Amazon MGM Studios has released the first trailer and poster for Mercy, a new sci-fi thriller starring Chris Pratt (Guardians of the Galaxy) and Rebecca Ferguson (Dune: Part 2) that is set to hit theaters on January 23, 2026.
Pratt plays a detective named Chris Raven who is accused of murdering his wife, and only has 90 minutes to present his defence and prove his innocence... to an A.I. judge played by Ferguson.
If he fails to do so, he will be executed immediately, but as the trial progresses it becomes apparent that Judge Maddox - technology that Raven had a hand in creating - may not be as impartial as she first seems.
“This was a departure for me,” Pratt said during the movie's NYCC panel. “He is a homicide detective in the near future, and a guy who has seen a lot, been through a lot. He’s part of this special new Mercy program that they’ve designed, essentially using AI to modify their core system to be more efficient, and to face the rise in capital crime in this version of Los Angeles. They just want to get these murderers off the street and send a message.”
“There is something new for Chris in this movie. It’s his next iteration. He plays a dark and very vulnerable character in a very dramatic story,” added director Timur Bekmambetov. “[Chris is] famous for his action movies, but playing a dramatic role, and he’s literally electric chair for 90 minutes. Kali is playing his partner, helping him, we think. And Rebecca is an AI judge. She’s smart, and we will discover her heart.”
Bekmambetov also noted that robodogs were used to help film at least one sequence.
“We used robodogs, for maybe the first time in the history of filmmaking,” the director said. “Cameramen were robodogs because I used the footage of the robodogs going through the extras in a crowd through the scene and filming it. How I directed the robodogs was that I just told them what I wanted. I said, ‘Go over there and film these guys,’ and it happened.”
Check out the trailer and poster below, and let us know what you think.
In the near future, a detective (Chris Pratt) stands on trial accused of murdering his wife. He has 90 minutes to prove his innocence to the advanced A.I. Judge (Rebecca Ferguson) he once championed, before it determines his fate.