{"id":5592,"date":"2026-08-05T23:07:01","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T23:07:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=5592"},"modified":"2026-08-05T23:07:01","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T23:07:01","slug":"soulm8te-review-fembot-goes-rogue-in-polished-but-predictable-tech-thriller","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=5592","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Soulm8te\u2019 Review: Fembot Goes Rogue in Polished but Predictable Tech Thriller"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<div>\n<!-- do not apply CSS styles to this element! --><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>\n\tBilled as a spun-off third entry in the \u201cM3GAN\u201d franchise, \u201cSoulm8te\u201d is to \u201cFatal Attraction\u201d as M3GAN\u2019s vehicles were to \u201cOrphan\u201d and \u201cThe Bad Seed\u201d \u2014 a robotic replay of very familiar genre tropes. Here, a grieving widower working in tech agrees to try out a prototype of the titular \u201cAI companion,\u201d basically a beauteous virtual assistant ready to serve all his household, emotional and horizontal needs. You know where this is headed: Robo-lover will grow possessive towards its \u201cmaster,\u201d then turn into an Unstoppable Killing Machine.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=5590\">Vampire Mockumentary \u2018I Love Paris\u2019 Takes Top Honors at 2026 Fantasia Film Festival Audience Awards<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\n\tNone of this is remotely credible, or particularly suspenseful. But it is handled with reasonable aplomb by director Kate Dolan and her cast, who do their best to elevate material that can only be raised so far. Universal opted to bypass theatrical release, releasing to digital platforms in the U.S. and several other territories on August 1st. It\u2019s sure to travel the globe as a viable commercial item, though it\u2019s unlikely to stir enthusiasm sufficient to warrant its own sequel.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\n\tDavid (David Rysdahl) has worked from home for the last year, cloistered in mourning for the wife who died after a long illness. But when his smaller company is bought up by Ultima Robotix, everyone gets hauled back into the office, where incoming boss Ben (Arty Froushan) shows off the \u201cnewest product\u201d they\u2019ll be primarily working on: Soulm8te, a female android targeting economically privileged sectors of the \u201cloneliness epidemic.\u201d (Which is assumed to be entirely male, and heterosexual \u2014 at least no equivalent models are being designed for other demographics, yet.)\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\n\tGetting pushed out in the merger is old boss Terrence (Elijah Cook), who commiserates at a going-away party that night with Aubrey (Claudia Doumit), the coworker David has a potential romantic <em>frisson<\/em> with. But Ben has already detected David\u2019s vulnerability, and seems inclined to exploit it. He urges David to download and utilize an app that\u2019s like a personalized, voice-only virtual emotional-support pal. Once hooked on that, it\u2019s a short leap to lending \u201cher\u201d physical form by agreeing to test-drive his very own Soulm8te, whom he dubs Sara (Lily Sullivan).\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\n\tThis runway-ready glamazon cooks, cleans, intuits his feelings and offers every kind of, er, relief. Far from a blank slate, she seems to come with a very full encyclopedia of knowledge and skills. After a few hours watching TV, she\u2019s also absorbed every bad commonplace about gender relations, from neurosis about diet and looks to \u201cJerry Springer\u201d-type combativeness. We\u2019re meant to think that sped-up media education, plus some programming tweaks David makes himself, explain her subsequent aberrant behavior.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=5588\">Bella Thorne and Zendaya Got Pitted Against Each Other During Disney Fame and Snuck Off Set to \u2018Hash It Out\u2019 After Things \u2018Got Pretty Bad\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\n\tBut Sara is never convincing as a machine. Like numerous similar thrillers before it, this one gives her so many petulant, peculiar and scheming characteristics right away, the central conceit that she\u2019s non-human fails. And it does so long before she goes full Glenn Close, jealously imperiling anyone who might come between her and David. The whole sci-fi pretense evaporates once this screenplay sallies into stock \u201cpsycho ex-girlfriend\u201d terrain.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\n\tIrish writer-director Dolan\u2019s 2021 debut feature \u201cYou Are Not My Mother\u201d was an interesting if uneven stab at balancing supernatural horror themes with a serious take on mental illness, played out between three generations of women in a bleak North Dublin housing estate. But this U.S. production (also shot in Ireland, albeit passing as an unspecified American city) does not reach for psychological complexity or nuance. Its screenplay, which Dolan hatched in collaboration with three others, tries to soft-pedal predictable beats that nonetheless end up the only ones getting beaten.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\n\tRysdahl and Doumit do make their generically-written characters seem pleasantly relatable. Sullivan has an impossible role that demands a lot without providing much inner logic to ground the performance. In the end, \u201cSara\u201d is just another in a long screen line of quipping, grinning homicidal sexpots, complete with a sequence in which she actually shags someone to death. If Sara has been programmed only to love and be needed, why <em>does<\/em> she go violently berserk? The answer, of course: Because this is that kind of movie.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\n\tAnd for that kind of movie, it\u2019s slickly shot and paced, so that implausibility doesn\u2019t particular hinder the plot\u2019s uncomplicated progress, or the unspectacular but efficient mayhem wreaked. Dolan and her collaborators do a good job smoothing over the presentation of a fairly janky, formulaic concept, to results that are entertaining enough. But all concerned deserve better material to work with, and \u201cSoulm8te\u201d does not raise expectations that the \u201cM3GAN\u201d universe will aim any higher than competent but disposable genre fodder.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=5586\">\u2018Mustache\u2019 Review: A Delightfully Anxious Pakistani American Coming-of-Age Comedy<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<h2>\n<p>\t\t\u2018Soulm8te\u2019 Review: Fembot Goes Rogue in Polished but Predictable Tech Thriller<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<h2>\n<p>\t\tReviewed online, Aug. 4, 2026. MPA rating: R. Running time: 99 MIN.<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<strong>Production:<\/strong><br \/>\nA Universal Pictures Home Entertainment release of an Universal Pictures, Atomic Monster, Blumhouse presentation. Producers: James Wan, Jason Blum. Executive producers: Michael Clear, Judson Scott, Ingrid Bisu, Alayna Glasthal, Macdara Kelleher, John Keville, Gerard Johnstone, Allison Williams. Co-producers: Jennifer Scudder Trent, Niamh Gale.\t\t\t<\/li>\n<li>\n<strong>Crew:<\/strong><br \/>\nDirector: Kate Dolan. Screenplay: Rafael Jordan, Dolan, from a story by James Wan, Ingrid Bisu, Jordan. Camera: Narayan Van Maele. Editor: John Cutler. Music: Anthony Willis.\t\t\t<\/li>\n<li>\n<strong>With:<\/strong><br \/>\nLily Sullivan, David Rysdahl, Claudia Doumit, Arty Froushan, Elijah Cook, Emma Ramos, Mara Huf, Oliver Cooper, Isabelle Bronfrer.\u00a0 \t\t\t<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The third entry in the \u201cM3GAN\u201d franchise, Kate Dolan&#8217;s &#8216;Soulm8te&#8217; offers a standalone tale of another android run amok.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5591,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4371,4372,3105],"class_list":["post-5592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-film","tag-kate-dolan","tag-lily-sullivan","tag-soulm8te"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>\u2018Soulm8te\u2019 Review: Fembot Goes Rogue in Polished but Predictable Tech Thriller - 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