M3GAN 2.0 (2025)

It’s a little overdue at this point, but I’ll be going over M3GAN 2.0 (2025) today. As I mentioned in my previous post, I saw the movie with friends back on Sunday 6/28/25 at “The Vicky” AMC theater in Rancho Cucamonga. Often when going to see movies with friends I tend to be the one that purchases tickets for the group , but in this case one of my friend’s was the ticket holder instead. We chose the 2:00pm showtime, particularly because it was considered an “early bird” time so tickets were 20%. So far so good. What my friend didn’t mention to everyone was that for the last couple of days prior he was out of state helping his brother move and will be flying on the day we’re set to see the movie. If everything went to plan, he would touch down in the airport close to the theater 30 minutes before showtime. Things did go to plan and he arrived on time, but I thought his plan was so convoluted that I felt like mentioning it. Working under the assumption that he would arrive on time, I came down to the area a little early to hang out with a couple of my friends that lived close to the theater and we walked there together to meet up with the rest of our group. In regards to the theater experience, there were quite a few other groups of people in the auditorium with us, but no one was really engaged with the movie (which should say something about the movie, but I’m getting ahead of myself). After the screening, we all went to eat at U-Grill Korean BBQ in Rancho Cucamonga. The food was quite good, I myself specifically chose to have spicy octopus brought in, but the experience wasn’t the best compared to other Korean BBQ joints. For one, our grill kept going out, requiring someone to step in and ignite it. For two, the grill itself was leaking grease at the bottom of the table. One of my friend’s remarked on why her shoes kept sliding around and then took note of the grease.  Overall I had a good time, although next time I’m in the area, I’d probably choose Gen or Gyu-Kaku when it comes to grill at the table BBQ. 

M3GAN 2.0 is a sci-fi action flick and a sequel to the sci-fi horror film, M3GAN (2022). Gerald Johnstone returns to write and direct 2.0, working in collaboration with Akela Cooper who did the screenplay for the 2022 original. The film takes place about 2 years after the original. Essentially, Gemma (Allison Williams) reluctantly has to rebuild M3GAN (voiced by Jenna Davis and physically portrayed by Amie Donald) in order to take down a US military android named AMELIA (Ivanna Sakhno), built using tech copied from M3GAN. The rogue android is apparently bent on starting an AI takeover. 

I was a surprise fan of the original M3GAN. I felt that it echoed the B-horror flicks of old and effectively mixed in horror, sci-fi, and campy humor. As such, when I saw the trailer for the sequel looking like a bonkers and yassified take on Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1992), I was very interested. I’m sure some fans of the original were not excited for the direction this film seemed to be going in, but I personally thought that it was a logical leap from camp horror that didn’t take itself too seriously and felt that it would be a great time if done right. While there were some entertaining moments and laughs to be had, there is quite a lot holding this movie back and I feel that much of the problems stem from the writing and the pacing. For a movie that yearns to be a fun and silly action flick, it’s surprising that it also contains a ton of exposition. Gerald Johnstone, the individual primarily credited for the screenplay, seemed to feel that so much of what’s going on the movie needs to be explained in drawn out detail. It made the first act a bit of a slog to get through as the movie covers events and characters that ultimately don’t come to matter much in the overall story. One wonders why so much time was devoted to characters like corrupt tech CEO Alton Appleton (Jemaine Clement) or Timm Sharp as a federal agent responsible for AMELIA’s creation. This becomes more glaring when you take note of how other characters play out in the movie. Gemma’s co-workers, Cole (Brian Jordan Alvarez) & Tess (Jen Van Epps) seem like they would’ve only been in the opening scenes of the film, however they become roped into helping rebuild M3GAN and stick around the whole way. For the purposes of the story, Cole mainly serves as comic relief (to good effect at points), but actually contributes to the stakes of the 3rd act, while Tess gets sidelined so hard that it’s difficult for me to recall what she actually brings to the story.

How do our main characters fare on the other hand? After the incident with M3GAN in the first film, we are told and shown that Gemma becomes a hardcore public advocate for AI regulation and heavily tries to limit how much tech her niece Cady (Violet McGraw) is exposed to on a daily basis. The film strangely presents Gemma’s position with technology and how it affects the way she interacts with her niece as over corrective and controlling, sort of like how anti-vax moms are currently out trying to “Make America Healthy Again”. Ultimately this conflict between the two isn’t really addressed again until the final act where Gemma clumsily tells the main villain (& the audience) that Cady is more capable and self-sufficient than she once thought. Moving on, I don’t really have a lot of issues with M3GAN herself. She retains a lot of her snark and sassy personality from when she went rogue in the previous film and it does lead to good moments when she works with people she previously wronged. When the movie finally decides it wants to be fun, M3GAN does contribute quite a bit to the entertainment value, but ultimately does not live up to the potential presented in the trailers.

Additionally, The main villains of the film are pretty one-note. We learn that Gemma’s boyfriend and partner in campaigning for AI regulation, Christian (Aristotle Athari) is ultimately the one responsible for AMELIA going rogue, secretly controlling her actions in the hopes that it would convince the world to take strong regulatory measures against AI. Mind you we only see Christian briefly in the first act, with Cady and the other side characters only telling us that they don’t like him while Gemma defends him. It’s not until the end of the second act, that “in a surprise twist” Christian reveals himself as the villian and we get another round of over-expository dialogue to explain his plan and motivations. After he’s taken care of, we’re left for M3GAN to deal with AMELIA with the latter trying to convince the former to join her side against humanity. Mind you this would be almost compelling if say we got more interaction between the two androids throughout the film, and/or if most of the characters aside from Gemma didn’t already trust M3GAN. 

Ultimately I’m gonna go ahead and give M3GAN 2.0 a Worst Movie Ever. I feel the movie is at odds with itself. On the one hand, it wants to be an unserious action film that provides good trashy fun, but also wants to slow down to a crawl with exposition like a poorly designed rollercoaster. The movie wants to elevate itself by giving all this background detail to ultimately flesh out an overly optimistic message about cooperating with AI (pretty laughable BTW given our current moment). This comes at the expense of the film being driven more by the circumstances of the plot rather than the desires and motivations of the characters, which I feel are what truly elevates an action movie beyond schlocky entertainment. As for what I’ll be writing about next, while I did just see Superman (2025) I still gotta work through my backlog. As such, I’ll likely be finally discussing La Bamba (1987). Have a good day!