Here’s the One Time I Laughed During Eddie Murphy’s “The Pickup”

Eddie Murphy has been making people laugh longer than some of us have been alive. From
Beverly Hills Cop to Coming to America, his career is basically a highlight reel of
quotable one-liners and chaotic set pieces. So when Amazon MGM Studios announced
The Pickup an action-comedy heist movie co-starring Pete Davidson, Keke Palmer, and Eva
Longoria the expectation was simple: this thing should be at least pretty funny.

And yet, for a lot of viewers and critics, the movie lands like an armored truck with four flat
tires. Reviews called it generic, forgettable, and an almost heroic waste of the cast’s talent.
That’s exactly the frustration behind Tara Ariano’s Cracked essay, “Here’s the One Time I
Laughed During Eddie Murphy’s ‘The Pickup’” a piece that basically argues: this movie is an
action comedy in which the “comedy” part rarely clocks in.

Today, we’re taking that premise and examining it from a fresh angle: why is it so hard for
The Pickup to land laughs, what’s going on in that one genuinely funny moment, and what
this all says about modern streaming comedies, Eddie Murphy’s legacy, and the way our sense of
humor has shifted.

What “The Pickup” Is Supposed to Be

On paper, The Pickup sounds like a slam dunk. The plot: Russell (Eddie Murphy), a
near-retirement armored truck driver in New Jersey, gets paired on a routine route with rookie
guard Travis (Pete Davidson), who dreams of becoming a cop. Their mundane shift explodes into
chaos when they’re ambushed by a criminal crew led by Zoe (Keke Palmer), who has way bigger
plans than just lifting a bag of cash.

The ingredients sound solid:

• A veteran comedy legend (Murphy) as the weary straight man.
• A chaos goblin sidekick (Davidson) who can riff on anything.
• Keke Palmer as a stylish villain with charisma to spare.
• A casino heist hook, car chases, and lots of opportunities for physical gags.

Directed by Tim Story, known for movies like Barbershop and Ride Along, the film is
positioned as a slick, fast-paced heist comedy designed for a Friday night on the couch with
Prime Video.

The problem, according to both critics and disappointed fans, is that all that potential gets
buried under flat jokes, generic dialogue, and action that feels like it was assembled from a
streaming-service template. Reviewers compared it unfavorably to Murphy’s earlier hits and even
to some of his more infamous misfires.

Why So Many Viewers Barely Laughed

Comedy is subjective, but when you have a big-budget Eddie Murphy movie and the general vibe
from Rotten Tomatoes, major outlets, and pop-culture writers is “I smiled twice,” something’s
off.

1. The Action-Comedy Mismatch

The Pickup leans heavily into car crashes, gunfire, and big, loud set pieces. The heist stakes
are there: armored trucks, casino money, betrayals, and double-crosses. But the comedy rarely
grows out of those situations. Instead of using the action to heighten the absurdity like in
21 Jump Street or Hot Fuzz the film tends to pause for dialogue that sounds like
placeholder banter (“That could’ve gone better,” “We’re so dead,” etc.), then slam the gas
again.

The result? You don’t get tight verbal comedy or inventive physical humor. You just get
explosions with occasional wisecracks sprinkled on top.

2. Eddie Murphy Is Stuck in “Low-Energy Legend” Mode

Murphy has reached the “I’ve earned the right to be chill” phase of his career, and honestly,
fair. But in The Pickup, that muted performance sometimes feels less like deliberate
deadpan and more like he’s conserving energy for his next, better project like the upcoming
Pink Panther reboot or another round as Axel Foley in Beverly Hills Cop.

Critics noted that Murphy seems disengaged, especially in action scenes where stunt doubles and
digital trickery do a lot of the heavy lifting. When your lead isn’t fully leaning into either
chaos or charisma, it becomes extra hard for the jokes to land.

3. A Script That Confuses References with Comedy

Modern action-comedies often fall into the trap of mistaking “characters mentioning memes” for
actual jokes. Several reviews of The Pickup point out that much of the humor relies on
characters reacting in familiar ways (“That’s above my pay grade,” “We’re not getting paid
enough for this”) rather than saying anything uniquely witty or character-driven.

Tara Ariano’s Cracked piece leans into this disappointment: she notes that the film is
technically “not awful,” but as an action comedy, it offers very few real laughs. When your
movie’s funniest gag can be counted on one hand and that hand still has fingers left that’s
not ideal.

The One Time the Movie Actually Earns a Laugh

So what’s that one moment that actually works? Ariano describes a single gag late in the movie
that finally got an honest, involuntary laugh out of her the kind that sneaks past your
disappointment and catches you off-guard.

Without spoiling every beat of the scene for anyone who still plans to watch, the joke hinges
on a simple formula:

1. A character is forced to improvise in a high-stakes situation.
2. The choice they make is both weirdly specific and perfectly in-character.
3. The camera actually holds long enough for us to see the reaction and process the absurdity.

It’s a small moment not a big stunt, not an expensive explosion, just a smart beat that
briefly aligns character, timing, and stakes. For one shining second, The Pickup remembers
how comedy works.

That’s what Ariano latches onto in the Cracked essay: the frustration of realizing, “Oh, they
can be funny when they want to they just don’t do it nearly enough.”

Why That Single Joke Stands Out So Much

Setup, Payoff, and Surprise

Good comedy needs rhythm. Even the silliest gag usually works because the setup gives your
brain a pattern and the punchline breaks it. In the rare successful moment of
The Pickup, the filmmakers let the tension build, allow the audience to make a reasonable
prediction about what’s coming, and then knock the scene sideways with an unexpected character
choice.

Most of the other jokes in the movie don’t get this kind of structure. They either arrive too
fast, without setup, or linger too long, killing the momentum. That one “I actually laughed”
moment stands out precisely because it respects comedic timing.

Character-Based Humor vs. Generic Quips

The best Eddie Murphy comedies work because the humor is deeply tied to who his characters are.
Axel Foley in Beverly Hills Cop isn’t just a guy who says funny things; he’s a motor-mouthed
hustler constantly outsmarting the snobs around him. Even in broader films, Murphy usually finds
some angle a voice, a mannerism, a specific worldview that makes the character feel like a
fully formed comedic creation.

In The Pickup, Russell is mostly defined by being tired and ready to retire. That’s relatable,
but not inherently funny. The one solid gag works because it momentarily cracks open Russell’s
shell and reveals something sharper and more idiosyncratic a glimpse of the clever, reactive
Murphy we know he can be.

What This Says About Modern Streaming Comedies

The experience of chuckling exactly once during a “comedy” isn’t unique to The Pickup.
It’s a symptom of something bigger happening in the streaming era.

1. The Middle-of-the-Road Algorithm Movie

Streaming platforms love safe bets: recognizable stars, familiar genres, and broad premises.
The Pickup feels engineered to sit comfortably in that middle lane something you click on
because “Eddie Murphy + heist + Pete Davidson” sounds like a decent background watch while you
scroll your phone.

The problem is that truly memorable comedies are rarely this cautious. They’re weird. They’re
specific. They lean into a point of view that might not work for everyone which is exactly
why they’re so beloved by the people they do work for.

2. The “Comedy” Label Has Gotten Fuzzy

Over the last decade, we’ve seen more films marketed as “action-comedies” or “dramedies” where
the humor is more of an optional garnish than the main dish. Critics at places like
Cracked, RogerEbert.com, and The Guardian have all touched on the question of what
audiences now expect from big-screen and streaming comedy: is a handful of smirks enough to
qualify, or should we still demand real belly laughs?

The Pickup ends up as a case study in that blurry category. It’s not aggressively unfunny;
it’s just lightly amusing in a way that’s easy to forget the next day.

Eddie Murphy’s Legacy vs. The One-Laugh Movie

Here’s the good news: one underwhelming streaming movie is not taking Eddie Murphy down. His
legacy spans stand-up specials, iconic characters, and multiple generations of fans quoting his
lines at each other.

But The Pickup does highlight how hard it is to live up to your own myth. When audiences see
Murphy in a new comedy, they’re not just comparing him to his peers; they’re comparing him to
the version of him embedded in their memory the guy who turned a laugh into a full-body
experience.

That’s part of what makes the “I laughed once” framing so effective. It’s not just a burn;
it’s an expression of grief from comedy fans who want more from a legend than algorithm-safe
heist banter.

So… Is “The Pickup” Worth Watching?

Honestly, it depends on your mood and your expectations.

• If you’re looking for a truly hilarious Eddie Murphy showcase, you’re better off rewatching
  his classics or checking out some of the sharper modern comedies on streaming.
• If you just want a light, mildly entertaining heist movie with a stacked cast and one or two
  decent laughs, The Pickup can absolutely fill a low-stakes movie night.
• If you’re a comedy nerd who likes dissecting why jokes do or don’t work, this might actually
  be a fascinating watch especially paired with Tara Ariano’s essay for context.

Just go in knowing this isn’t the next Trading Places or Coming to America. It’s more like
“Eddie Murphy clocks in for a decent day at the office,” with one truly memorable gag hiding in
the back half of the runtime.

500 Extra Words: What It Feels Like to Laugh Once During a Comedy

There’s a special kind of awkwardness that comes from watching a comedy and not laughing.
You’re sitting there, waiting for the movie to do the thing the marketing promised it would do.
The trailer said “hilarious.” The poster used at least two pull quotes involving the word
“fun.” The algorithm slapped this into the “Laugh-Out-Loud” category. Your brain is primed for
joy and instead, you’re just… observing.

With a movie like The Pickup, that non-laugh experience stretches out even more because you
know these people can be funny. You’ve seen Murphy obliterate a room with a look. You’ve
seen Pete Davidson riff his way out of weak material. You’ve watched Keke Palmer steal entire
movies with a single reaction shot. Waiting for this particular movie to start being funny
feels like waiting for a band you love to finally play one of their hits and they keep
insisting on new stuff.

Then, finally, the moment hits. A line reading, a visual gag, a bit of physical comedy
whatever it is, it just works. You actually laugh out loud, partly because the joke is good,
and partly because you’re relieved to know you still remember how to laugh. That’s the
experience Ariano describes in her Cracked piece: not rolling in the aisles, not clutching your
sides, just one honest, surprised laugh that feels like finding a single M&M at the bottom of
an otherwise empty bag.

Afterwards, you start playing the dangerous game of “What if the whole movie felt like that?”
Imagine if the script had leaned harder into character-based humor. Imagine if the director had
given the cast more room to improvise. Imagine if the action scenes had been constructed like
setups instead of obligations. Suddenly, the film stops being just “kind of boring” and turns
into this alternate-universe masterpiece that exists only in your head.

That one laugh becomes a weird little anchor in your memory. Years later, you might not
remember the full plot of The Pickup. You might not remember who double-crossed whom, or how
the casino heist actually plays out. But you’ll remember that one gag the moment where, for a
brief flicker of time, the movie aligned with the talent on screen and the promise on the
poster.

In a way, that’s the most “Cracked.com” thing about this entire experience. The site has spent
years breaking down why certain jokes, scenes, and movies work (or don’t), often zooming in on
oddly specific moments that stick in our cultural brain. Here, Ariano is doing the same thing
with a streaming-era Eddie Murphy vehicle: she’s isolating the one piece of the machine that
actually functioned and holding it up as evidence that, yes, this could’ve been better.

And if you’ve ever watched a “comedy” that barely made you smirk, you’ve probably had your own
“single-laugh movie” experience. Maybe it was a studio-produced reboot that played it too safe,
or a streaming rom-com that seemed more interested in product placement than punchlines. You sit
through 90 minutes of pleasant nothingness, and then one joke one line, one pratfall, one
perfect side-eye actually gets you.

That little burst of laughter doesn’t always redeem the whole film, but it does give it a
strange kind of staying power. You might not recommend the movie. You might not ever watch it
again. But you’ll talk about that one moment, the same way Ariano talks about her one laugh
during The Pickup. It becomes a story you tell: “This movie barely made me laugh… but here’s
the one time it did.”

In the end, maybe that’s why a flawed, forgettable action-comedy like The Pickup still earns
a place in the conversation. Not because it’s great, or even good, but because it accidentally
reminds us what we actually want from comedy not just noise, not just content, but the sharp,
surprising, human moment that makes us laugh in spite of ourselves.