Meet Dave is a 2008 American science fiction comedy film directed by Brian Robbins and written by Bill Corbett and Rob Greenberg.

It stars Eddie Murphy in the title role, Elizabeth Banks, Gabrielle Union, Ed Helms, Scott Caan and Kevin Hart.

In a New York City apartment, a boy named Josh Morrison (Austyn Lind Myers) notices the object heading towards him through his telescope and it lands in his fishbowl.

When Gina leaves his room, Josh sees the orb quickly absorb all of the water inside his fishbowl, so he takes it to his school presentation.

A superstitious cop named Dooley (Scott Caan) desperately searches for the alien, despite his partner Knox's (Mike O'Malley) doubt.

As the crew (via Dave) spend so much time with Josh and Gina, they adopt Earth's culture, mannerisms and general laid-back attitude.

In the meantime, Number 17 (Kevin Hart), a young, fun-loving alien, jumps out of the ship while drunk from the alcohol Dave has imbibed.

Corbett later revived the idea for a movie and discussed it with friend and fellow writer Rob Greenberg, who would become his screenwriting partner for the project.

Corbett unsuccessfully argued against the new title, which he described as "beyond generic" and said was repetitive of a comedy released earlier in the year called Meet Bill.

Corbett said most of the people they worked with were pleasant and some of the notes from the studio were helpful, but that Meet Dave ultimately suffered from a "too-many-cooks thing.

[7] Meet Dave began receiving criticism and virulence months before it was actually released, especially by die-hard film fans, Corbett compared to the Comic Book Guy character in The Simpsons.

[8] Screenwriter Bill Corbett also missed the premiere, which he said was due to family plans, "not an act of protest, per se".

The film opened on July 11, 2008, in 3,011 theaters in North America and grossed $5.3 million, ranking seventh at the box office.

The site's critical consensus reads, "Easy gags and slack direction drag this occasionally clever alien-out-of-planet comedy down to unimaginative lows.

[13] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film a grade "B" on scale of A to F.[14] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone gave the film a negative review and wrote: "Murphy, teaming again with his Norbit director Brian Robbins, is assuming we'll all line up for lazyass toilet jokes and pay for the privilege.

We might have enjoyed the powerful force of this big star and his gift for physical comedy if the movie offered fresh scenarios and fewer predictable jokes.

"[16] Joe Leydon of Variety gave it a positive review and wrote: "Aimed squarely at the same family audiences that flocked to Murphy's "Doctor Dolittle" comedies, this is a lightly amusing and surprisingly sweet Fox release.

Jay Leno said that the film's title was going to be changed to Meet Dave: At Blockbuster, insinuating that the movie should have been a straight-to-DVD release.

[citation needed] In the also Fox-produced Family Guy episode "Friends of Peter G", during the "Mr. Booze" song number, Carl mentioned that since he started drinking, he has never left his couch and has seen every movie ever made.

[5] A reference to the film was included in the RiffTrax Presents commentary for Planet of the Apes recorded by Matthew J. Elliott (in which he suggested that the filmmaker's original intention had been to launch Charlton Heston's character into space inside a giant Eddie Murphy), as well as the commentary for The Day After Tomorrow recorded by Corbett and Kevin Murphy, in which Corbett claims the natural phenomena hitting Los Angeles were "almost as big a Hollywood disaster as Meet Dave's box office".