Commentary: ‘M3GAN 2.0’ Channels ‘Aliens’ With Its Change Of Genre
by Frank Martin
Most sequels typically follow the same genre as their predecessors. This makes obvious sense as fans of the first film will want to stay within the genre parameters for the sequel, but it’s not always the case. Many stories deviate from their original genre for any number of reasons. The most notable and prominent sequel to do this is James Cameron‘s Aliens. It took the original Alien, which was undoubtedly a horror film, and saw an opportunity to make an action movie with the iconic xenomorph. M3GAN 2.0 did something similar. The original film was a horror movie about a killer doll, but the sequel transformed the series to align with an action thriller type of story.
The sequel continues the story of the first film as Gemma (Allison Williams) and her niece, Caddy (Violet McGraw), try to carve out a life for themselves after M3GAN (Jenna Davis) went on a killing spree to protect Caddy. They thought she was gone, but M3GAN was only hiding in the digital world, spying on them all along. However, she’s forced out when a new killer robot commissioned by the military goes rogue. Sensing that Caddy is in danger, M3GAN compels Gemma to build her a new body so that she can protect Caddy and take down this new robot called AMELIA (Ivanna Sakhno) for good.
The first M3GAN followed all of the typical plot points of a horror film while focusing on murder and tension. Meanwhile, the sequel had plenty gory kills similar to the original, but it focused much more on action and creating a thrilling environment. The opening scene featured a robotic super soldier infiltrating on a mission. So right from the start, the film set a completely different tone than its predecessor. Similar to how Cameron saw the potential for action with xenomorphs, the M3GAN filmmakers saw the potential for action with a killer doll and explored that possibility with the sequel. It’s unclear whether any future installments will continue to focus on action or return to its roots with horror. Either way, fans should be satisfied with either direction.
M3GAN 2.0 is now streaming on Peacock.
