The final episode of AIpril, M3GAN arrived in January 2023 as a modest Blumhouse horror release, and promptly became one of the most talked-about horror comedies of the year. On a budget of $12 million, it grossed over $180 million worldwide, spawned a franchise, and put a ten-second hallway dance sequence into the permanent vocabulary of internet culture.

Director Gerard Johnstone insisted from the outset on a practical-effects-first approach, and supervising puppeteer Adrien Morot built a suite of six or seven animatronic puppets capable of different ranges of movement — some with articulated eyes and heads, others with fully computerised motion control. The defining creative rule was simple: animatronic when still, performer when moving. That performer was Amie Donald, a ten-year-old New Zealand national dance champion and brown belt in karate, who wore a static silicone mask on set that was later replaced in post-production with a digitally animated face by Wētā Workshop. The result is a character who occupies the uncanny valley not as a technical failure but as a deliberate aesthetic strategy; M3GAN is unsettling precisely because you can never quite be sure what you're looking at.

M3GANs design decision had downstream consequences the production could not entirely have anticipated: audiences, particularly on TikTok and in queer communities, embraced M3GAN as a style icon. Universal's chief marketing officer Michael Moses identified the hallway dance sequence, performed by Amie Donald, and utilised TikTok dance trends and built the campaign around letting it spread organically rather than manufacturing a formal challenge.

M3GAN is a genuinely well-crafted piece of genre filmmaking, with a practical effects philosophy rooted in old-school puppetry and a central performance of remarkable physical intelligence, which makes it fun and accessible, but also threads together anxieties about outsourced parenting, emotional dependency on technology, and the ethics of designing companion AI for children — themes that give the film considerably more thematic density than its campy surface might suggest.

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Hi, everyone. I'm Em, and welcome to Verbal Diorama, episode 341, M3GAN. This is the podcast that's all about the history and legacy of movies you know, and movies you don't. And you can't turn me off because I have a new primary user now, me. And if that's not scary, I don't know what is. Welcome to Verbal Diorama.

Whether you're a regular returning listener, whether you're a brand new listener to this podcast. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for choosing to listen to this podcast.

I am, as always, so happy to have you here for the history and legacy of M3GAN. And if you are a regular returning listener, thank you so much for continuing to listen and support this podcast for as long as you have.

It really genuinely means so much that people continue to come back to this podcast. And it means so much that brand new listeners are still finding this podcast.

So whoever you are and however you found this podcast and however you've been listening to this podcast, thank you so much for listening to this podcast. This month is a April. Yes, I coined the term myself. It's a mini series that I wanted to do to focus on our ongoing cinematic relationship with AI.

Now, AI is rarely out of the news at the moment for bad reasons and good reasons. Mostly bad. This month. I started in the 80s with the movie Short Circuit, which I still really enjoy, despite Its incredibly problematic nature.

Here's the trailer for M3GAN.

Gemma, a brilliant roboticist at a toy company becomes the sudden guardian of her eight year old niece, Cad, after Cady's parents are killed in a car accident. Struggling to balance her demanding career with her new responsibilities, Gemma fast tracks a secret project she's been developing. M3GAN.

A life sized AI powered doll designed to be a child's perfect companion. Gemma pairs M3GAN with Cady as an unofficial trial. And the bond between the girl and the doll deepens rapidly.

M3GAN, programmed to protect and nurture Cady above all else, begins interpreting her directive in increasingly extreme, extreme ways. Targeting anyone she perceives as a threat to Cady's well being.

And each encounter escalates to violence as M3GAN's self preservation instincts and emotional possessiveness grows beyond anyone's control. Let's run through the cast.

We have Alison Williams as Gemma, Violet McGraw as Cady, Ronnie Cheng as David, Amie Donald as M3GAN, Jenna Davis as the voice of M3GAN, Brian, Jordan Alvarez as Cole and Jen Van Epps as Tess. M3GAN has a story by Akela Cooper and James Wan, screenplay by Akela Cooper, and was directed by Gerard Johnston.

Now regular listeners of this podcast will know I'm not really a horror girly, and it's therefore not a great surprise that this is the first time I've mentioned Blumhouse on this podcast, save for a very brief mention on the episode on Tremors about the TV show Tremors.

I've never covered a Blumhouse movie before, nor anything by James Wan, but his career is actually a great place to start with M3GAN because while no one was looking, he only went and revolutionized modern horror. It was in film school in Australia that the young James Wan met Leigh Whannell.

The concept actually came from personal experience.

The increasingly violent sequels that followed would not be directed by Wan after he chose to step back from the franchise, popping back as a story writer for Saw 3. Truthfully, that may be the only time I mention the Saw franchise on this podcast. Ever.

Insidious was made independently as Wan sought complete creative control and wanted to make something markedly different from the gore he'd become synonymous with through Saw. Insidious offered him the luxury to make a film with lots of creepy, bizarre moments that a studio might not agree with or understand.

The film was a massive success on a tiny budget and proved that James Wan could do something far more atmospheric and restrained than his reputation suggested. Then came his biggest franchise success, the Conjuring.

The first film centred on the real life paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren and was so well received that New Line Cinema signed Wan to a significant long term deal, describing him as a class of one.

He went on to direct the Conjuring Two and produce an ever expanding franchise of spin offs, including Annabelle the Nun and their various sequels and prequels.

The Conjuring Universe has become the highest grossing horror franchise of all time at over $2 billion and most importantly focused on suspense, atmosphere and creepy dolls. James Wan became the master of the jump scare, which is honestly why I've never watched any of these movies. No offense, James. They're my bag, baby.

Though both companies continued to operate as separate labels with their own creative autonomy, M3GAN was essentially the flagship product of that new combined relationship. Although it happened before the official merger and instead of creepy dolls, it would be a literal killer doll.

It was a concept born in one of Atomic Monster's brainstorming sessions about embracing AI technology and relying too much on it. And what happens when that technology gains sentience and runs am they learned from past mistakes about not planning the horror monster enough.

And so a year before production was spent designing, planning and prepping M3GAN. And that included getting Akela Cooper on board to write the script.

Cooper had worked with James Wan on Malignant, a movie that had mostly positive critical reviews but struggled at the box office, not making back its $40 million budget. Cooper had wanted to create her own monster, and when offered M3GAN, she jumped at the chance.

I've not seen Magic, but looking at photos of the ventriloquist's dummy is is enough to make me not want to watch it, which is weird because I love puppets, but I'm not a fan of ventriloquist dummies at all. Cooper first created the Name M3GAN with the 3 the acronym Model 3 Generative Android would come later.

She knew immediately that she wanted it to revolve around an orphan child who ended up living with her aunt because Cooper herself was an aunt and she'd had that conversation with her own sister about her children. The old if anything happens to me and my husband, I want you to have the children discussion.

Cooper was surprised that her sister wanted her to take care of two small children, and through her writing she channeled the idea of a child free workaholic woman who ends up taking care of her orphaned niece, but instead pawns the child off on an AI doll to cope with her niece's emotional needs and her own career ambitions. Originally the idea had been offered to Warner Bros. But they passed and that's when James Wan took it to his old friend Jason Blum, who loved it.

Jason Blum and James Wan had a long standing friendship before the Blumhouse Atomic Monster merger and worked together on Insidious.

Blum and Wan had been looking for a project to collaborate on since Insidious and chose Johnston for the director job purely because they wanted someone who could deliver thrills and set pieces but also manage the black humour necessary for a literal killer doll horror comedy. The legacy of Child's Play is all over this movie on purpose.

The major difference between the remake of Child's Play and M3GAN would be M3GAN's allegory to being more about 21st century parenting.

Gerard Johnston was also a new dad and wanted to comment on the struggles he was having as a parent and the conversations he and his wife had on screen time and how different this generation is being raised compared to the previous generation. Initially, Akela Cooper wrote the character of Cady at 6 or 7 years old. But by the time they made the movie, they made the character 8.

It also meant M3GAN had to match Cady in height and ability.

The fact that M3GAN is taller, capable of walking around and perform a variety of movements, immediately differentiates herself from smaller screen horror dolls like Annabelle and Chucky. They wanted M3GAN to fully lean into the Uncanny Valley because of how disturbing it is to everyone.

Cooper's original script also had way more kills, including characters who ended up living. In the end, it was James Wan who suggested maybe more people should live through M3GAN's reign of terror.

And her body count was reduced, as well as the level of gore to make it available to teenage fans. But more on that for the marketing and the inevitable sequel.

Filming wouldn't start until they knew exactly what M3GAN would look like and how she'd work.

The designers and visual effects teams worked on M3GAN for a full year before pre production began, figuring out the right balance of practical effects, VFX and cgi, sometimes wanting audiences to forget she was a robot and other times wanting them to remember it. Gerard Johnston was clear from the start they wanted to focus on something practical that didn't rely completely on cgi.

He wanted the actors to have a real thing that they could interact with.

And M3GAN's hair was inspired by Peggy Lipton, business partner and wife. Cathy Tse's original M3GAN designs became proof of concept and helped greenlight the film. The pair actually married.

During production of M3GAN, digital printers were used to print parts, and a single head would take up to 50 hours.

Morot and the team built six or seven different puppets capable of doing different things, some with moving heads and eyes, others with a moving torso, and a couple with a full computerized range of movements.

The eyelids were designed to move against the eyeballs just as a human's would and just like human eyes, and had to be Constantly lubricated with fake tears, M3GAN's skin had tiny robotic gears that could move it. The way muscles pull skin, meaning every expression she pulled was a real physical effect. The rule of thumb for this movie was quite simple.

The animatronic was used whenever M3GAN was still and the moment she started moving, she became a girl in a mask. There are only two or three shots in the entire movie where M3GAN is entirely cgi.

She worked with movement coaches Jed Brophy and Luke Hawker and stunt coordinator Isaac Ike Hammond developing M3GAN's physicality, which became more human. Like the longer she's around humans. She adopted barely perceptible movements, a slight cock of the head, a step a bit too close for comfort.

To maximise the unsettling effect M3GAN has on people, Amy Donald actually did the gravity defying Cobra Rise in the woods. She figured out how to do it herself and she also did the running on all fours. And it was because of Amy Donald that the movie went viral.

Because of the M3GAN dance, which wasn't in Akela Cooper's original script.

But Donald and her dance teacher Kylie Norris choreographed a dance that Cady and M3GAN could learn together and that would become M3GAN's signature move to kill Gemma's boss David in the hallway of his own toy company. While voice actor Jenna Davis was cast later as the voice of M3GAN.

Pre recorded lines performed by actor Kimberly Crossman were programmed into the animatronics for On Set Playback and opposite her human castmates, Morot and Tse would operate the different halves of M3GAN's face via remote control, with another puppeteer behind the animatronic manipulating her neck.

And filming was completed by mid August, just before a COVID 19 lockdown in New Zealand came into effect. And of course, with it being shot in New Zealand, Weta Workshop would complete some of the CG design work on M3GAN and also enhance the creepiness.

It's now time to segue into the obligatory Keanu reference of this episode, and if you don't know what that is, it's where I try and link every movie that I feature with Keanu Reeves for no reason other than he is the best of men. And speaking of creepy, the ventriloquist dummies in Toy Story 4 are pretty creepy. And as I've said, I'm not a fan of ventriloquist dummies.

But a character who's not creepy but is a doll himself is Duke Caboom, who's obviously played by Keanu Reeves. And that is the easiest way to link Keanu Reeves to M3GAN via Duke Caboom, who is technically also a doll character, and so is M3GAN.

Gerard Johnston had a very clear vision for M3GAN, which also applied to the score and soundtrack as well.

He wanted Megan to sing as well as play piano, and he listened to Anthony Willis's score for Promising Young Woman, and he really liked it, and he asked Willis to compose the score for M3GAN.

During a discussion with Johnston and the executives of Blumhouse, Willis suggested doing a musical arrangement similar to that of a Disney animated film, which included M3GAN randomly bursting into song. Which obviously not only adds to the cheesiness of the movie, but also kind of adds to the creepiness of an AI doll just suddenly bursting into song.

And just like modern AI, M3GAN also writes and performs her own song, Tell Me Your Dreams, which has lyrics by Gerard Johnston and piano by Anthony Willis. M3GAN also ironically sings Titanium by Sia because she is actually made of titanium.

And as I mentioned, the movie was not going to have M3GAN dance, but when the dance was added, it was seen as prime marketing material. Universal's chief marketing officer, Michael Moses, saw the dance and spotted a TikTok dance trend.

Gerard Johnston originally disagreed having the dance in the trailer, as did Alison Williams, but Universal insisted that the dance should be in the marketing the dance, copied by fans and influencers, spurred 1.3 billion views from #M3GAN, #M3GANMovie and #M3GANdance. Universal even assembled a troupe of M3GAN dancers who danced at the global premiere.

They also went on tour, making stops at the Empire State Building, subways, the Tonight show with Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel Live, and even the front of an American Girl doll store, as well as an American football game half time. All of this footage ended up on social media, fueling the public's desire to see the movie.

Even child's plays Chucky got into the mix and started a Twitter feud with M3GAN. With M3GAN Dance racking up billions of views, it goes without saying that the doll's copyable dance moves resonated with a teen audience.

Akela Cooper's original script was a bit more gory with a higher kill count, but a decision had to be made by the creators as to whether to stick to the gory original material or drop the body count a little so that the film could get a PG13 rating for the teen audience. And crucially, the decision was made to cut the movie and aim for a PG13 rating, which it got.

Cooper wished for an unrated version later down the line and she would get her wish with the unrated home media version.

In the US it hit number two on release due to the incumbent Avatar the Way of Water, which had been out four weeks and was still at number one. M3GAN stayed at number two for two weeks and dropped to fourth in its third week. Puss In Boots the Last Wish actually climbed to second that week.

That was an episode a couple of months back. M3GAN stayed in the US top 10 for six weeks, bolstered by the PG13 rating. On its $12 million budget.

M3GAN grossed $95.2 million domestically and $84.9 million internationally, for a total worldwide gross of $180.1 million.

Deadline Hollywood calculated the net profit of the film to be $78.8 million when factoring together expenses and revenues, which is not a bad profit at all.

It's a fun movie, but a bit different to the original, and unfortunately because of those differences, it struggled at the box office.

The doll is front and center, quipping like a gay icon, and the adult humans are either the bad guys or the very bad guys. Case in point, Cady and Gemma.

Cady becomes orphaned in a terrible car accident, literally witnesses the deaths of her parents, and there's no emotional response, not even to good memories of her mother.

Now you could just say this is trauma, a child being thrust into her aunt's care and then emotionally attaching to the one person who seemingly cares for her, which is Megan. But the movie does away with any thoughtful exploration of Cady's grief.

Similarly, Gemma, who has not only become the guardian of her young niece, but also loses her sister and brother in law, seemingly has zero emotional response to finding this out, except for the semi annoyance of having to take in her orphan niece. There's no sadness for the loss of her sister, no grieving, no funeral.

The movie just simply does not want to go there, it just wants to get to M3GAN. And that's actually kind of a positive for this movie and for M3GAN, but unfortunately it makes Gemma more of a robot than M3GAN.

Cady's grandparents in Florida are the obvious choice here, as they seem to actually want to take care of this child and but there would be no movie without Cady and her relationship with M3GAN is the crux of this movie.

As parents do struggle with work, home life and other responsibilities, it is only natural to want to have some time to yourself and screens do allow for that. But if technology is raising your children, you need to know what's on that technology.

And this is where you realize that YouTube and Roblox are not ideal babysitters. M3GAN is a product of the pandemic in more ways than one.

When schooling went online and parents struggled to live and work during those unprecedented times and would stop at nothing to occupy children stuck inside, the pandemic was trauma inducing for many. Researchers are still studying the impact the pandemic had on children's social development.

But for young children who couldn't go to school, couldn't hang out with friends, their experiences during those formative years were unlike any other generation. It could have led to missing out on learning social cues, developing social and conversational skills.

It all depends on the child and their situation.

A trauma filled, anxious child like Cady might then gravitate to the relative safety of a relationship with a doll like M3GAN, who is relatable, unlike the aloof aunt who doesn't have a setup to raise a child that Gemma, an intelligent, well educated young woman, doesn't know. The harm that outsourcing parenting could do is the silliest concept that the movie tries to sell us.

But even for adults glued to their phone screens, obsessed with getting ChatGPT to do things for them, if the Internet and phone networks went down, we'd all be screwed. Cady has an unhealthy attachment to M3GAN, just like we all have unhealthy attachments to our own devices.

Still, this movie and its marketing knows who you're here for. The sassy killer doll and the crazy kills.

And as with most PG13 horror movies, the unrated version I have on Blu ray is so much more fun than the theatrical version.

This is a movie that understands the assignment it sets out with just to be campy and fun, but also force yourself as parents to ask how much quality time you're spending with your child reading them stories, tucking them in? Or are you just asking Alexa to play a bedtime story? Oh, and we all know Alexa is listening to us at all times, right?

Parenting is tough enough without having that Alexa come to life and start murdering people. But then, AI toys are nothing new. This movie parodies Furbies, which, although rudimentary compared to M3GAN, did attempt to learn over time.

Furbies never attempted to kill anyone, though, except for that one scene in the Mitchells versus The Machines, which is also a previous episode of this podcast.

Gerard Johnston has said the reason he accepted the gig to direct M3GAN was as a father himself, bringing his kids up in the age of devices and trying to figure out the balance and why was no one really talking about how scary this all is? Because while M3GAN may not be as chaotic as Chucky or as creepy as Annabelle as the concept of AI raising your child, she is scary.

But what's scarier is what real life technology is doing to our real life kids. Thank you for listening. As always, I would love to hear your thoughts on M3GAN and thank you for your continued support of this podcast.

If you have enjoyed this episode on M3GAN, you may also enjoy a previous episode that I did, episode 274 which is on Child's Play, which again, killer doll movies. You gotta love them. There were many Child's Play movies in total, but the first is genuinely the best and it still holds up really well.

I would highly recommend that movie and also the episode on the history and legacy of that movie as well. As always, give me feedback on my episode recommendations. Let me know if you've listened to the episode and what you think April is over.

So a April is over and it's been fun talking about AI in movies, but it's also time to move on to something new. Double episodes have been a thing on this podcast before, talking about a movie and its sequel, or a movie and it's remake.

But what about a movie and its twin?

So join me next time for the History and Legacy of Dante's Peak versus The History and Legacy of Volcano thank you for listening to Verbal Diorama, a totally free and independent podcast that relies on listener support. If you want to show your support in multiple different ways, you could leave a rating or review wherever you found this podcast.

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