Companion sees Josh (Jack Quaid) misusing his robot companion, Iris (Sophie Thatcher), as part of a sinister plan, but there’s a key moment before her reboot in the third act of the movie that points to her gaining self-control. Following the trend of stories about AI-powered robots and androids in the genres of sci-fi and horror comes Companion. Written and directed by Drew Hancock, Companion introduces the audience to a young woman named Iris and her boyfriend Josh, who go on a weekend getaway with some of Josh’s friends and their respective partners.

However, Iris is a companion robot, designed and programmed to keep Josh company and make sure he’s happy and safe. With a couple of illegal modifications, Josh makes Iris do what he wants, and he uses her for a very sinister plan he and his friend Kat (Megan Suri) came up with. To their surprise, Iris gains control of herself at one point, but Josh regains it and tortures her in one of the most suspenseful parts of Companion – however, this same scene has a hint that Iris was gaining self-control during her most vulnerable moment.

Iris Says “No” Right Before She Shoots The Gun At The Dinner Table

Josh Forces Iris To Shoot Herself In The Head

Iris changes her own programming by stealing Josh’s tablet with the modified code. However, he makes a modified and reset Patrick (Lukas Gage) catch Iris, turn her off, and bring her back to the lakehouse. Once there, Josh handcuffs her to a chair and turns her back on, but she still has her own programming, with her intelligence and awareness at its maximum. After telling Josh about her desire to live and letting him know she’s aware of his whole plan, Josh panics and victimizes himself in front of Iris, who tells him everything she knows about him.

This only enrages Josh even more, who sets her intelligence to 0% so he can have full control of her. Josh decides to test if she can truly feel pain and makes her place her hand above a candle, to the point where her hand and part of her forearm are burnt. Josh then makes Iris take a gun, point it at her head, and pull the trigger. Despite her intelligence being at 0%, Iris hesitates to do it until Josh repeats his command.

Iris says “no” right before pulling the trigger, and Josh waits for the representatives of the company that built her to arrive and pick her up. Iris can still talk with her intelligence at its lowest, but as seen with the candle, she won’t move because she doesn’t have the intelligence and awareness to do so – yet she hesitated a lot and even said “no” before essentially killing herself because Josh told her to.

Did Iris Break Her Programming & Gain Self-Control By Saying No?

Iris Is At Her Most Vulnerable During THAT Scene With Josh

It’s unknown what the consequences of going from 100% intelligence to 0% could be in the world of Companion, but Iris saying “no” hints at these robots being able to retain some self-control under such circumstances. Iris hesitating to shoot herself and saying “no” right before she does show that she’s fighting her own programming, though she still does what Josh tells her to. Iris doesn’t have her full self-control at that point due to Josh modifying her programming again, but she either has some remnants of it or is close to getting it when she says “no.”

Luckily for Iris, she’s rebooted and given full control of herself by Teddy, a worker at the company that built her, allowing her to get her well-deserved revenge against Josh. In the end, Iris gets what she desires and deserves after such a nightmarish day, and Josh also gets what he deserves, as his actions hurt not only Iris but his friends, as well.