We should've known the second that trailer dropped and the internet lost its collective mind for M3GAN and her weird flowy dance sequence... We should've known right that very second that this was going to be a winner.
While it is still obviously very, VERY early in the year, it doesn't feel unfair to say that M3GAN is in with a great shout for being the most entertaining movie of 2023. (If it had arrived just two weeks earlier, we'd likely be making the same argument for it amongst 2022's releases.)
The premise is simple but effective: when young girl Cady (Violet McGraw) losses both of her parents in a car crash, she is sent to live with her aunt Gemma (Allison Williams). It turns out that Gemma is genius roboticist, and she soon pairs Cady with M3GAN, her latest creation - a life-like doll designed to be a child's best companion. However, things start to take a bit of a turn when M3GAN becomes self-aware and overly protective of Cady's physical and mental well-being...
Directed by Gerard Johnstone (interviewed above), who had previously delivered 2014's hidden gem comedy-horror Housebound, what does initially feel like a slightly more tech-forward version of Child's Play soon evolves into something else entirely.
Where as Chucky wanted to murder everything and anything in its way, M3GAN isn't pure evil. She truly does want to protect a young girl who is still in the middle of the trauma of a horrific event.
But instead of leaning into a nastier, more-violent tone, Johnstone - who was working from a story by modern horror legend James Wan (The Conjuring, Saw, Insidious) - redirects into a surprising avenue: incredibly dark comedy.
In much the same way that James Wan's jaw-dropping horror Malignant had our collective heads spinning thanks to some truly unique genre-hopping, Johnstone taps into a brilliant vein of viscous, uncomfortable humour. Producer Jason Blum, another modern horror legend (The Invisible Man, Split), also seems to know where to put support behind the horror makers who are just as interested in making us laugh as to scream.
Blum has been behind the likes of Get Out, Upgrade, Ma, The Hunt... all face-value scary movies, all soon revealing a deep pool of dark comedy.
The parallels to Get Out continue with the movie's leading star Allison Williams (interviewed below), who herself helps to draw comparisons between Jordan Peele's horror classic and Johnstone's new release.
Will M3GAN be bothering the Oscar votes this time next year? Probably not. Will M3GAN be on everyone's best of 2023 lists, with universal demand for an immediate sequel? You can practically count on it.
M3GAN arrives in Irish cinemas on Friday, 13 January.
