The Electric State review (2025)

The Electric State is perhaps fittingly a sci-fi, action-adventure that never quite manages to find its spark.

There’s plenty of potential here with the always reliable plot of man vs machine. The cast is solid with quality performers and action sequences where the filmmakers have some good ideas. Not to mention The Electric State boasts the directors and writers of two of the biggest movies of all time with The Russo Brothers and Christopher Markus & Stephen McFeely of The Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame fam.

So why doesn’t The Electric State click? A variety of reasons. A lengthy two-hour run-time for one when a tighter film with 20- to 30-minutes shaved off would have been more effective. While the premise is intriguing, the execution of it is just not that exciting. While the cast is game and dutifully performs their roles. it just feels like they’re playing paler imitations of far better roles here.

A helpful news report breaks down the current state of life in America in the mid-1990s. Humans got lazy and created robots to do menial tasks for them, which worked fine until the robots decided they had rights too. Soon a war breaks out between the factions with the robots holding a decisive edge.

The Electric State is based on the 2018 illustrated novel by Simon Stålenhag. Setting Electric State in the mid-90s is a smart move as it’s right before the dramatic advances in technology before people had minicomputers in their pockets and access to vast information via Google or YouTube.

Ethan Skate (Stanley Tucci), a brilliant tech innovator comes up with a means to level the playing field by creating drones that humans can pilot to pit machine vs. machine albeit under control of humans. With the odds evened out, humankind wins the war, and the surviving robots are gathered up and sent to an exiled zone. Skate has become very influential with his tech that allows people to slip into their own personal VR worlds. There are certainly many similarities to Ready Player One with this being the most obvious.

In the fallout of the war, Michelle (Millie Bobbie Brown, Damsel) is in her latest foster home with a grumpy guardian (Jason Alexander) who’s only interested in the monthly paycheck. Michelle is still trying to cope with the loss of her family especially her brother Christopher (Woody Norman), who was her best friend. They weren’t casualties of the war, just victim of a fluke car accident.

Electric State gets weird when a small robot that looks like Christopher’s favorite cartoon robot, Cosmo (Alan Tudyk), appears at the house. The robot doesn’t have an extensive vocabulary, but it communicates enough to give Michelle the crazy notion that somehow Christopher is communicating to her through the robot. Recalling a conversation from years back, Michelle starts to wonder if Christopher is still somehow out there, and she sets out to find him.

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With the robot offering some random clues, the unlikely duo set out to track down the doctor (Ke Huy Quan, Loki) who last saw Christopher alive. Their journey leads them to Keats (Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3’s Chris Pratt rocking a ridiculous looking mullet perm wig and handlebar mustache) a former soldier, turned smuggler. Keats is in a unique position as he is a robot war veteran whose closest ally is a robot, Herman (Anthony Mackie, Captain America: Brave New World), he first encountered during the war.

Keats and Herman play out like old friends constantly ragging on each other. The dynamic is fun and good for some laughs though it is a little too reminiscent of another of Pratt’s more famous roles. Only this time instead of Pratt trading one-liners with a talking racoon in Guardians of the Galaxy.

Brown and Pratt don’t mesh as well, which feels more a function of Markus and McFeely not writing Michelle particularly likable. Her backstory does lend itself to her not being the cheeriest or hopeful optimist, but she’s too snarky and argumentative when Keats already has those traits covered. As the secondary lead, Keats is doing the Han Solo shtick, but Michelle is more Han-lite than Luke Skywalker or Princess Leia. Two heroes with essentially the same personality doesn’t make for a good squad dynamic.

Skate needs Cosmo and hires infamous drone mercenary Col. Bradbury (Giancarlo Esposito, Abigail) to bring it back. The others are expendable. Michelle, Keats, Harold and Cosmo make it to the robot sanctuary. After an initial rough meeting, the robots and their leader, Mr. Peanut (Woody Harrelson), the robots agree to help them. The robot designs are well done and one of the best aspects of The Electric State. Some of the standout robots include a mail robot Penny Pal (Jenny Slate), baseball robot Popfly (Brian Cox) and magician robot Perplexo (Hank Azaria).

The robot showcase is probably one of the best as it’s all about the fun and wonder of meeting the various robots and them showcasing their special skills. At times, it feels like The Russos aren’t settled on the film’s tone.

This kind of scene is playful and happy, which seem fitting for a more family-focused adventure, but the language and less joyful scenes make it decidedly darker. The big dramatic explosion-filled final act results in several robots getting cued up for the scrap heap, which might be jarring to younger children whose favorite gets zapped.

Trying to walk the line of making a family-friendly movie that doesn’t insult adults is too taxing a balancing act and the script nor the direction manages to please both target groups. The Electric State probably would have fared better trying to please one group instead of catering to adults and children-heavy families. It’s hardly the worst movie of the year, but it runs out of juice so quickly it’s easy to forget it as soon as the credits roll.

Rating: 5 out of 10

Photo Credit: Netflix

Check out the hardcover edition of The Electric State illustrated novel now on Amazon.

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