WEEKLY RECAP #110: "Ma" Sequel Confirmed & THR's Hollywood Takes

6/1/25 -- 6/7/25

Ma-keting Tactics

No, your eyes don’t deceive you: we are getting a sequel to Ma, the classic Blumhouse horror (?) film that bestowed us classic reaction clips of Octavia Spencer chanting “don’t make me drink alone,” nodding with satisfaction behind a brick wall and yelling “GET NAKED, BOY”. I suppose I can’t be too surprised, given that the original made $61 million, and Blumhouse is nothing if not a remarkably efficient money machine. The master puppeteer of marketing himself, Mr. Jason Blum, announced the news this week in a typically corny fashion:

“‘Ma’ has proven to be a social phenomenon since its release in 2019, with fans eagerly embracing the film and Octavia’s iconic performance… Ma likes to say ‘don’t make me drink alone,’ so we’re thrilled Octavia will join us again for a second round.”

I’ll be real with you guys: I straight-up *despised* Ma when it first dropped back in 2019, on account of its cringe-inducing teen slang, ugly color palette and overall fucked vibes. (I even went so far as to give it a half-star rating on Letterboxd, which I almost never do.) If I’m being totally honest, the six years of spiritual enlightenment I’ve gone through since its release would probably result in me upping my rating slightly by a second watch — for the memeability, if nothing else. It is undeniable that the sheer weirdness of having an Oscar-winning actress act like a tweaked-out freak in iPhone recordings blasted Ma into the coveted realm of ironic Internet humor, and a part of me will always respect it, even if the whole movie itself is very much #notmything. As for my thoughts on the sequel: normally, I would say “fuck it” and encourage Blumhouse to go extra stupid with this new one… but with the marketing campaign they’ve been assaulting us with for the upcoming M3GAN 2.0, I don’t trust them to do so tastefully.

Oh, you thought I *wasn’t* gonna rant about M3GAN 2.0? YOU THOUGHT I *WASN’T* GONNA RANT ABOUT M3GAN 2.0?! DID YOU FORGET WHOSE SUBSTACK YOU SUBSCRIBED TO?!?! I AM THE KING OF LOSING MY SHIT ABOUT MOVIE NEWS THAT NOBODY CARES ABOUT!!!!

The thing about Blumhouse is that they always get away with generating huge profit for movies that have potential but are super undercooked and shitty, and what pisses me off about this is that they always market the hell out of the interesting premise without ever putting in the hard work to actually deliver a good product. Of course, this is a generalization: given their prolific output, there were bound to be at least a few Blumhouse-produced movies, like Whiplash and Get Out, that are actually great movies. But when their movies *are* finally good, their titles are then plastered on text cards for every single trailer of theirs for the next fifty years, as if they have a consistently memorable output — and I’m sorry, but that’s fucking cheating! You can’t keep spamming “From the studio that brought you The Purge” in front of your latest movies that have titles like “The Curse of Skibidi Sunday” or whatever! The Purge came out twelve years ago, and it’s not even a good movie! Make something new and memorable, for the love of God!

When I saw the trailer for the first M3GAN movie, and I saw that clip of her doing her little hallway dance, and I saw that the film was written by the same screenwriter as Malignant — an actually great campy horror movie that you should watch if you haven’t already — I actually had a sliver of hope that Blumhouse was leaning into its strengths and delivering a dumb fun horror comedy with a sense of humor. And wouldn’t you know it… THEY HOODWINKED ME ONCE AGAIN! M3GAN was a boring-as-shit PG-13 horror snoozefest, and that dancing scene lasted fourteen goddamn seconds! And now the sequel is coming out, because ten million other suckers like me fell for it, and guess what their strategy is? Leaning even further into the meme aspect of the first movie by trying to turn M3GAN into a gay icon. I’m not fucking joking: they have M3GAN dancing to Chappel Roan’s “Femininominon” in the teaser trailer, and they end with a release date card that says “SLAYING JUNE 27.” In the main trailer, they showcase an epic moment where M3GAN says “Hold on to your vaginas” amidst an epic trailer rendition of Britney Spears’ “Oops!… I Did It Again”. Hilarious, right?

Listen, I’m not claiming to be an expert on queer culture or anything — I would be shocked if anyone has ever described my Substack page as “for the girls and the gays” — but I’m sorry… the buck stops here. To all of the gay people reading this, I want you to ask yourselves: are you really going to fall for this? Are you going to let this company pull the wool over your eyes and lure you into the theater with a hapless attempt at mimicking your slang? During Pride Month, of all times? I sure hope not. M3GAN 2.0 is not the answer. Ma 2 is not the answer. Malignant 2 could be the answer, but that’s not a Blumhouse property, so it’s irrelevant in this conversation. Just trust me, guys. Your money will be better spent elsewhere.

“You’re not a killer.”

The Hollywood Reporter released an article on Wednesday entitled “Inside Hollywood’s Succession Wars”, which pulls back the curtain and reveals the real-life [insert HBO prestige drama series]-eqsue power struggles happening at some of the biggest entertainment companies in the country. It’s an interesting read, as it explores how, from mega-studios like Disney to top agencies like CAA, there are currently power struggles being waged for head positions that will go on to shape the immediate future of the industry, which is already in a precarious position from, you know, everything I’ve been writing about for the past two years. And there’s a major underlying theme of all these struggles: a generation divide.

“As THR reported in an October cover story, “The Big Squeeze: Why Everyone in Hollywood Feels Stuck,” as top-level execs have seemed frozen in place, those in their 30s, 40s and even 50s have been lamenting the existence of a ‘gray ceiling’ that they say has cheated them out of their big moment. But in recent months, some cracks in that gray ceiling have started to appear… Last year, across the U.S. economy, a record 2,221 CEOs stepped down, the highest level of turnover since 2002. In Hollywood, too, a generational turnover is happening — if too slowly for some — and it’s prompting all sorts of questions: What will this new cadre of leaders look like? How will they emulate the leaders who came before? And what will the metrics of success be in a town that’s reinventing itself?”

As refreshing as it is hear one of the biggest entertainment publications acknowledge how fucking old all of our CEOs are getting, there is an aspect to this article that I want to hone in on with a more critical eye. After providing the perspective of a top agent who “contends that the generation that has run Hollywood for decades was hungrier and more aggressive than the one that followed,” Peter Kiefer (the author of the article) delves further into that theory:

“Or maybe the Hollywood culture has just changed too much to make that kind of Machiavellian behavior viable. In recent years, Hollywood has lost some of its mojo. Decades of consolidation, a pandemic, two strikes and a pivot to streaming have resulted in a much smaller industry with fewer top jobs and less money sloshing around. The culture has changed, too. Algorithmic tech companies dominate. Data prevails over instinct and experience. Many of the much-caricatured qualities that used to be hallmarks of Hollywood power are now recognized as toxic. The personalities that now run this town are much different than the swashbuckling moguls who came before.”

Essentially, THR posits that recent cultural shifts away from the cutthroat I-will-chuck-a-stapler-at-your-head-if-you-don’t-get-this-done-by-the-end-of-today energy of old Hollywood might end up harming things long-term. In other words, these newer generations are huge #MeToo pussies who don’t have the balls to get shit done efficiently. There’s even this comically bleak quote from an unnamed manager: “If you want to stay in power for decades, you have to run an oppressive system, even if it’s subtle.”

Now, obviously, I don’t think THR is claiming that you have to literally act like Harvey Weinstein to get the job done as the head of a conglomerate empire in the film industry. It’s not even specifically abuse they’re talking about, so much as shrewd business decision-making — an unflinchingness to make the smartest decision, no matter whose feelings you’re hurting. And sure, I may not be a Finance major, but I agree that no good business can be run by a wet blanket, least of all one operating in the perpetual Category 5 hurricane of the modern Major Motion Picture Industrial Complex. However, it feels like a bit of a boomer take to assume that the fresh blood currently taking over some companies — and by fresh blood, I mean people in their 40s and 50s — are likely doomed for failure because they’re not constantly screaming and flipping desks over. Kiefer points out that “steady, calm, almost gentle” personalities are “rarely associated with agents”, which is true. But who’s to say a leader with a calmer disposition won’t get serious when the situation demands it? Are we really operating under the assumption that, if your boss isn’t *constantly* scaring the ever-loving shit out of you in abusive ways, that they won’t be able to scare the shit out of people in productive ways?

I get it — no, really, I do. Being the head of an agency or studio is ludicrously time-consuming and daunting, regardless of if you’re doing a good job or not. You are making tough decisions round-the-clock, each of which concerns deals in the millions of dollars. Every choice you make is getting publicized by major outlets, and every major force determining the very dynamics of how your business works is changing by the week. It’s such an insanely ridiculous type of job to have that Seth Rogen just made an Apple TV+ series about how stressful it. But, on the other hand… I dunno, man. A better world is possible. Just because things have operated in a way that makes everybody lower down on the totem pole feel like shit doesn’t mean they have to stay exactly like that for ages. I don’t think it’s that delusional of a take to think that Hollywood CEOs can do their jobs without being 24/7 rage-spewing douchebags. With how unstable things are in the industry right now, it’s delusional to think we will achieve a workplace utopia anytime soon, but that doesn’t mean we can’t embrace efforts to constantly creep closer toward a more ideal world. Perfection may be unrealistic, but improvement is not.

But hey: that’s just a theory… a Corporate Theory! Thanks for reading!