Mel Gibson Gives Major ‘Lethal Weapon 5’ Update: “The Fifth Script Is Better Than All the Others”

Mel Gibson has given fans another update on Lethal Weapon 5, and the actor sounds confident about the script. The long-awaited sequel has been discussed for years, but production still has not started.

Speaking with Collider at Fan Expo Boston, Gibson explained that the new movie will show Martin Riggs and Roger Murtaugh at a very different point in their lives. The characters are older now, and the story will not rely on the huge action scenes that became common in later movies.

“The characters are quite different. They’re older. One’s retired. The other one’s on a desk job. He’s putting on too much weight, and it’s low-tech,” Gibson said.

That does not mean the movie will completely leave behind the spirit of the franchise. Gibson said the film will still have the energy of an action movie, but the focus will be more on the characters and their relationship.

“It doesn’t get into the big explosions and all this sort of stuff. But it still has the energy and, I think, drive of a big action film,” he explained.

Gibson also teased a different kind of action sequence. Instead of trying to make every scene bigger than the previous films, the sequel would use simpler ideas in creative ways.

“It’s a foot chase, right? But it’s kind of filmed like a car chase,” Gibson said. He added that the movie will still contain familiar elements from the earlier films while putting more attention on the people at the center of the story.

The actor also plans to direct Lethal Weapon 5 if the project finally gets moving. That would be especially meaningful because original director Richard Donner wanted Gibson to take over the franchise.

Gibson recalled a conversation with Donner in which the filmmaker asked him to direct the next movie if something happened to him. Gibson initially did not take the request seriously, but Donner eventually passed away in 2021.

After Donner’s death, Gibson worked with writer Richard Wenk to complete the script. According to Gibson, they tried to approach the story by asking what Donner would have wanted.

“Donner, when he was 90 years old, was working on the fifth, and of course he passed away in the middle. So I got together with the writer, and we completed it thinking, ‘What would Donner do?’” Gibson is particularly proud of the finished screenplay. In fact, he believes it could be the strongest script in the entire franchise.

“I think that the fifth script is better than all of the others,” he said. The main problem is getting the movie into production. Gibson said the project became stuck because of studio issues and has been sitting in what he described as “some kind of industrial film hell.”

The original Lethal Weapon arrived in 1987 and became a major hit, leading to three sequels starring Gibson and Danny Glover. Lethal Weapon 4 was released in 1998, meaning the proposed fifth movie would arrive more than two decades later.

For now, there is still no confirmed production date. However, Gibson suggested that changes involving Warner Bros. and Paramount could potentially help free the project and allow Lethal Weapon 5 to finally move forward.

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