Hey Siri – show me a cautionary tale of tech bro entitlement.
Companion begins with the kind of setup that feels both familiar and quietly ominous: a lakeside retreat, a close circle of friends, and something just… slightly off. What follows isn’t so much a slow-burn thriller as a slow-coil – a tension that tightens and twists in unexpected directions until it has you right where it wants you.
Sophie Thatcher is extraordinary, delivering a performance rich in physical detail. Her every subtle movement – whether it’s the smallest shift in posture or the flicker of hesitation – speaks volumes, conveying truths about her character long before the film delivers the first of its twists. Jack Quaid matches her with a quietly unpredictable turn as Josh, a man whose superficially charming facade hides an archetypal masculine malevolence that could be considered cliché were it not for its ubiquity across social media and increasingly in public life. Lukas Gage and Megan Suri add vibrant energy to the group dynamic, while Harvey Guillén offers moments of sly levity just when the tension is about to boil over. Rupert Friend’s Sergey, on the other hand, is less a character than a caricature plot device in human form. He’s a trigger, a catalyst for everything that unfolds, bringing an unsettling air of menace to his relatively brief appearances and making sure the story is always pushing forward.
This may be Drew Hancock’s feature debut, but there’s no tentativeness in his direction. The film is confident, precisely paced, and visually economical. Hancock knows exactly when to let the tension simmer and when to deliver a gut punch. There’s a sleek, deliberate restraint to the film’s storytelling that feels kindred to Black Mirror – but with a more grounded, character-driven focus.
Perhaps Companion‘s most pointed critique, though, is the way it addresses our own relationship with our prized technological possessions, offering an uncomfortable glimpse into how humanity might handle the evolution of artificial general intelligence from its stunted present day AI roots. The film paints a chillingly casual picture of how easily people (men) project their desires, fears, and expectations onto something under their control and how callously they (men) can discard their playthings when they no longer amuse or obey in predictable ways. It’s less concerned with technological marvels and more with how those marvels reveal our (men’s) flaws – how we (men) often seek validation and reflections of ourselves in the things we own rather than seeking out genuine connections with something or someone truly independent. There’s a yellow streak of misogynist paranoia and self-loathing threaded through Companion that’s part 24-carat gold satire and part trickle or urine as little boys and their toys recognise themselves on screen.
And that’s where Companion stays with you. Part M3GAN, part Ex-Machina, but entirely fresh, beneath the techno-thriller’s surface is an excoriating deconstruction of the prevailing techbro worldview, a searing commentary on mankind’s uneasy relationship with progress, trust, and control. It lingers long after the final scene, offering no easy answers but plenty to chew on – a dark, unsettling reminder that the scariest things are rarely the ones we don’t understand, but the ones we’ve understood – and stood aside for – for far too long.
