For anyone familiar in the film industry, you would know that January is usually never the brightest month for movies. After the holiday blockbusters and Oscar nominated films being released at the end of the prior year, it leaves a time to where studio is practically given free realm to dump whatever movie they have zero faith in quietly onto the big screen in the hopes of not losing too much financially from it. Every once in a while you’ll get a Kung Fu Panda 3, Split, or Scream (2022), but for the most part, it’s usually a month in the dump for movies and always gives early nominations for critic for Worst Movies of the year, which they usually tend to forget until they got to make their end-of-the-year lists. While a legit good new movie to come out January is rare, a legit good movie in the very first weekend of it is even more rare. Yet here we have M3GAN, which is here to say, let’s kick off this new year in the best way they can and get us excited what 2023 has to come for films. While I can’t say M3GAN is a great movie overall, it’s a damn good one. As it’s own thing, that’s awesome but for a January movie, it’s sensational.
Premise: A roboticist/inventor named Gemma (Allison Williams) is developing a new artificial intelligence for her toy company called the Model 3 Generative Android, M3GAN for short. This AI is created to be a lifelike doll programmed to be a companion for a child and a big help towards a parent. After a terrible tragedy occurs for her little niece Cady (Violet McGraw), Gemma wants to use the M3GAN prototype in the hopes to help her heal and mourn during these troubled times. Little does anyone working on the M3GAN program know that the AI is created to be too self-aware and be massively overprotective to their child’s counterpart, so much so that it can lead to her kill and harming anyone that gets in her way. Can Gemma find a way to make the proper version of M3GAN to save herself, her niece, and the rest of the world or is it simply too much of a good thing and needs to be shut down for good?
Horror movies with the premise involving toys and AI are nothing out of the ordinary. It’s clearly done as a means to create an unrealistic threat to provide some genuine scares and brutal kills to keep the audience on their toes the whole way through. These mostly tend to provide surface level entertainment with not much commentary or unpredictability thrown into the mix. Despite it being a familiar premise, M3GAN does actually put more thought and effort to it than you would think.
While yes, M3GAN herself is clearly there in the hopes of being a new horror movie villain icon to provide the most memorable lines, laughs, moments, and especially kills, she does also exist to be at the center of a human and surprisingly heartfelt story the movie provides. She exists to be a companion to Cady in the wake of a horrific life changing event that will mentally scar her. While M3GAN is certainly the friend Cady needs now, is she really the one that should guide her for the rest of her life? Eventually she will have to put her tragic past behind her and blaze her own path. When that happens, should M3GAN still be there for her or should she be cast aside kinda like when a kid grows up and give away his toys? The movies goes into lengths of that commentary a bit more than most of these movies do.
M3GAN might be special but she is still deep down a form of technology and not a real person. No matter how hard one might work hard to create a real person through technology, you will never be able to capture the complete heart and soul of a human being. Technology is important and A.I.s can be as well but going too far with either one of those could result in replacing actual human beings. It’s then that makes the characters in the movie wonder whether special projects like M3GAN are actually worth it in the end.
Even if you are not fond of all the commentary with the relationships between human and technology, the movie does provide enough entertainment on the surface value. It’s take a while to get going as the first half-hour take it’s time to set up the human drama for the characters along with getting a bit too bogged down in exposition but once, M3GAN arrives at her new home, it starts to take off. It’s then we see the way that M3GAN interacts with her new family along with others that she believe might cause harm to them. We see her responses to that in ways that are funny, touching, scary, and especially brutal.
While no doubt M3GAN is going to open the floodgates for the most glorified memes in the upcoming days, she is sill quite entertaining and an engaging presence whenever she appears on the screen. Even if most of her actions from scene to scene are ones you can predict, hers ways of doing it and the timing off it are what will keep you off guard. It also helps that Jenna Davis provides a unique voice that helps gives the character the small sense of humanity that she deep down doesn’t have.
There are times where the tones can collided with each other a bit too much as there are certain scenes that feel like they should be funnier than they should while other scenes feel like they should be scarier than they should. It has a ending that feels rather abrupt, mostly so the final shot can give a hint at an upcoming sequel. And just like with the majority of these kind of movies, I don’t think you will be all that surprised where all of this will lead too.
Allison Williams is able to hold the whole movie on her shoulders with her captivating performance, able to balance being an ambitious creator but also being forced into being a mother figure for her nephew. She’s not quite as good her as she is in Get Out but she just might be a new lucky charm in the horror genre. Violet McGraw is admittedly a bit flat in certain scenes but is engaging enough to make you care enough. And as I mention, Jenna Davis works wonders as M3GAN, helping the character stand out in a very unique way.
I’m sure a question someone will have reading this is whether or not M3GAN would be judge differently if it came out in any other month. My answer would be Yes and No. While the flaws here are more forgiving than other films that usually come out this month, there is a certain warmth and heart here with some meaningful messaging that doesn’t feel forced or phony that helps make the picture stand out. Sure, it’s uneven and not the most unpredictable, but it definitely makes for a fun, engaging time. If movies can stand out quite well like this to start the year, than 2023 will definitely be a year to look forward to for movies.
Other comments:
- During my early advance screening of this, the promo actually spoke during it. I will definitely be seeing that in future advance screenings.
- I sure can’t wait for all the memes from this movie in the next few days.
- The marketing for this movie has been genius btw.
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