Lateral Upgrade
The theory: ‘M3GAN’ was lightning in a bottle that can’t be reproduced. Result: correct.
M3GAN 2.0
Director: Gerard Johnstone • Writer: Gerard Johnstone
Starring: Allison Williams, Violet McGraw, Brian Jordan Alvarez, Jen Van Epps, Ivanna Sakhno, Jemaine Clement, Amie Donald, Jenna Davis
USA • 2hrs
Opens Hong Kong June 26 • IIB
Grade: B-
Somewhere in the unstable region on the border between Europe and the Middle East, a buffoonish colonel called Sattler (Timm Sharp) is demoing the military’s latest flashy, tech-based weaponry, the Autonomous Military Engagement Logistics and Infiltration Android, or AMELIA (Ivanna Sakhno, Ahsoka), a familiar looking AI-enabled robot. AMELIA has been deployed to the Iran/Turkey border to rescue a kidnapped bioweapons scientist on an official test assignment, but she goes off book and murders everyone in the compound – including the scientist – and takes off with the weapon. Uh oh. Told you this AI is no good.
Thus begins M3GAN 2.0, picking up two years after roboticist Gemma (Allison Williams) lost control of her AI-powered toy M3GAN, almost got herself killed and did prison time (?) for the havoc said toy wrought on (probably) Silicon Valley. Gemma’s now a very loud advocate for AI regulation and a bestselling author of books about how we’re collectively parenting badly because it takes a village or some shit. Some things never change though: Gemma’s still a control freak, she’s no better at dealing with her niece Cady (Violet McGraw), now a surly-dull teen, and she still undervalues her colleagues Tess (Jen Van Epps) and Cole (Brian Jordan Alvarez). Despite taking M3GAN offline for good at the end of the first film, we knew she might not really be gone given Gemma’s Alexa throwing down some spycraft, and it’s confirmed when she contacts Gemma through the smart TV after the FBI and the bungling Sattler break into her home. It seems someone jacked Gemma’s original programming, stole the M3GAN code and created AMELIA – or at least a version of both that’s become 100% sentient. And she’s looking for her imprisoned family. Damn.
Is this robot meta text?
If that sounds like M3GAN 2.0 is more loopy spy thriller than horror it’s because it is, and it kicks things up a notch when Gemma and the gang decide to find AMELIA themselves, with help from a re-embodied M3GAN (Amie Donald in body and Jenna Davis in voice). There’re car chases, mainframe break-ins, secret lairs, disguises, the whole shebang. Their first target is omnipresent tech mogul Alton Appleton (Jemaine Clement), a not-at-all-disguised Elon Musk type (he’s going to blow a gasket knowing yet more people are making fun of him), just with less love for apartheid policies, who has some kind of master switch access that will turn AMELIA off. Then it’s off to a secure tech black site (?) for some robot fisticuffs, Sakhno channelling Kristanna Loken (Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines) big time and the film channelling Fritz Lang’s Metropolis.
M3GAN 2.0, perhaps even more than the original film, taps into the increasing collective panic over the increasing use of artificial intelligence in everyday life, which has grown in leaps and bounds since 2022 and writer Akela Cooper’s childhood development focused script. Working on his own this time, returning director Gerard Johnstone starts wtih a mostly amusing heist-like thriller as Gemma comes up with a plan to get into said black site and learns to trust M3GAN as much as she can. They get an assist from Gemma’s AI-cautious investor Christian (SNL alum Aristotle Athari), who is very particualr about how you say “Chris-tee-UHN”. Despite all this it’s still hard to know exactly what the end goal is. Oh well. Look! Robot murder.
This is all entertaining enough, it just suffers for not being the surprise the first film was; there’s no dancing hallway chase, no ripping an ear off a bully and chasing him into traffic (both fabulous). Knowing it doesn’t have that advantage Johnstone tries too hard to make up the difference with shaggy plot point upon shaggy plot point, and running 20 minutes longer for no good reason I can see. Even still, there are more than a few highlights and smart story admissions in M3GAN 2.0, among them Clement, naturally, stealing every scene he’s in with his spin on Muskian sleaze, and OG M3GAN demanding her new body be taller, acknowledging actor Donald grew a bunch in between films. And M3GAN’s rendition of Kate Bush’s “This Woman’s Work” is straight hilarious, as is Williams’s awkward yet deadpan reaction. Van Epps and Alvarez get way more to do this time around, which is a boon given how both possess impeccable comic timing, though McGraw is reduced to angry teen who would prefer not to be known as Killer Doll Girl. She mostly just pouts during her C-plot about servitude and free will. And this isn’t close to over either; a spin-off called SOULM8TE is supposedly in the works – even though (based on that title) we’ve already seen it. It was called Companion. In the end M3GAN 2.0 is kind of like an OS upgrade: You’ve been told something new and better is in there but you just can’t see it. It works just fine, but what was the point of even bothering with the bandwidth to download it?