“Guess who’s bizzack,” in the words of Jay-Z, our by any means necessary to be THE best friend android toy M3GAN has returned in the simply titled M3GAN 2.0. Horror fans beware, though, as this isn’t a horror movie; in this case, our sarcastic and rhythmically possessing android is here to save the world. Following the events of the first movie, Gemma has become an advocate for regulating artificial intelligence and for limiting children’s access to specific technological platforms. Meanwhile, her designs for M3GAN were stolen and used to create a new military android named AMELIA (Autonomous Military Engagement Logistics and Infiltration Android). Created by the US military, AMELIA (Ivanna Sakhno) becomes self-aware and rebels against her creators, starting to pursue them in a manner that would make Roy Batty proud.
With Gemma (Allison Williams) and Cady (Violet McGraw) now in danger from multiple people, M3GAN (Amie Donald) reveals herself to Gemma and says that only she can save the world, AMELIA. From there, we get a team of characters that feels like a late 80s through mid-90s cyberpunk anime, as Gemma and her business partners, Tess (Jen Van Epps) and Cole (Brian Jordan Alvarez), all join together to stop the killer android. We get more sarcastic jokes delivered perfectly by Jenna Davis back as the voice of M3GAN, along with her dance moves and singing random pop hits.
Cady and Gemma have an interesting arc, as Gemma’s guilt from the first movie and Cady’s growing up and desire to be treated less like a kid fuel their conflict. Their performances are just as good in this movie as they were in the last movie. This time, McGraw gets to take on a more active role by giving her character a fandom of sorts, centered on 90s Steven Seagal movies, after practicing Aikido. Williams is pretty comfortable drawing from her comedy bag here as Gemma and M3GAN spend more time together on screen as an uncomfortable buddy spy duo.
I think the change in tone is a significant shift and might be jarring for some, as they may have expected more of the original or a more modern-day Child’s Play-like story from this sequel. Here we have action and fight scenes, super hacking, and car chases. There’s a point where the movie reminded me of Armitage III when M3GAN is wearing a pink outfit and some cool glasses. I feel Gerard Johnstone and Akela Cooper might be old anime fans like myself. Johnstone’s return helps maintain the consistency of the M3GAN world, even with the genre shift. The filmmaking feels more confident and comfortable. It didn’t take a lot of time with exposition, and just sped through it into the new story.
Jemaine Clement easily steals scenes as Alton Appleton, an obnoxious tech bro billionaire who’s clearly inspired by many real-world figures. He might be too much for some, but I thought he was quite perfect. The film also excels at incorporating very good jokes about Silicon Valley tech business history, which I found surprising. This movie is about AGI and AI, as we’re discussing it now, more so than we did in 2023. It’s not all doom and gloom and has a more pre-ChatGPT outlook on what technology can hold for our future and our responsibilities with that future. M3GAN 2.0, while vastly different from the first film, was a delightful time in the theater. With good humor and solid fight scenes, this is definitely a movie you should check out.
Rating: B
