M3GAN 2.0 Will Be Leaning into Action-Comedy, but Don’t Worry, "The Horror DNA Is Absolutely Still There"
M3GAN is back, and this time, she's bringing a little extra flair to the chaos.
M3GAN 2.0 is taking a sharp pivot into new territory, with director Gerard Johnstone teasing a bold mix of genres that expands on the original film’s twisted AI horror roots.
While early descriptions of the movie have drawn comparisons to The Terminator 2, thanks to the showdown between dueling robots, Johnstone wants fans to know that the soul of M3GAN hasn’t been overwritten. Johnstone said:
“Are we completely abandoning why people like M3GAN in the first place? No. Even though we are in action-comedy territory, the horror DNA is absolutely still there.”
The new film finds the fan-favorite killer doll resurrected to face off against a new robotic threat, a hostile AI built with the same experimental tech that created M3GAN in the first place.
While this sounds like a setup for a robot grudge match, Johnstone says that the psychological tension and unsettling vibe at the heart of the original are still very much in play. He explains:
“M3GAN being a mistress of manipulation is something that you can take into several different stories and genres, You don’t know if you can actually trust her; you don’t know if everything she says is real. You don’t know if she really is self-aware or just an algorithm.”
It’s that uneasy dynamic that keeps M3GAN in creepy territory, no matter how many genre shifts she goes through.
Returning to the story are Allison Williams as roboticist Gemma and Violet McGraw as her niece Cady, the young girl M3GAN was originally designed to protect. Joining them is Ahsoka’s Ivanna Sakhno, who plays Amelia, the film’s new mechanical antagonist, setting the stage for a twisted, tech-anime-style fueled showdown.
The film takes place two years after M3GAN, “a marvel of artificial intelligence, went rogue and embarked on a murderous (and impeccably choreographed) rampage and was subsequently destroyed, M3GAN’s creator Gemma has become a high-profile author and advocate for government oversight of A.I. Meanwhile, Gemma’s niece Cady, now 14, has become a teenager, rebelling against Gemma’s overprotective rules.
“Unbeknownst to them, the underlying tech for M3GAN has been stolen and misused by a powerful defense contractor to create a military-grade weapon known as Amelia (Ivanna Sakhno), the ultimate killer infiltration spy. But as Amelia’s self-awareness increases, she becomes decidedly less interested in taking orders from humans. Or in keeping them around.
“With the future of human existence on the line, Gemma realizes that the only option is to resurrect M3GAN (Amie Donald, voiced by Jenna Davis) and give her a few upgrades, making her faster, stronger, and more lethal. As their paths collide, the original A.I bitch is about to meet her match.”
James Wan is producing the film for Atomic Monster, Jason Blum for Blumhouse and Gerard Johnstoneis back to direct the next wild chapter of A.I. robot mayhem. Akela Cooper (Malignant, M3GAN) returned to write the script.
The upcoming horror sequel co-stars returning cast members Brian Jordan Alvarez and Jen Van Epps as Gemma’s loyal tech teammates, Cole and Tess, and new characters played by Aristotle Athari, Timm Sharp and Jemaine Clement.
M3GAN 2.0 will be released in theaters on June 27, 2025.
Via: GamesRadar+