M3GAN was an entertaining horror comedy about a highly advanced computerized toy that turns out to be evil. (I hate when that happens.) A hit with critics and audiences, the little film turned into a big hit, grossing over $181 million worldwide in early 2022.
A sequel (M3GAN 2.0!) is already in development, but today Universal announced they are “expanding the M3GAN universe” with an “erotic thriller” called “SOULM8TE.” Oh boy.
Essentially, it imagines the same dark riff on A.I. technology, only instead of a kids’ doll coming to life and egging a little kid on to do bad stuff, this will now be a story about a man who gets into serious trouble with a “lovebot.” (Again, I hate when that happens.)
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Kate Dolan is directing the film; she wrote the latest draft of the movie, following work by Rafael Jordan, James Wan, and Ingrid Bisu.
An erotic thriller spinoff of this technology makes plenty of sense, sadly. And frankly it will probably feel way more original than M3GAN did. We get lots of horror movies these days about killer A.I. We don’t get too many erotic thrillers of any kind. So that could be quite interesting.
Here is the official description of the project:
In this erotic thriller, a man acquires an Artificially Intelligent android to cope with the loss of his recently deceased wife. In an attempt to create a truly sentient partner, he inadvertently turns a harmless lovebot into a deadly soulmate. The film is in the tradition of the 90s domestic thrillers but with a modern, technological twist.
SOULM8TE is scheduled to open in theaters on January 2, 2026. M3GAN 2.0 is on track to debut in theaters on June 27, 2025. So that’s two killer bot movies in six months.
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