NEW YORK, NEW YORK – JUNE 24: Jen Van Epps attends the “M3GAN 2.0” New York City Premiere at AMC … More
After the killer AI robotic doll tried to permanently delete her character, Tess, in M3GAN, in 2022, Jen Van Epps has decided to give the self-aware being another chance in M3GAN 2.0.
Joking that her character should be called “Teflon Tess” ahead of our recent Zoom conversation for eluding a grisly fate in the first M3GAN movie, Van Epps, along with fellow cast members Allison Williams (Gemma), Katie McGraw (Cady) and Brian Jordan Alvarez (Cole) are all back for M3GAN 2.0, which opened in theaters on June 27.
Also back are Amie Donald and Jenna Davis, who embody and voice M3GAN, as is director Gerard Johnstone, who helmed the 2022 movie.
In M3GAN 2.0, Gemma, along with her fellow roboticists Tess and Cole are tasked with doing the unthinkable — rebuilding M3GAN — after they discover a government defense contractor stole the plans to their AI creation and upgraded it to the military-grade robot/weapon named AMELIA (Ivanna Sakhno).
As AMELIA becomes self-aware and goes on a murderous rampage, Gemma, Tess and Cole have no choice but to reconstruct a new and improved version of M3GAN to defeat the doll’s rapidly evolving counterpart before it becomes a threat to all of humanity.
Like the AI characters in the film, Van Epps said the story of M3GAN 2.0 was something that evolved over time.
Allison Williams and Jen Van Epps in “M3GAN 2 0.”
After all, the smashing success of the first M3GAN movie led to a quick green light for the sequel, but with a new chapter came a bit of uncertainty for Van Epps. Williams for sure would be back, as would Donald and Davis.
But in an effort to make the plot decidedly different from the first film, the possibility existed that the story would move away from such vital supporting characters as Tess and Cole. Luckily for Van Epps and Alvarez, their presence in the story of M3GAN was too big to be denied and her character grew with each draft of the M3GAN 2.0 script.
“By the last draft, I was like, ‘Yes! Yes! She’s here!’ Tess had growth and that’s the best you can ask for,” Van Epps enthused. “[Gemma, Tess, Cole and Cady] are trauma-bonded together and rightfully so.
“With any person in real life, if you face death — and I can only assume because I’ve never been there — you have two trajectories: You can either fall off a cliff or you look at your life and say, ‘What can I do now?’ — and Tess had that attitude,” Van Epps added. “I’m so grateful that Tess was given more hutzpah.”
Besides, building M3GAN was and again a three-pronged effort and Johnstone, along with his co-writers Akela Cooper and James Wan, wanted Cole and Tess to make that point to Gemma after she became the public face of their company’s efforts.
Allison Williams in “M3GAN 2 0.”
“It’s a team effort that includes Tess and Cole. I mean, he’s a bit of the bumbling ding-dong brother that we love, but they are both geniuses and their own right and she’s a roboticist, too,” Van Epps said.
On top of that, you have to hand it to Tess for utilizing her sartorial sensibilities to give M3GAN her stylish clothes.
“Tess is in charge of the style of M3GAN,” Van Epps said with a smile. “Gemma in the first movie is wearing flannels and sweatshirts, but Tess is like fun and kooky, a little bit out there and has a sense of style, so I’m taking ownership of that!”
Jen Van Epps Says ‘M3GAN’ Inadvertently Became A Sign Of The Times In 2022
While the point of M3GAN and M3GAN 2.0 is first and foremost to entertain, there’s no denying watching AI grow rapidly as it has since the first film in 2022 can be quite disconcerting to not only movie audiences but for the people who make them, Jen Van Epps included.
“It’s wild. In the first M3GAN we hit on a moment when AI was starting to creep into our everyday lives,” Van Epps observed. “I’m sure the tech companies already had it running around in our day-to-day lives but we just weren’t aware of it yet. Now, it’s ever-present. I love my dad, but the guy is planning trips on ChatGPT, you know? Everything that is possible is being done through AI.”
On the contrary, Van Epps said she’s never used ChatGPT and has no interest in learning about it anytime soon.
“We don’t even have an Alexa in our house,” Van Epps said. “My husband is insanely private. No social media, even. But AI? It’s scary.”
Luckily for the actor, she can see the perils of AI through the prism of a movie script that is turned into a frightening — although oftentimes funny action-filled —vcautionary tale that is playing on the big screen called M3GAN 2.0.
In fact, the level of humor is one of the things that Van Epps enjoyed the most about M3GAN 2.0, as well as Gerard Johnstone grounding the story in situations that while they might not exist now, could certainly become reality in the near future.
Brian Jordan Alvarez and Jen Van Epps in “M3GAN 2 0.”
“Gerard wanted to walk a razor-thin line from being really funny — slightly camp, as he calls it, ‘Scooby-Doo Land’ — but he was also very clear that he needed grounded performances so the film couldn’t turn into sort of cartoon,” I mean, yes, it’s about a robot doll, but again, but again he found a way to make that work and it was about grounding our performances in reality.”
Of course, there were serious situations on film where Van Epps couldn’t help but laugh, including the outrageously funny scene where Gemma and Tess streamed M3GAN’s AI consciousness into something that could best be described as a turquoise-hued plastic encased member of the iconic TV characters the Teletubbies. It’s a precautionary measure Gemma and Tess take as they need to trust M3GAN before reforming the robot into its former self.
The idea certainly doesn’t sit well with M3GAN, who certainly isn’t impressed after getting its first look after being trapped in a computer for three years. In fact, the first words the robot utters after getting its new look is, “What the f— is this?” (In the trailer, the dialogue’ is changed from the F-word to “hell”).
“Every iteration of Megan is hilarious, but to hear the voice out of this Teletubby-adjacent doll toy is insane,” Van Epps said, laughing. “The funny thing it’s actually a real toy called Moxie that comes from a company in California, and they would program voices in it and lines for us.”
However, Van Epps added, there was a slight problem with getting the GPT-powered toy to say the F-word that M3GAN uses in the film. That happened, of course, through an audio dub, but the rest of the dialogue coming out of the character was real, Van Epps said.
A Moxie doll was used in “M3GAN 2.0.”
“It was so funny, we could give it lines to say, but the company said, ‘We cannot program cursing into our child’s toy,’” Van Epps recalled, laughing. “Still, it was fun that they let us sneak the word into the movie [with the audio dub]. I think Moxie actually says ‘funk.’”
Rated PG-13 — a rating that generally allows two of those funky words, so long as they don’t have dirty connotations — M3GAN 2.0 is playing in theaters nationwide.
