The care robot as a technical service provider for the care of old people is not far from being suitable for everyday use.

But what about the other age group, where caregivers and care are no less important?

Robots for children are as delicate a matter as they are for the infirm.

The potential is huge, but the ethical issues are huge too.

There will still be a lot of commissions on the subject while the industry is already developing powerfully.

And popular culture is rushing to do the first technology assessments.

The American boutique studio Blumhouse has the relevant genre ready for this.

It specializes in horror, dystopian, and generally disturbing.

In Gerard Johnston's film M3GAN, the alarm emanates from a doll that can do a little more than just say a sentence when you pull a string on the back.

"M3GAN" is a third generation Android (Model 3 Generation Android), outwardly there is a certain similarity to another doll that appeared in a series in the late 80s: Chucky made it on television and with seven films at least until 2017, when “The Cult of Chucky” was the end of the lethal companionship for the time being, which over the years also migrated more and more into the comedy genre.

M3GAN actually has all these external features that also condition trust in animated cinema, but the effect on her tends to be sinister, without anyone noticing it at first.

It has to do with the bias developers tend to have when they're on to something really big.

In this case, the programmer's name is Gemma, and she works for an overtly totalitarian toy company run by a rampage-ready CEO (Ronny Chieng in a cute, over-the-top tech-guru parody).

So far, the company has mainly made its profits with small furry monsters that cross the term cuddly toy with the concept of the booby trap.

In any case, this shatters the stimulus tolerance of every person with even a small toe in a pre-digital present in which children could grow up with plasticine and matadors.

Life size doll with artificial intelligence

Gemma is now taking it to the next level, a life-size doll with artificial intelligence that would be much more than just a doll: it would be the realization of those imaginary friends that some children make when they lack affection.

Or when they have to cope with an unexpected loss, as is the case with Cady, whose parents die in a car crash at the beginning of M3GAN.

The orphan girl ends up with her aunt, Gemma, who is also the "mother" of M3GAN.