Publication Date: 06-27-2025

M3GAN 2.0 (2025) review

Dir. Gerard Johnstone

By: Steve Pulaski

Rating: ★★

In my review of M3GAN — Blumhouse’s surprise hit that kicked of the 2023 calendar year with a bang — I noted that what kept the film buoyant during incredulous third act happenstance, such as the titular robot’s ability to start cars and shut off emergency alarms in the name of plot conveniences, was its human angle. It was ultimately a story about a young girl desperate for companionship after being placed in the care of her busy, career-driven aunt. Her aunt thought a humanoid powered by A.I. was the perfect substitute for an actual parental figure. Disaster ensued; it was good fun to be had, and a sequel was inevitable after its runaway success.

M3GAN 2.0 reunites director/writer Gerard Johnstone and Akela Cooper (story) for a follow-up that at least valiantly attempts to take the series in a bold new direction. The absence of James Wan, who served as a story credit on the original, is noteworthy, for he always seems to know when to cut-and-run on a franchise. Or, perhaps, franchises don’t know what to do with themselves following his departure. Unlike the Saw series, let’s hope M3GAN doesn’t take two or three movies without him to figure out exactly what direction it wants to take.

At its essence, M3GAN 2.0 takes the Terminator 2: Judgment Day approach in having the villain team up with the protagonists to take down an even greater threat to humanity. That threat is introduced in an espionage-style opening sequence, and her name is AMELIA (“Autonomous Military Engagement Logistics and Infiltration Android”). She’s a powerful A.I.-programmed bot that goes AWOL and assassinates the subject she was sent to rescue. Cut to Gemma (Allison Williams), who tows the difficult ethical line of touting the latest in robotics technology while arguing for intense A.I. regulation and responsible parenting. She’s dating a “Chris-tiane” (Aristotle Athari), a butter-soft executive who seemingly shares her views, and is still trying to be a good mother figure to now 12-year-old Cady (Violet McGraw).

A grandstanding, egomaniacal, elongated muskrat billionaire named Alton Appleton (Jemaine Clement) seeks to acquire Gemma’s company, while the authorities are trying to hunt down AMELIA under the assumption Gemma has connections to the rogue bot. This is due to AMELIA’s programming software originating from the pirated code of M3GAN, who reveals herself still to be alive. M3GAN convinces Gemma that the two of them can stop AMELIA, for the greater code of Cady, who she still seeks to protect beyond her programming configurations — M3GAN in fact might be developing something resembling a conscience.

To call M3GAN 2.0 a horror movie is completely inaccurate. Johnstone makes the decisive pivot into the realm of action/sci-fi with this follow-up, which at least prevents any chance of this sequel becoming a bloodier rehash of its predecessor. While no one can argue this film feels familiar, it does become draining and ghastly overlong at two hours. The runtime itself wouldn’t be an issue if the film wasn’t plagued by so many of the same errant issues of Mission Impossible – The Final Reckoning.

Succumbing to many of the same annoyances of modern action movies, M3GAN 2.0, for one, doesn’t know when to stop talking. The dialog is an abject mess of various motivations, technobabble, computer processing codes, and PG-13 zingers (“hold onto your vaginas,” references to humans as “meat-sacks”). Johnstone has dialed up the plot to levels of convolution that might only be cogently deciphered by having ChatGPT explain it to you like you’re five-years-old. The decision drains the charisma and humanity out of Gemma, her obedient coworker (Brian Jordan Alvarez), and even Cady, who must speak like robots themselves to relay so much information in unwieldly exposition dumps that simply aren’t entertaining.

M3GAN 2.0 also has a strong, and frankly commendable, message in the beginning that suggests that, at a certain point, unregulated artificial intelligence will get to a point when it turns against its human creators and potentially cause global economic upheaval. This is a promising message in a capitalistic presence that is embracing the technology without any sort of clear definition of where it could be going or how it will eventually lead to a blurring of reality and fiction, the likes of which society has never seen. Then, like clockwork, it suggests a happy medium can be achieved in time for the credits to roll. Optimism might be in short supply these days, but apparently, there’s still plenty of room for foolish thoughts and frustrating line-towing. Imagine if in The Final Reckoning, Ethan Hunt and company recognized the Entity could be good after all.

On a technical level, M3GAN 2.0 sits alongside its predecessor as proof of how much can be achieved with a medium-budget if you have the right creatives and visionaries in place. Cinematographer Toby Oliver achieves a gorgeous slickness that makes this technological hellscape convincing, and Johnstone gives somewhat without the knowledge of Blumhouse’s known frugality the idea that he worked with a blank check.

M3GAN 2.0 is not flawed due to a lack of ambitious, but rather, its execution of such ambition. The material’s grin-inducing humor is sadly no match for complicated plotting and sterile dialog, the presence of which drains the charisma out of a concept that was recently enjoyable on both an entertainment and subtextual level.

My review of M3GAN

Starring: Allison Williams, Violet McGraw, Amie Donald, Brian Jordan Alvarez, Ivanna Sakhno, Jen Van Epps, Aristotle Athari, Timm Sharp, Jemaine Clement, and Amy Usherwood. Voiced by: Jenna Davis. Directed by: Gerard Johnstone.