Upgrade (2018) Review: When Technology Takes Control
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| Upgrade (2018) movie poster. Source: Universal Pictures. Used for review and commentary purposes. |
What if technology could make your body stronger and faster than ever before—but you were no longer completely sure who was in control?
Leigh Whannell's Upgrade (2018) takes that idea and turns it into a fast, violent, and surprisingly thoughtful science-fiction action thriller. At first, the movie may look like a straightforward story about a man searching for answers after his life is suddenly destroyed. But underneath the fights and futuristic technology is a more interesting question about the relationship between humans and artificial intelligence.
Logan Marshall-Green plays Grey Trace, a man who is uncomfortable with a world becoming increasingly dependent on technology. He prefers working with his hands, repairing older cars, and living a life that still feels physical and familiar.
That makes what happens to him especially interesting.
When Grey is given access to an advanced piece of technology called STEM, the movie begins exploring what can happen when human instinct and artificial intelligence occupy the same body.
What impressed me most about Upgrade was that it does not simply talk about advanced technology. It finds a creative way to show what that technology might feel like in action.
🛡️ Spoiler-Light Review: This review discusses the basic setup, characters, action style, technology, violence, and themes of Upgrade, but avoids the major twists, important character outcomes, and ending.
1. A Simple Setup With an Interesting Sci-Fi Idea
Upgrade takes place in a near future where technology has become a normal part of everyday life. Self-driving vehicles, smart homes, advanced computers, and other automated systems are everywhere.
Grey Trace does not completely fit into this world.
He enjoys restoring classic cars and seems much more comfortable with machines he can physically understand than with artificial intelligence making decisions for him.
After a violent incident changes his life, Grey finds himself facing a future he never expected. Eventually, he is offered an experimental technology called STEM that may give him abilities he thought he had lost.
I think that is the best place to stop explaining the story.
The less you know about what happens after STEM enters Grey's life, the more enjoyable the movie becomes. The basic idea is enough: a man who does not trust modern technology suddenly has to depend on an extremely advanced form of it.
That contradiction gives the movie a strong foundation.
2. STEM Makes the Action Feel Different
The action was probably the biggest surprise for me.
There are plenty of movies where technology makes a character stronger, faster, or more dangerous. Upgrade does something more interesting because Grey's body sometimes seems capable of things that Grey himself could never do.
This creates a very unusual style of fighting. Instead of moving like a traditional action hero, Grey can suddenly become extremely precise. His movements look calculated, efficient, and almost mechanical.
The camera helps sell the effect. During several fights, it seems to move together with Grey's body, making his movements feel even more controlled and unnatural.
I especially liked the contrast between what Grey's body can do and how he reacts to it. There are moments when the technology appears completely confident while Grey himself seems surprised by what is happening. That gives some of the action a strange sense of humor without turning the fights into comedy.
One of the more interesting action moments comes when Grey encounters an opponent who is not as easily overwhelmed by his unusual abilities. Up to that point, STEM can make Grey seem almost impossible for an ordinary person to handle. Seeing him face someone who can challenge that advantage changes the rhythm of the action and creates a different kind of tension.
I liked this because the movie does not simply keep repeating the same idea of Grey becoming more powerful than everyone around him. For a moment, the question is no longer just what STEM can do, but what happens when that advantage is no longer enough to make a fight feel easy.
More importantly, the action supports the movie's science-fiction idea. STEM is not simply an excuse to give the hero impressive abilities. The way Grey fights constantly reminds us that technology is changing what his body is capable of doing.
3. Logan Marshall-Green Makes the Idea Work
Logan Marshall-Green's performance is an important reason this unusual idea works.
Grey has to feel like a real person rather than simply a body being used for action scenes. He is angry, confused, vulnerable, and uncomfortable with much of the technology surrounding him.
Marshall-Green also has the difficult job of making Grey's new physical abilities believable without making the character suddenly feel like a conventional superhero.
That balance could easily have looked silly, but his performance keeps Grey human even when the action becomes increasingly unusual.
For me, that is more interesting than simply watching another nearly unstoppable action hero. Grey's limitations remain part of what makes the action exciting.
4. The Most Interesting Question Is About Control
The idea that stayed with me most was surprisingly simple:
If artificial intelligence can make better decisions than you, how much control would you be willing to give it?
At first, the answer may seem obvious.
If technology could help someone walk, protect themselves, or perform tasks that would otherwise be impossible, accepting that help would be easy to understand.
But Upgrade gradually makes the question more complicated. Convenience and control are not necessarily the same thing.
The more decisions technology can make for us, the more important it becomes to ask where assistance ends and dependence begins.
I found this especially interesting because the movie was released in 2018, before the current explosion of public interest in artificial intelligence. Today, its basic idea feels even more relevant.
We already allow technology to recommend what we watch, tell us where to drive, answer questions, organize information, and automate parts of everyday life. Upgrade takes that familiar relationship and pushes it into a much more extreme science-fiction situation.
The movie does not need to give a simple answer. The question itself is enough to make the action more meaningful.
5. A Small Future That Feels Believable
Another thing I liked about Upgrade is its approach to the future.
This is not a giant science-fiction world filled with spaceships and enormous futuristic cities. Much of the world still looks recognizable.
Cars, homes, streets, hospitals, and ordinary environments feel familiar, but advanced technology has quietly become part of them.
That makes the future easier to believe.
The movie seems less interested in saying, “Look how futuristic everything is,” and more interested in showing how technology might slowly become normal enough that people stop thinking about it.
That approach also works well with the movie's focused story. Upgrade does not need an enormous world to explore its ideas. It keeps the technology close to Grey and lets us experience the future through his situation.
6. The Violence Is Strong, but It Has a Purpose
Viewers should know that Upgrade can become quite violent.
Some fights end suddenly and brutally, and there are moments of graphic injury. The violence can be more intense than the movie's science-fiction premise might initially suggest.
However, I did not feel that every violent moment was included simply to shock the audience.
The sudden brutality helps show the difference between ordinary human fighting and what becomes possible when advanced technology enters the situation. The action can change from messy and physical to frighteningly efficient in a matter of seconds.
There is also a darkly humorous quality to a few moments, which prevents the movie from becoming relentlessly grim.
Still, viewers who dislike graphic violence should know that the movie does not always hold back.
7. Where Upgrade May Not Work for Everyone
The movie has a strong concept, but it is not perfect.
Some supporting characters are less developed than Grey, and the story occasionally moves quickly through ideas that could have been explored in greater depth.
The movie is also fairly direct once its action-thriller side takes over. Viewers expecting a slow, deeply philosophical examination of artificial intelligence may find that Upgrade spends more time on physical conflict than discussion.
For me, that balance mostly worked.
The film gives us enough to think about without allowing the ideas to stop the story. At the same time, the action becomes more interesting because there is a larger question behind it.
Its relatively short runtime also helps. The movie moves quickly and rarely feels as if it is stretching its concept beyond what the story needs.
8. Why I Give Upgrade 4.5 Out of 5 Stars
I give Upgrade 4.5 out of 5 because it takes a fairly simple revenge-thriller structure and gives it a distinctive science-fiction identity.
The action is creative, Logan Marshall-Green's physical performance makes Grey's transformation convincing, and the camera work gives the fight scenes a style that feels different from a standard action movie.
I also liked that the artificial-intelligence theme is connected directly to the action rather than existing only in the background. Questions about control, dependence, and human choice remain connected to what Grey is experiencing throughout the story.
I stopped short of a perfect score because some supporting characters and ideas could have been developed further, and viewers looking for deeper science fiction may find the story more action-focused than expected.
Still, Upgrade accomplishes a lot without becoming unnecessarily long or complicated.
Final Verdict
Upgrade is the kind of science-fiction action movie that surprised me by having more on its mind than I expected.
The fights are fast, brutal, and visually creative, but the movie's most interesting element is the relationship between a human being and technology that may be more capable than the person using it.
Logan Marshall-Green helps keep that idea grounded because Grey never feels like a traditional superhuman action hero. His new abilities may make him more dangerous, but they also introduce questions that are more complicated than simply becoming stronger.
That is what makes Upgrade memorable for me.
It gives us the excitement of watching technology do seemingly impossible things while quietly asking whether having more power is always the same as having more control.
If you enjoy science-fiction movies that combine unusual technology, intense action, dark humor, and questions about artificial intelligence, Upgrade is easy to recommend.
🎬 Movie Info
Title: Upgrade
Year: 2018
Director: Leigh Whannell
Writer: Leigh Whannell
Starring: Logan Marshall-Green, Betty Gabriel, Harrison Gilbertson
Genre: Science Fiction, Action, Thriller
Runtime: 1h 40m
Rating: R
My Rating: ★★★★½ (4.5/5)