EXCLUSIVE: After finding a breakout film role last year in New Line’s Evil Dead Rise, Australia’s Lily Sullivan has landed a lead in SOULM8TE, Atomic Monster and Blumhouse‘s new film out of the M3GAN universe.
Sullivan will portray the gorgeous, artificially intelligent android that a man acquires to help him cope with the loss of his recently deceased wife. In an attempt to create a truly sentient partner, the man inadvertently turns a harmless lovebot into a deadly soulmate.
While the film is part of the M3GAN universe, sources stress that it’s a great deal more risqué than the original horror thriller. Following a different story and characters, it falls in the tradition of ’90s domestic thrillers but with a modern, technological twist.
Kate Dolan (You Are Not My Mother) will direct after rewriting the original draft from Rafael Jordan (Salvage Marines), which was based on a story by James Wan, Ingrid Bisu and Jordan. Wan and Jason Blum will produce SOULM8TE, with Michael Clear and Judson Scott of Wan’s Atomic Monster exec producing alongside Ingrid Bisu. Alayna Glasthal is the executive overseeing the project for Atomic Monster.
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Announced back in June, SOULM8TE came to be following the huge surprise success of M3GAN, a horror thriller centered on a life-like robot doll that begins to take on a life of its own, which broke out in January 2023 with over $181 million at the global box office. A sequel, titled M3GAN 2.0, has also been announced, with Allison Williams and Violet McGraw returning for the film, slated for release on June 27, 2025.
Sullivan portrayed Beth, an aunt looking to protect her nephew and nieces from a demonic spirit, in Evil Dead Rise, the fifth installment in the Evil Dead film series from Sam Raimi, which Lee Cronin directed from his own script. Originally scheduled to debut on Max, following its SXSW world premiere, the film ultimately tested well enough that it was released in theaters, to great acclaim, grossing over $147 million worldwide.
Also previously seen in Matt Vesley’s sci-fi thriller Monolith and Greg McLean’s Jungle, opposite Daniel Radcliffe, Sullivan’s TV credits include National Geographic’s Barskins and Picnic at Hanging Rock, which is currently streaming on Prime Video and elsewhere. She is represented by CAA and RGM Artists in Australia.
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