Netflix teams with Joe and Anthony Russo again for a large-scale, blockbuster-style sci-fi adventure that seems tailor-made for Imax, except you will be watching it on your couch. Hopefully your TV is really big.

With elements of 2023’s The Creator, 1986’s Short Circuit and the wondrous WALL-E among others, Simon Stålenhag’s graphic novel serves as a starting point for screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeeley and this humongous big-screen adaptation set, like the book, in an alternate version of the 1990s where Bill Clinton as president engages in an all-out war against a robot uprising. Humans are being attacked, but it is the robots who had all the humanity as it turns out: They lost everything and now are relegated to the sidelines in a world that once was an idyllic place for them.

Now humans live in a virtual-reality world much of the time and that is how we meet Michelle (Millie Bobby Brown), a teenager who is not going along with the crowd, refusing the dictum to behave like all the other students in her high school, and still mourning the loss of her brother Christopher. But not so fast. When a verboten yellow cartoonish-looking bot named Cosmo (voiced by Alan Tudyk) comes into her life, she realizes her brother is not dead but is somehow controlling this bot.

She sets off with Cosmo to her father Ted’s (Jason Alexander in a one-note deadbeat-dad role) apartment, but when he discovers she is hiding a bot, he goes ballistic. This sets Michelle and Cosmo off on a journey to find Christopher, who is being used as an experiment at Sentros, a factory controlled by tech wizard Ethan Slate (Stanley Tucci). He seems evil but really believes he is using this dicey unethical technology to help people.

Before encountering Slate and his cronies, Michelle and Cosmo stumble on to what is known as the Exclusion Zone, where what is left of the defeated robots roam. Here she meets low-rent smuggler Keats (Chris Pratt) and his faithful wiseacre sidekick robot Herman (voiced by Anthony Mackie). Together this oddball quartet sets out to help Michelle’s ultimate quest in finding her brother. There they meet a bevy of colorful robots styled after mascots, cartoon characters and others, notably the proud leader of this land, Mr. Peanut (yes that one), voiced with dignity by Woody Harrelson. There is also Penny Pal (Jenny Slate), Perplexo (Hank Azaria), the baseball prophet Popfly (Brian Cox), Wolfe (Colman Domingo) and more.

These are the outcasts, but they are still in danger. In one major set piece, they find themselves nearly wiped out again by forces set loose to stop them, notably controlled by Col. Bradbury (Giancarlo Esposito), a warrior sent in to find Cosmo but who just might also have a conscience himself. Just when things get most dire, will they all live to fight another day? You bet.

Pratt, in a familiar kind of role he has virtually trademarked now, is appealing as a bit of an affable loser finding his calling and inseparable from Herman in the process. Brown, finding ever stranger things in this universe, is the center of the story and much of its heart. As the scientist employed to do Slate’s dirty deeds, Ke Huy Quan finds his own humanity. Tucci is such a good actor he manages to make Slate not a typical heavy, merely a misguided one.

The voice cast is superb right down the line, especially Harrelson’s Mr. Peanut. Shout-out to movement choreographer Terry Notary and VFX supervisor Matthew Butler and his team for this seamless blend of CGI VFX and animation that clearly shows the advancements in the field with genuine character work that soars here and gives the story its soul in a way VFX is often not used enough.

Producers are Anthony Russo, Joe Russo and Angela Russo-Otstot.

Title: The Electric State
Distributor: Netflix
Release date: March 14, 2025 (streaming)
Directors: Anthony Russo, Joe Russo
Screenplay: Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely
Cast: Chris Pratt, Millie Bobby Brown, Key Huy Quan, Jason Alexander, Woody Norman, Giancarlo Esposito, Stanley Tucci, Woody Harrelson, Anthony Mackie, Brian Cox, Jenny Slate, Hank Azaria, Colman Domingo, Alan Tudyk
Rating: PG-13
Running Time: 2 hr 8 mins