By M3GAN 2.0 has malfunctioned at the box office – but Jason Blum, who produced the film and leads the production company Blumhouse Productions, has been open about the reasons behind it.
“We all believed M3GAN was like Superman,” he expressed during an interview on The Town with Matthew Belloni podcast. “We could do anything to her. We could shift genres, we could position her in summer, we could alter her appearance, we could flip her from the antagonist to the protagonist. And we sort of traditionally overanalyzed how influential people’s connection was with her.”
The sequel, which debuted on June 27, only grossed $17 million at the worldwide box office during its opening weekend. While this isn’t terrible given the film’s budget of $25 million, it represents a significant decline from the original film, which earned $45 million globally in its opening weekend back in 2023.
“We chose to shift genres, but the audience wasn’t prepared for a genre shift,” Blum added, alluding to the fact that M3GAN 2.0 leaned more towards sci-fi action than horror. “Each time you create a sequel, you have to navigate a delicate balance; if you make it too similar to the first film, everyone claims, ‘You copied that.”