Universal Pictures has dropped a trailer for its latest horror offering, M3GAN. Set to star Allison Williams, the film's story is a collaboration between horror maestro James Wan and Akela Cooper.
Wan, who is currently working on Aquaman 2, and Cooper's original story for M3GAN involves genius roboticist Gemma (Williams), who works for a toy company. Gemma develops M3GAN to be a child's greatest companion and a parent's greatest ally. When she unexpectedly gains custody of her niece, Gemma sees it as an opportunity to test M3GAN on a human test subject, and help her niece in her grief at the same time. Unfortunately for Gemma, the move has unexpected consequences.
Universal Pictures' new M3GAN trailer starts out as though the horror film is a heartwarming tale of an aunt and her niece adapting to a new living situation. As it develops, Gemma admits that she is unready to parent her orphaned niece Katie, and decides to show her an experiment she's working on at her workplace. There, she introduces Katie to M3GAN (which stands for Model 3 Generative Android) and explains to her that M3GAN will always keep her "physically and emotionally" safe.
Katie and M3GAN get along well at first, dancing with one another and becoming attached. When M3GAN begins to speak back to Gemma and criticize her parenting, however, it becomes abundantly clear that the film is pulling a lesson from the Chucky franchise and that M3GAN is a killer doll. M3GAN's delusional and strong connection with Katie drives her to murder those she perceives as threats, even attacking another child who appears to be bullying Katie. Gemma grows to suspect the doll, but taking out a killer robot is never easy.
The trailer packs a suitably creepy punch. M3GAN's design evokes a real little girl, and with her oversized sunglasses, she looks almost human. But she falls into the uncanny valley often: running on all fours, looking human-but-not-quite, dancing far too fluidly for a being made out of metal. She recalls another of Wan's horror projects, The Conjuring Universe's Annabelle. Despite her small form, she demonstrates the capacity AI has to harm humans.
With real artificial intelligence coming closer into humanity's grasp, the idea of a rogue AI is more relevant than ever. Through sci-fi horror films such as M3GAN, humanity is left to ponder its continued existence in the face of machines that can think faster, are far stronger in any form they can take, and could possibly supplant humans as the dominant sentient form on the planet.
M3GAN hits theaters on January 13, 2023.
Source: Universal Pictures/YouTube