Or the Very Modern Prometheus

Playing like an extended, less serious episode of Black Mirror, M3GAN is more fun than frights. Fortunately, with some genuine laughs and just enough weirdness to keep things interesting you won't mind not watching from between your fingers.

Violet McGraw plays young girl Cady who goes to live with her toy designer aunty Gemma(Alison Williams) after her parents are killed in a car crash. More interested in her work than building bonds with her niece, Gemma decides to kill two birds with one stone by letting Cady play with her prototype AI doll M3GAN. The doll learns through playing with Cady and essentially takes on the responsibility of caring for her with predictable consequences.

Like a modern day Victor Frankenstein, Gemma is more interested in what she can make rather than what she should make and in many ways is the real villian of the piece, although she learns her lesson in time for the final act so I guess we are meant to think she is ok. M3GAN herself is no Chuckie, she only begins to harm people in response to Cady becoming distressed, although by the end of the film logic has mostly gone out the window and she is in full slasher mode.

What makes the film work is the consistent tone and sense everything in the world of M3GAN is slightly removed from our own. The doll herself is pure uncanny valley, looking just enough like a real girl to make her robotic actions unsettling. Every side character is a little weird, providing laughs and keeping a sense of the off kilter. This means we don't bother questioning the fact a toy company has developed world beating AI or that said AI seemingly cares more about killing entertainingly than efficiently. Maybe all thats normal in this world.

Not everyone will enjoy meeting M3GAN, the film doesn't go anywhere with the philosophical debate it pretends its going to have and some horror fans will be disappointed by the small body count, but its a fun and fairly unique offering thats almost certainly going to manufacture a new franchise

7 consoled children out of 10 murder bots.

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