Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1545089
6 SUMMER 2026 AI: Apocalypse Incoming AI: Apocalypse Incoming When we think of the term "artificial intelligence" (AI), most people would think that it's something up-and-coming, something that while yes, does exist, is not yet an existential threat. The potential of AI first leaped into the forefront of people's imaginations with the launch of ChatGPT in 2022, an AI chatbot using generative pre-trained transformers (GPTs) to generate A C T I V I S M By Kathleen Qiu (2024) to blend child actor Alyla Browne's and her adult counterpart Anya Taylor-Joy's faces to make them look more similar, with Furiosa's face looking more like Taylor-Joy's as the film progresses. In the same film, Metaphysic used the same machine-learning process as Revize to create the character The Bullet Farmer, which mixed the performance of Lee Perry with the likeness of Richard Carter, who appeared in Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) but passed before Furiosa was filmed. AI has also reached mainstream Oscar controversy with Respeecher's use in both The Brutalist (2024) and Emilia Pérez (2024). Respeecher was used in The Brutalist to augment the Hungarian pronunciation in certain dialogue, whereas it was used in Emilia Pérez to augment star Karla Sofía Gascón's singing, adjusting her performance on notes outside of her natural register rather than using a traditional vocal double. And keep an eye out for upcoming Watch the Skies (2026), an originally Swedish- language film using Flawless AI to create a "vub," a visual dub in which the technology will ensure that the character's mouth movements and sound are perfectly synced. In this case, the original Swedish actors also provided the English dialogue, creating a new English movie that feels far more natural than a traditionally dubbed movie. While these examples may seem a little innocuous, if not somewhat unnatural, we only need to look at Vogue magazine to text, speech, and images in response to user prompts. It accelerated the AI boom, and since, no one has been able to stop talking about AI, especially in regard to how it may affect all of our future employment. In reality, even before ChatGPT, AI had been slowly permeating our lives and has already made appearances in a variety of films. In both The Irishman (2019) and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023), a program called FaceSwap was used to de- age their stars. FaceSwap uses machine learning to comb through countless reference images of the actors in their earlier films, focusing on similar angles and lighting conditions to spit out frames similar to the ones needed for the films. Rising Sun Studios, an Australian VX studio, uses its Revize machine- learning software to swap out stunt performers' faces with actors' faces, as seen in Shang- Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021), The Fall Guy (2024), A Complete Unknown (2024), among others. It was also used in Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga Top: De-aging Robert DeNiro in The Irishman. Bottom: On The Fall Guy, stunt performers' faces were swapped out with the actors' faces. PHOTOS: (TOP) NETFLIX; (BOTTOM) UNIVERSAL PICTURES