered his signature role is too good to ignore outright, even if it might wind up feeling more like a greatest hits album than something fresh.
Axel F arrives in Summer 2024.
