Like sweeteners, love can be artificial…and deadly.

That’s (sort of) the premise of SOULM8TE, a new film being fast-tracked to a theater near you by Blumhouse and James Wan’s Atomic Monster production houses.

The movie, already scheduled to open on January 2nd, 2026, will be set in the same universe as Blumhouse/Universal’s 2023 hit M3GAN, about an AI bot created to be a friend to a grieiving and lonely little girl, with the predictably dire robot-run-amok results.

SOULM8TE keeps the grief, but this time the story is an “erotic thriller” about a recently-widowed man who acquires an artificially intelligent android to alleviate his loneliness, but it’s not long before this once harmless lovebot (or more likely, sexbot) gets a programming override and becomes more of a Fatal Attraction-style threat.

Kate Dolan, (You Are Not My Mother) will direct, and she also rewrote the script originally penned by Rafael Jordan. The story was developed by Wan, Ingrid Bisu (Malignant) and Jordan.

“Fundamentally, I view this film as an exploration of relationships and loneliness,” Dolan said in a statement. “Despite technological advances, there are enduring human truths we cannot escape, and I am looking forward to delving into those depths.”

Wan, who along with Jason Blum is producing, added, “SOULM8TE is a thrilling and seductive addition to the M3GAN universe.”

M3GAN grossed more than $181 million at the box office after its release, and its sequel, M3GAN 2.0 is slated for a June 27th, 2005 release. Allison Williams and Violet McGraw, whose characters survived the first film, will return for another chance to die at the hands of an evil robot.